My Life Living with Mental Health Challenges

Took a day off yesterday. Had to figure out which direction to go. The worldly part of me a few months ago wanted to go SCORCHED EARTH and just tell it ALL!! Throw people under the bus! No mercy! But then I thought more about that attitude and looked inward. I decided, let’s talk about ME first. My mistakes, my faults, and my struggles, my history. So….let’s start there.

My child hood…..normal. Grew up in the big Metropolis of Kernersville, NC…..or KVEGAS as we use to call it. At that time, it was a small town nestled between Winston-Salem and Greensboro. It has grown A LOT since I left there in 1995. I had friends, especially the fellas in the neighborhood, Big Dave, Chris, Kevin, and a few more. Loved sports and music…still do. I played football and baseball in high school and played college football for 1 year. I was never the most popular guy in the school but I was fine. Had a girlfriend or two in high school, one of which I was with for quite the while. Never the best student, especially as I got older. It was always hard for me to concentrate on subjects that bored me….and in high school I was more worried about playing sports and trying to find a girlfriend. Obviously there is more to the backstory and I imagine I will share more as we continue on this journey, but for now you get the gist.

Looking back, I was not as “normal” as I thought. I hated losing..in anything. Some people say I was just “ultra competitive”, but it was more than that. It hurt my soul to fail. It ate me alive. I beat myself up mentally when I fell short. And then, I started questioning myself. Am I good enough? Why am I coming up short? Why does it hurt so bad to lose? And when I say “lose”, I am not just talking about sports, I’m talking about life. Why can’t I get the girl? Am I ugly? Why can’t I sit still? Why does my brain go all the time…etc….etc. And then, the depression. Why do my feelings get hurt so often ? Why do I take everything so personal? Am I just not good enough? Am I meant to even be here?

In hindsight, my emotions and my feeling were a ROLLER COASTER day to day. No rhyme or reason sometimes. My good days were GREAT and my bad days were BAD. One of the BAD days I remember vividly was when my longtime high school girlfriend dumped me. I remember my parents weren’t home so I went into my dad and mom’s large walk in closet, closed the door, and cried..and cried. This was the first time I remember thinking “Do I want to even do this thing called life anymore if it hurts like this?”. The term “even keel” did not apply to me very much. It was either ALL IN or ALL OUT. I was agitated quite a bit and wasn’t really sure why. It’s like I was upset because I was agitated and I had no idea why I was…agitated. There was a constant battle going on in my brain. There were days I was just the happiest guy on Earth, and days where I was the most miserable. This had to be HARD to be around at times for my family and friends.

So the signs were there early in my life. The signs of depression, bipolar, and anxiety. But I didn’t see them then. In my mind I was just an ultra competitive, emotional guy that just took things too hard. As youn people, we were taught to just “suck it up” and “deal with it”. Emotions and feelings were not that important. We weren’t supposed to talk about that stuff. Just be a man and handle it. But what if you can’t just “suck it up and handle it”. What if you can’t “just think different”? What if you can’t just “level everything out” not matter how bad you want too? Why if you are fighting a mental battle with yourself everyday? Well, what happens, eventually, is your crash. You burn. You break. And that happened to me. Like I said, the first big crash was that day in high school when I got dumped. That was the first time I thought, “Can I deal with life”?

Well, that is it for today. Next episode I will cover college, marriage, and…why? I was and, and am I like I am? What was the real reason? What was the diagnosis?

Probably won’t write tomorrow…I have a date. Not that kind of date….a date with friends. Two of them actually. Two of my people. Two of the people that have my back, that never gave up on me, and that give me courage and inspiration to do hard things. A wise woman and friend once told me, “We can do hard things”.