Defeat to the hands of a heinous beast.

Monday, January 25th

So today was the faithful day that I delved into the adventure of being both blind and deaf for two days. I was actually excited to do this. I felt like I had a good grasp on both blindness and deafness and felt that I could take two days of both.

We spoke with Dr. Pittman about our paper before I went blind/deaf and then jumped right in. As I put in the earplugs Ben started putting on the eye patches. Once again, I stared at a picture of my girlfriend before I went blind as to have a wonderful image for when I went blind.

As soon as I put them on…

My mind raced. I could beat a cheetah in that moment. It wasn’t like before when the hallucinations that came from my lack of vision. They didn’t come to me a few hours later or the day after, they came almost immediately. And then on top of that later I started hearing sounds.

No I don’t mean like I heard music or I heard voices. I almost welcome that experience as opposed to what I had. No, instead I had started to experience a random cacophony of noises.

I think that was the most discomforting thing. It was the random hallucinations that I was experiencing with the addition of these crazy noises.

In all honesty, I can’t really remember what happened on Monday. It’s a really fast blur. I know that I had no perception of time. I would have thought that I was sitting on the couch for maybe around 30 minutes when it turned out to be closer to 3 hours. I vaguely remember eating lunch. I think that I had pizza.

I couldn’t tell where I was. It wasn’t like when I was just blind where I could orientate myself to the sound of the cars, the fountain, or the sound of sidewalk as opposed to street. No; this was much worse and more terrifying. It became a constant struggle to keep myself going. Somewhere in this time, I think right after lunch, my mind began racing again. This time it was combined with the strange noises and sensations that I was feeling.

I don’t know how quite to explain all the things that I was imagining. So this is the best that I’ve been able to put it.

Imagine you sitting in a dark room with one well lit table. On the table is 10 images that are moving, changing, pulsing, and won’t stop. These images range from beauty, horror, gentle, to grotesque. Wildest imagination does not do the image justice.

No imagine that all the sounds that you’ve heard in your life start screaming into your ear. Every car, person, instrument, noise… I mean everything.

There is no structure to it, there is no pattern, and there is no stopping it.

Now imagine that there are ten tables in the room with you. You begin jumping back and forth from image to image on each table without being able to take a good look at anything. You begin to jump from table to table, your body moving without you wanting it to. This booming headache that stems from all the noise that you’ve been hearing this entire time as the sounds only get louder.

Now imagine that there are ten rooms with all the same kind of tables but different images. There is no stopping yourself from moving to all of them to take a look at it all.

This is how I felt all day. I even tried going to sleep. I’m not even sure if I did sleep. I couldn’t tell the difference between me being awake and being asleep. I woke up crying because I didn’t know or could tell what was going on. My mind was everywhere at once.

I can’t really tell you what happened for the rest of the day. I know that I moved some and I got something to eat so I assume we went to Zach’s for dinner. I nearly broke down there because there were so many people around me. Some people would touch me and I wouldn’t know what to do.

I couldn’t even tell you now what I should have done. Half of the time I thought that I was being told by Ben that we were leaving only to find out that someone had patted me on the shoulder.

We went back to the room and I sat outside while David and Zach smoked. I had something to focus on for a bit but then soon lost all concept as to where I was and began going into that miasma of terror that I had experienced before. I told David that I couldn’t even imagine it as a downward spiral because at least with that you have a focal point. This is so much worse.

I broke down again. I began to cry. I didn’t know what to do. All that I knew was that I couldn’t take this again. It wasn’t getting any better and I was having issues with it happening to me over and over again. I couldn’t really handle it.

This time, it didn’t go away. It kept with me for what seemed like hours on end. Turned out to be two. Around 10:30 I had to talk to Ben. I told him that I couldn’t handle being like this because it was too stressful and I couldn’t control what was going on. I didn’t want to become scarred from an interim experiment. It’s not worth that.

He said that he understood and that he did not blame me for wanting to stop the experiment. I did feel at first like a failure for not being able to handle the situation. I took off the eye bandages and began to try and decipher my experience to David, Zach, and Ben. It was then that I noticed that practically no one would have been able to endure what I had been going through for the past 12 hours.

So no, I don’t feel like I’ve failed. I kept this on longer than I wanted to. I kept the bandages and headphones on for an extended period of time, found myself to not be able to control my behavior or time perception. This scared, frightened, and horrified me. I don’t want anyone to go what I had to go through for that.

It was in no way a pleasant experience. Even the images and sounds that I could identify and be comfortable with were scary to watch because I knew that they were images that my mind had created or fostered. Its very strange to see just what you will do when you’re without sight or hearing.

Ben tried to compare it to free writing and how instead my brain was on a free thinking cycle. Nothing hindered my thinking and so my brain went into overdrive. When I had something to focus on, such as the texture of a fabric, food, or a strange smell, I was able to somewhat control my thinking for a very short period of time. It wasn’t long before I habituated to the sensation and began “free thinking” again.

So what do I see from this? I see that loss of a sense is terrifying. It’s doable but it is so scary. I could see it being easier on people who have not had that sense since the day that they were born only on the fact that it is the only thing that they know. The physical difficulties are still there. They are still present, do not get that wrong. These amazing individuals go through the same things that we do everyday.

So, with that said, loss of both sight and sound is absolutely the scariest thing that I have ever experienced. It is the most frightening thing you can experience. Mainly because your brain tries to relive all that you’ve experienced.

I don’t know how people can do sensory deprivation chambers. My deprivation was for a fairly long time but that is so much more extreme. Who knows? Maybe one day I will decide that I need to face this monster again and take it head on. All I know is that now is not that time.

I move on to begin writing scientific and personal reports on the experiment. I’m very glad that we were coerced into keeping this blog. It has let me organize my thoughts and look back objectively on my experience. I will continue blogging over the next few days so that you all can keep up with the more scientific part of the experiment but I have to say that I’m relieved that I’m done.

I’m glad to be in good health with all of my senses. I know now that even if I were to lose one of my senses that I would still function. Nothing could stop me from that. Thank you for reading.

A small experience.
A big effect.