Finding My Way Out

 

Yes, the title of this post is a line from a song…because, well, of course it is.  The song in question is “Unsteady” by X Ambassadors. Below is a post that has been sitting in my Drafts for…well, for a long time. Talking about this stuff ain’t easy. Not for me, and not for anyone.  But, sometimes you just have to…and in honor of Thanksgiving and the coming family-oriented holidays, it is time again…

There’s really nowhere else to start: I suffer from depression.  I’ve mentioned that before, but if there is any disease that gets pushed aside and forgotten, it is depression.  It especially is pushed aside and forgotten by family and friends.

“What’s wrong with you today?”

“What mood are you in today?”

“Why can’t you just fix yourself?”

For those who’ve never felt the stifling, suffocating, paralyzingly grip of depression…thoughts like that do nothing but make it worse.  A lot worse.  That feeling of being alone?  Of having nowhere to go, and no one to turn to?

Yeah, “checking on my mood” ain’t helping.

Why am I writing about this? I hear you ask.  Why, more importantly, am I writing about this again?

Because it needs to be talked about.

I’ve fought this demon since I was teenager.  I’ve fought this demon in the only way I’ve ever really had: alone.  I’ve lost more battles than I’ve won…but I’m still alive, and a number of my friends are not, so I guess the war itself is going okay…

“C’mon…just change yourself.”

“Turn to Christ” or “think happy thoughts” or “look on the bright side”…

It doesn’t work that way.

The reason I am writing this post is because…well…hearing other folks talk about their own struggles helped.  It helped tell me that I wasn’t alone {and remember the central theme to Wrath & Tears: alone is worse}.  It helped to tell me that, as broken as I am, there are others out there just as broken.

It told me, in the end, that I wasn’t a freak who had to suffer in silent solitude.

How can I not try to pass along that support?  How can I not, to throw out an over-used and tired phrase, pay it forward?

Carrie Fisher became very open about her battles.  Ashley Judd has become equally so.  Even so huge a figure as Winston Churchill had his struggles with depression.  NFLer Joel Klatt…NHLer Marek Svatos…actor Owen Wilson…Heath Ledger…Buzz Aldrin…Art Buchwald…Terry Bradshaw…Johnny Carson…Ray Charles…Dwayne Johnson…it ain’t a short list, folks, and these are just a semi-randomly selected handful.

I’m not alone, and that helps.  That is important to know…and it does help.

How can I not share my own experience in the face of that?  How can I not try to help — to support, and hopefully to save — just one fucking person, if that is all I can reach?

As many things as have gone right in my life, this is a demon that still hovers over my shoulder. He always has, and he always will.  Even as things got better in my life, he never left.  When things were bad, he was there…but when things were good, he was equally there.

Honestly, even today his voice still has power…and I still pay attention.

Depression, for those of you who just don’t know or understand, is very very real. Even those you think should never suffer problems of any sort — those with money and loved ones and lives to be envied — can suffer from depression. Trust me on this one: I’ve lost friends who had every single fucking thing in the universe to live for.

Hell…I have everything to live for, and still I hear that little voice: why bother? Who the fuck are you? Nothing will ever get better…

Believe me, I hear that voice. Far, far too often.

There ain’t much to hold on to in the universe for people like us…but what there is, is important.

And what folks like us have to hold to is simple: people.

Look, we know we’re annoying…we know we’re hard to deal with…but, holy shit, we have, in general, pushed away almost everything and everyone we know, and we need something. Trust me on this — it is far, far too easy to lose yourself in the isolating currents of your own thoughts and emotions. It is far too easy to drown.

When I’m at my worst, when I’m a drowning man at sea, I’ll clutch at anything. Unfortunately, far too often, that something is exactly the wrong thing. Whether it’s booze, or drugs, or isolation, or despondency…they all seek to fill the space that only friends and loved ones can truly fill.

Just one friend — just one loved one — can make all the difference.  Does make all the difference.

To those who fight similar demons, I’ll say this: I have my own tiny little list of those who have helped save me — some figuratively, but some very, very literally — and you need to find a way to create your own little list.  One name…one name, one person, is all it takes.  That being said, there also are ways to work yourself out: after so many years, I have learned to write my way out…or to hike my way out…or, in a very few instances, to love my way out.  So, please: find…something.  Some meaning, some tool.

And always remember the first rule: alone is worse.

To those who can’t even begin to conceive of the numbing pain, nor the suffocating isolation: I know we can be annoying, and challenging, and hard to understand…but we need you. Trust me on this one: we’ll push you away, we’ll isolate ourselves and say we don’t care, say that we don’t need anyone…and we’ll be lying.

We need some form of stability — some semblance of life — to hold to, or that little demon in the back of our minds will win…

…and when that bastard wins, you end up with a rope around your neck and a bottle in your hand.

Trust me on this one, I know.

Further reading here and here.