Week 6 Storytelling: Observations of Mr. Yamato

                                                         Observations of Mr. Yamato

Patient # 4002

Date: August 25, 1917

Observations: To protect the confidentiality of the patient I will refer to patient number 4002 as Mr. Yamato. Yamato has suffered fits of extreme delusion during his time here at the Tokigama Psychiatric Facility due to severe schizophrenia. I fear that Mr. Yamato has lost all sense of what is reality and fiction in his mind. I will describe any events that Mr. Yamato experiences in this journal.

(Psych Ward on Pinterest)

Date: August 30, 1917

Observation: While Mr. Yamato was roaming the halls, he saw another patient violently grab one of our nurses, Yoko Himata. Mr. Yamato insists in telling the story as Ms. Yoko being a princess known as Tacibana that was kidnapped by a group of bandits and taken hostage. He declared his love for the princess and gave details of how he slew the bandit that took her hostage. However, the true actions of Mr. Yamato were that he called the guards and they handled the situation peacefully. It is interesting to see how his delusions are progressing steadily each day.

Date: September 2, 1917

(Nurse found on Pinterest)

Observation: Mr. Yamato's condition is progressively declining and his ability to differentiate between reality and fantasy is fading. Today, the nurse Yoko that Mr. Yamato insists is truly the Princess he calls Tacibana took his vitals as usual. Mr. Yamato was not interested in talking with the nurse today, but he heard the yells of another patient down the hall that calls for help out of a desire to seek attention. Mr. Yamato was transfixed by this patient’s voice and insisted that she was in fact a siren calling his name. On September 2, Mr. Yamato left his room and travelled throughout the psychiatric ward in search of the patient calling for help. When he had at last found his “siren”, she asked him to bring her the medications that would help her. Mr. Yamato accepted this mission and believed that he was indeed searching for a “golden apple of immortality.” I can honestly say that Mr. Yamato has lost all sense of where he is and does indeed believe that he is on a heroic quest.

(Siren found on Pinterest)

Date: September 15, 1917

Observation: Mr. Yamato searched that day for medications, but every hospital employee that he asked refused to help him and directed him back to his hospital room. One of the other residents, named Goku, told him a story of a man that had made his way to the island of paradise full of golden apples, which in reality was the pharmacy.

Date: September 22, 1917

Observation: Mr. Yamato’s seemingly harmless delusions have now begun to become physical. Today, Mr. Yamato attacked a male attending nurse with a pair of scissors, cutting his stethoscope and he came to check vitals. Mr. Yamato shouted at the nurse calling him a demon boar and after cutting the stethoscope Mr. Yamato screamed in victory that he had slain the boar by cutting his tail. I fear that the medications we have given to Mr. Yamato have only worsened his condition.

Date: September 24, 1917

Observation: Mr. Yamato awoke in his hospital bed with a burning sensation throughout his entire body. He began to go into cardiac arrest and our medical team swarmed into the room to help him. Mr. Yamato screamed about a fire taking place in a field surrounding him and screamed as any employee touched him that he was being trampled by hundreds of deer. However, the nurse Yoko or in Yamato’s eyes Tacibana came into the room and gave him an injection of morphine. Mr. Yamato thanked "Tacibana" for bringing him the weapon needed to counter the fire and for saving his life.

(Morphine found on Pinterest)

Date: December 1, 1917

Observation: Days have passed without an incident, but today while Yoko was tending to Mr. Yamato he heard the cries of his “siren.” Mr. Yamato asked Yoko to leave him alone for a little while, but as she turned to leave he had swiped her keys and ID card. When he was alone, he travelled to the pharmacy and found a pharmacy technician who was just entering the pharmacy. He tied up the pharmacy technician and took with him a large amount of morphine and oxycodone. Upon questioning the technician remembered Mr. Yamato asking, " where is my sacred sword!" A visitor witnessed Mr. Yamato approach the door of his “siren” and show her his “sacred sword.” The "siren" tricked him into opening her door and she then stole his “sacred sword” to fuel her drug addiction and locked him in her hospital room. We found Mr. Yamato in the room and let him out of the room and discovered what happened. We locked down the hospital in search of the patient, but Mr. Yamato found her hiding in a storage closet. Mr. Yamato took the medications from the patient and reported her location to the guards, and upon his arrival the guard heard Mr. Yamato shouting, "I have recovered my sword and destroyed the demon deer." Mr. Yamato has given this patient two separate and unique identities of both the "siren" and "the demon deer." 

Date: December 12, 1917

Observation: Mr. Yamato was placed under surveillance since the incident that took place on December 1.  However, on this day he managed to escape his room in search of the "siren" that had deceived him. He was armed with a pair of scissors and witnesses recall hearing him muttering that he would slay the “siren.” Before anything happened Yoko stopped Mr. Yamato and he openly praised her for saving him from the "siren’s" grip. He awoke in his hospital bed and looked for Yoko, but she was nowhere to be found. The patient in the room next to Mr. Yamato recalled hearing Mr. Yamato screaming that a dragon had attacked his kingdom and he went to search for the dragon. I saw Mr. Yamato in the hall and asked him what he was doing, but based upon his physical agitation, rapid breathing, and perspiration that covered his body I knew there was going to be trouble. Mr. Yamato lunged at me screaming that I was the dragon controlling all of these evil deeds and stabbed me with the scissors in the arm. The guards tackled Mr. Yamato, but he was screaming in victory that he had slain the dragon. When we brought him to his room, we discovered the appalling truth that he had slit the throat of Yoko at the beginning of his psychotic break just before attacking me. However, Mr. Yamato will forever believe that his princess Tacibana sacrificed herself to save him from the grasps of the dragon. We then sent Mr. Yamato to a psychiatric facility in a high security prison where he will live the rest of his days as Yamato, unaware of the pain he caused in the real world.

(Solitary confinement found on Pinterest)

(Scissors found on Pinterest)

Author's Note: This tale is based from the Labors of Yamato, but I chose to place a wonderful twist on the story.  I chose to follow each individual tale in the same order, but chose to make the tales a hallucination of the doctor's patient. I believe that this is an interesting way to portray the story and can bring about a different interpretation of mythological tales.  This tale originally contained the hero Yamato who saved a princess and married her soon after. However, he began to be bored and craved adventure. He travelled by sea to another land and that is when he met the siren. She called to him and sent him on a quest to find the golden apple of immortality. A man told him where he could find this apple by a stranger and then set on his way to get it. Throughout his quest he defeated a demon boar and was trapped in a fiery field, but his princess saved him by bringing him his sacred sword which he used to create a counter-fire. He then traveled to the siren and told her that he could not find the apple, but she tricked him and stole his sacred sword for her father, the god of the sea. Yamato found his sword, took it back, and killed the siren's father who was in the form of a dragon. However, after defeating the dragon at land he was at sea and he angered the god of the sea. He was going to destroy their boat, but the princess sacrificed herself to save Yamato.


Bibliography: The Labors of Yamato from Romance of Old Japan, Part I: Mythology and Legend by E.W. Champney and F. Champney (1917).