Three years ago today, I was involuntarily admitted to a psychiatric hospital. In the grand scheme of anniversaries and key days in my life, this is certainly not one of my favorites to remember. But it was a defining moment in my life, and I don’t know that another January will go by without the series of strong memories tied to this event replaying themselves in my head.

What does depression look like to you? Do you get a mental picture of someone sitting in a dark room with their head in their hands, unable to get out of bed? A perpetual Debbie Downer who doesn’t seem to get much enjoyment out of anything and sucks the life out of the room when they’re in a social setting? A Charlie Brown-type who always opts out of social events and seems ill-at-ease when they do decide to show up at a party? While those stereotypes have some basis in truth (as all stereotypes do), the reality is that many (I’d say most) people who struggle with one or more of the maladies defined as mental disorders do so silently and unbeknownst to their circle or to the world at large.

Those of you that haven’t known me long may be surprised to know that I struggle with depression, anxiety and a variety of other mental disorders and have since I was a kid. Some of you that have known me long, but only know me on a casual basis (or aren’t aware of my social media presence–particularly on Twitter, which I’ve used as a venting post as well as an advocacy platform for mental health issues) might be surprised, too. After all, I’m a fairly outgoing person, usually friendly, and upbeat-seeming. However, I’ve become pretty good about covering my feelings up, whether for the sake of closing a sale professionally, getting the job done, or just not wanting to be the turd in the punch bowl at a social event. I also tend to withdraw when in a dark place, so many of you who’ve known me a while and have never seen me in a dark place may not be aware of the fact that I generally make myself unavailable during those moments. 

…of course, there are also some of you who know me well enough to be acutely aware of the emotional struggles I deal with, and some of you who are aware of this particular sequence of events because you were there when it happened or may have even gone through this experience alongside me…

But in the same way the average person might not be aware that I’m diabetic, or that I sucked the middle and fourth fingers on my right hand until I was almost 18, I don’t come across (in person) anyway as someone that is…whatever I am. With that in mind, I can pretty much guarantee that at least one person close to you (and most likely more than one) is dealing with some kind of depressive disorder, whether they have an official diagnosis or not.

Why did I end up in a mental hospital to begin with? That’s a long story and it would probably fill up two books. I’ll try to keep this relatively brief.

Knowing what I know now about depression, I can say a few things definitively: one is that it doesn’tt have a particular shape. Some folks deal with situational-based depression that might fly in during a particularly traumatic event (death of a family member, divorce, childbirth) and then go away…perhaps forever. Others, like me, have constant periods of darkness, or depressive episodes. I’ve dealt with some form of it since before puberty. I can’t point to a specific incident in my life as a catalyst, but I’ll allow that my illness (which several psychiatrists have diagnosed as “dysthymia”-constant low-grade depression that can spiral out of control due to a catastrophic event or a series of them) has been a part of me for as long as I can remember. I wrote my first suicide note at 9, and went through my teenage years and most of my twenties dealing with long periods of darkness, knowing that I felt different but not really knowing what name to put on it. Even once I was able to get a handle on the fact that I dealt with some kind of mood issue, I didn’t know what to do about it. Going to a therapist and talking to a stranger about my issues? That was something rich people did. Or white people did. Besides, how the hell was I going to be able to find one in the days before search engines (also worth mentioning: in those days, I had a 2 hour commute and worked 60-70 hours per week.) Friends and co-workers called me “moody” or “grouchy” and would make jokes about me being on my period. I didn’t start seeing a therapist regularly until I was 31 (after I had one of several mini-breakdowns) and it wasn’t until 2008, at the age of 32, that I was officially diagnosed with dysthymic disorder, which is sort of a constant low-grade depression that gets aggravated and can turn into severe depression during traumatic periods. Later on (after my hospitalization), I would also be diagnosed with severe anxiety and moderate AD/HD. Over the next half decade, I found myself on something like 8 different pills, none of which seemed particularly helpful. The best of the meds turned me into something of a zombie, which muted my depression but, also muted my imagination and creativity-a dangerous and frustrating thing to deal with as a writer and an appreciator of the arts. The side effects were difficult to deal with as well. Staying awake and focused was a constant struggle. Most of the meds made me completely unable to function sexually, not a good look for someone who often found themselves lonely. I won’t reject the use of anti-depressants for everyone-we all have different body chemistries and they’ve worked wonders for other people I know-but I will say that the ones I used during this period were not especially helpful to me.

As the calendar moved into 2013, I was facing my late thirties. I had a good job, but I felt inadequate and, more importantly, unfulfilled; not learning anything. I was working from home in Boston, my office was in New York and I felt detached. I was writing my ass off, but managing a staff of people who weren’t getting paid was time-consuming and frustrating. I was also in the process of working through 30 years of bullshit; difficult/strained/non-existent relationships with my parents, siblings and other family members, a consequence of being the first American-born member of my family, being the first openly gay member of my family, and just having a weird fucking family history. I was (and still am, last time I checked) black and queer in a culture that’s not particularly kind to either minority, and feeling like a perennial outsider on a social level. I wanted badly to find “my people”, but felt as though I fit in with no one. I thought of myself as damaged goods, looking at a future of diminishing professional and personal appeal as I aged. I was also involved in vague fashion with someone I had strong feelings for-enough to comfortably talk about my sexuality to members of my family for the first time ever. That involvement (with someone who had their own mental health issues and in fact had been hospitalized-unbeknownst to me at the time-right around the time we started hanging out) very quickly took a turn for the bizarre shortly after the New Year, and I think it might have been the proverbial last straw during this particular cycle of events.

At any rate, I’d spent most of the year’s second weekend in bed. This was a low for me, as even at my worst, I was able to function relatively normally. I can’t remember, but I’d probably been drinking some as well. In desperation, I began to text people I felt close to. Some folks texted back, some didn’t. Someone called a suicide hotline. The hotline called me back. I told them I was fine. My friend Mose came over. We talked for a little while. By this point, I’d moved from my bed to my couch. I hadn’t turned a single light on in my apartment. He sat with me for a while in the darkness and eventually I asked him to go home. He did. I continued texting people. To this day, I don’t know who called the cops, but someone (or someones) did. There may have been 4 police officers in my apartment. They asked me if I was OK. I said I was. They asked me if I had any weapons in the house. I decided to be a smart ass and say “well, that depends on what you consider a weapon.” They looked around the apartment. I worried that they might find my pot and lock me up. They didn’t. They asked me if I wanted to go to the hospital. I said no. Three of them went outside. They came back. They told me they were taking me to the hospital and I had no choice in the matter.

I was immediately deposited in a private room in the ER at Mount Auburn Hospital. Tired and somewhat delirious, I stared at the walls in the emergency room for what seemed like hours. The room wasn’t locked, and I guess I could have made a break for it, but I didn’t. A few doctors came in, asked me a few questions. I answered them absentmindedly. I slept in 30-45 minute intervals. Day broke–it was Monday–MLK Day. Thankfully, I didn’t have to work. I asked the doctors how much longer I’d be in the ER. No one gave me an answer. My landlord showed up with his son and brought me some magazines and a book of Sudoku puzzles-not fully aware why I’d been carted away from his house in an ambulance.

At some point in the morning, a doctor came in and told me that I was being transferred to another hospital and placed on 72-hour psychiatric hold. I quickly realized I had no say in the matter, and any outburst or tantrum was going to hurt more than it helped. Needless to say, I was afraid, but I had no fight left in me to argue and somewhere in the back of my mind, figured that this might be the best decision anyway. After waiting a few more hours (I’m sure I don’t have to tell you about the inefficiency of emergency rooms), I was strapped into another ambulance (restraints and all) and brought to the first of the two psychiatric hospitals I would be admitted to in the next 30 days.

The next 96 or so hours were traumatic and surreal beyond even my wildest dreams. As if one should expect any different. Once I was wheeled in. they took my phone, which was something my vague romantic interest (VRI from here forward) at the time told me was not standard procedure at every psych hospital. After you fill out your intake forms and they take your vitals, they confiscate your belt (so you don’t hang yourself with it). They control when you eat, and the overall structure of your day. You start off with breakfast and the daily dispensing of meds, and then go on to spend most of the day in groups-mainly centered around communication and concepts like “mindfulness” (something I was not familiar with at the time.) You get 1 on 1 time with a psychiatrist, as well as some down time to do things like watch TV (almost always the news–as just about everything else on TV could be a “trigger” point for another patient…like the news wasn’t?), shower or make calls on the hospital phone. I made two during my time there–to my personal psychologist and to my boss. I thought about making up a story about where I was (I had enough physical health issues to pull together something plausible), but when I got her on the phone, my “fuck it” light turned on and I said “look…I’m not going to bullshit you. I’m in a psych ward and I’m not sure when I’m getting out.” I don’t advise that you use this in the future as a “get out of work” card, even though I got a lovely care package out of it.

I saw and befriended people in the hospitals I was in that ran the gamut of mental illnesses-and believe me, there are many. They range from schizophrenia to disassociative disorders to anorexia and bulimia to cutting to OCD. There was a guy whose obsessiveness over a book he wanted to write caused his family to have him committed. There were folks who were detoxing from alcohol and drug abuse (or continuing their alcohol and drug abuse-more on that later). There were people who’d recently lost spouses or other family members, and perhaps most sad to me, there were folks who’d spent Christmas in the psych ward. There were older guys and girls who mumbled to themselves, and there were kids (patients in the ward could be as young as 17) less than half my age who’d been kicked out of school for being disturbances (and my guess is that some of them just had families that didn’t know how to deal with them.) Many different walks of life, many different social statuses, ages, races and genders. My two roommates were one guy whose name I don’t remember because he didn’t speak to me for our entire time there (nor did he shower, or speak to anyone else–he was pretty far gone) and a kid I’ll call J. He arrived hours after me and seemed to be in some advanced state of shell-shock. He immediately activated my big-brother reflex, which I possessed even in the state I found myself. We bonded fairly quickly, a good thing to do when you’re sharing a living space. We quickly got used to the fact that one of the counselors would check in on us every half hour over the course of the night, to make sure no one tried to hang him or herself with the bed linens. If sleep wasn’t already a fitful pursuit due to a) the fact that I was in a mental hospital and b) there were probably 40 other people sleeping on the same floor as me, it certainly was difficult to rest peacefully when you were being checked in on ten hours a night.

I was fortunate enough to have visitors during my time here. My friend Kyle visited twice, as did my friend Deb (who I’m fairly positive was one of the people who called the cops that night). Mose came to check in, and it was nice to encounter familiar faces, because otherwise, that hospital felt like what I’d imagine jail feels like.

(note: I’ve never been inside a jail and I hope to never have to go inside one.)

Not to say that we were treated like criminals. We weren’t. t’m referring to the whole “loss of freedom” thing (and maybe the shitty meals thing) more than anything else. The one thing I definitively and immediately pulled from this experience is that I never wanted to lose my freedom again. Oh, there’s also the largely apathetic staff thing. A solid 75% of the hospital staff was either burned out or just earning a paycheck. For people who were paid to care about people who were clearly in a very vulnerable state, most of the guys and girls there couldn’t have given two shits. There were exceptions-an older black gentleman, and a white guy who kind of reminded me of Michael Stipe. After giving him the short version of why I felt I’d been admitted to the hospital, he asked me if I wanted to bring VRI in for a session/meeting. To VRI’s credit, he showed up. It couldn’t have been easy to come to a psychiatric hospital mere months after being a patient in one himself. It wasn’t easy for me to hear him say that there was no chance of a relationship in our future (although something vaguely resembling it went on for another several months-but more on that later). I wish I could say the end result of that meeting was some kind of catharsis, or even some kind of resolution. But it wasn’t. It was just–frustration.

The cycle continued for a few more days. Older patients transitioned out, new patients transitioned in, but the routine stayed the same. Get up, line up for meds, grab breakfast, go to your groups. Some of the groups centered around an activity, or exercise. J impressed us with his yoga skills. Some of the groups were communication-based, which resulted in quite a bit of awkwardness. While I had no problem sharing, others were just not in a good enough mental state to talk. Others (particularly the younger males) just didn’t feel like it. In between groups, some folks did artsy craftsy kind of stuff. Some took the opportunity to catch up on roommate-free sleep. I read a lot and did crossword puzzles. A few more days, a few more meetings, and the doctors weren’t convinced that 72 hours was enough. So a deal was worked out for me to transition into what they called a partial care facility. This meant that for the next week (which turned out to be a lot more than a week), I would check into a hospital (different from the one I was at currently) in the morning, and leave in the evening. This would allow me to continue my care while also allowing me to sleep in my own bed at night. It would also allow me to work a few hours a day. I agreed to it, and on Friday January 18th, 4 ½ days after I was carted off to the emergency room, VRI picked me up and took me home. That weekend was a blur. I emailed friends and family (well, the one family member I told where I was and then swore to secrecy) to tell them I was okay. I thanked my boss for her care package. I talked to my friend/professional colleague Pat (who’d been admitted to a hospital right before Christmas with pneumonia) and said I’d give him details when we were both done with our respective hospitalizations. I initiated medical leave procedures with my insurance company. I sat on my couch and petted my cat and ate real food and tried to figure out how I ended up in this predicament, and whether it was helpful or not.

The partial program was more of the same, but it was also not more of the same. It was a different group of people (excluding my roommate J, who joined me at this hospital shortly after my intake) and definitely better food-no more almost-spoiled bananas! There was much more of a focus on group sessions, which I guess is what happens when they only have to figure out 8 hours of your day as opposed to 24.  The overwhelming sense of staff apathy continued-as evidenced by the resident psychiatrist, who didn’t do much other than ask a series of formulaic questions every few days and dispense anti-depressants in increasingly higher dosages. She reminded me of a teacher I had in high school who was so checked-out that he never got out of his seat and wouldn’t even turn around to write on the chalkboard. He’d taught himself to write perfectly, facing the class and holding the chalk over his shoulder. 

On my first day at this new place, the group (15-20 people) talked a little bit about ourselves and were then given an assignment. We were asked to pass a piece of paper around and write one thing we noticed about or wanted to say to the person whose name was on the piece of paper. It seemed like a pretty difficult thing to do when I’d only known the group for an hour and a half, so I’m pretty sure most of the stuff I wrote consisted of self-help platitudes. When I got my paper back, one of the things written about me was “you have cool shoes” (they were black Vans slip-ons. I still wear ’em.) I counted heads and figured that it was written by a squinty, nervous-looking dude named C who looked to be around my age. I was right-and we started up a conversation, quickly realizing that we lived mere blocks from one another. I also struck up a conversation with a young-looking blond dude who seemed really quiet but actually did wear cool shoes. His name was Tyler. He was from Oregon, and he’d been admitted to the hospital because he’d gone after his roommate with a knife. Over lunch (or rather, multiple lunches, because the kid ate like a fucking horse), Tyler mentioned that he’d been hospitalized several times before. He’d moved to Boston from Oregon because his girlfriend lived there, and he was hoping to be able to move back at some point. In the meantime, he was nervous that he was going to get jail time for an incident in which he snapped and threatened to stab his roommates. Future conversations revealed a smart and funny guy underneath the sadness. We bonded fairly quickly and ate lunch together just about every day for the rest of the time I was in the facility.

Some of the group sessions were enlightening, like the one in which one of the counselors soberly stated in regards to mental illness “this will never go away…and in a lot of cases, will probably get worse.” It felt like a slap across the face at the time, like “do you mean I’ll never get rid of this thing?” And while I certainly agree with the first part of his statement, I can’t say I’m totally convinced of the second part. Still, it was a much-needed dose of reality, and it wasn’t said in a pitying or mocking tone.

There were scary moments; like the time one patient was literally rocking back and forth in her seat because she was jonesing bad and wanted to go out and score. There were a couple of screaming matches between patients, and at least one or two between patients and the staff. There were lighter moments too, like the trips down the street to Blue State Coffee that me, C and a mild-mannered British lady patient made after our first group session every morning. There was also the time when J blurted out an anecdote revolving around his masturbation habits in the middle of a session. I suppressed a giggle. Other patients laughed out loud. The (female) counselor on hand reprimanded him, red-faced.

A rule at this hospital was that you weren’t allowed to fraternize with other members of the group before or after our sessions. That seemed dumb to me. A lot of recovery from various things hinges on finding people who are in the same boat and building a network. Considering that loneliness was a major factor in the triggering of my major depressive episodes, asking me to not be social (especially with people who actually understood what I was going through) wasn’t something I was going to be able to do. So, a bunch of us exchanged numbers and/or Facebook information. C drove me to and from the hospital most mornings, which was frowned upon. Not that it stopped us. Not even C getting chastised by some of the other counselors who found out kept us from hanging out. It was a good opportunity to bond over our shared experience, gossip about some of the other patients, and on a more serious note, talk about the circumstances that led us to being hospitalized and what we could do to prevent it from happening again.

Finally, on February 13th-a month after I’d been brought to the emergency room-the experience was over. I can’t say for sure whether I was ready to go back to my regular life, but I was definitely ready to go back to work full-time. Tentative arrangements were made for me to participate in an after-care program once a week. I called the hospital once to get a schedule. They never called me back. I was on my own-back to dealing with work and feeling unfulfilled and VRI and all of the other shit I was dealing with. I was glad to have my freedom, but I wasn’t totally sure whether I was going to do anything different with it, or what “doing anything different” even entailed. I’d imagine the feeling was similar to graduating college, and wondering how the hell you’re gonna be an adult with the dumb shit you’ve learned for the previous four years. A million thoughts swam through my head; some were related to the things I’d learned (should I start meditating? How do I learn more about mindfulness?). Others were based in fear: what happens when I have another breakdown? Will I have to go back? What’s going to happen to the other people in my groups? How is this experience going to color the rest of my life?

The experience has colored the rest of my life-not a day goes by that I don’t relive some part of that experience. But it doesn’t rule my life now, and even in the immediate aftermath, things continued to happen. After a short break, VRI and I continued to hang out three or four times a week, although what we had now was clearly defined as “not a relationship”. C and I went to lunch a few times, and he came to my apartment to listen to music and borrow CDs, a handful of which were never returned to me. I met and befriended his wife and he would bring his kid to the park I lived close to, and we continued to talk about moving past the hospital experience. We even went to a couple of shows together, and he almost got me killed when we came thisclose to driving directly into a moving bus on our way to see Jim James. Tyler and I celebrated our release by going to a brewery together. Later, he came over to my apartment and showed me how to rubber-band dryer sheets to a toilet paper roll so that when I smoked weed, I could blow the smoke through it and it would come out smelling like fresh laundry. I visited him at his apartment and met his girlfriend. In the late spring, with his court case settled (I think he got probation), he decided to move back home to Oregon. We celebrated his move at some bar in Downtown Boston. I promised I’d keep in touch. He didn’t seem too convinced. I maintained relationships with a few folks (particularly from the first hospital) via Facebook and text, serving in almost a mentor capacity. Even though I never shared my sexual orientation with anyone when I was in the hospital, a lot of the younger guys eventually ended up sharing some level of confusion regarding sexual orientation with me, and the only reason I mention that is because I think that, for young men in particular, sexual confusion is a major cause of mood issues. J showed up to my birthday party that May, looking and sounding great.

That last paragraph may lead you to believe that things got better following my release. Well, here’s a loose timeline of the next few months: my friend Pat (who, as I mentioned earlier, was hospitalized with a seemingly innocuous case of pneumonia), died suddenly five days after my release. He was only 44. A week after leaving the psychiatric facility, I found myself taking a day trip to Long Island to attend his wake, staring at his body and watching his widow and teenage daughter attempt to keep themselves together. Still in a daze from the past month and a half, I felt weirdly disengaged, like I was dreaming the experience. I wondered how many of my co-workers attending the service were aware of everything I’d dealt with. On June 25th, I went onto Facebook to post something about Michael Jackson since it was his death anniversary. I realized June 25th was also Tyler’s birthday, and logged onto his page to wish him a happy birthday. Came to find out that Tyler shot himself to death on June 20th, five days before his 25th birthday. In a state of shock, I called C, who was in disbelief. It was the first time someone I knew committed suicide (at least that I was aware of–and it wasn’t to be the last), and I had a lot of trouble digesting the fact that the guy who I’d had this very recent and still raw experience with-who’d sat on my couch and watched TV with barely three months before-was gone. At the same time, a good friend of mine was dealing with addiction issues. I was getting frequent calls in the middle of the night. Those calls were rambling and occasionally incoherent. I assisted in getting a group of friends together to stage an intervention. I was happy to hear that he’d volunteered to enter a rehab facility. When he called me later that summer from the facility, he sounded more lucid than I’d remembered him sounding in a year, but trying to be present for someone else’s recovery when you’re going through your own shit is exhausting. And it wouldn’t be long before he relapsed. I was still feeling unfulfilled at work, and contemplated a career change. At the same time, the management of Popblerd was turning out to be more than I could handle. Pride and guilt led me to a series of rash decisions: turning control of the site over, resuming control of the site, and finally disbanding the staff altogether. Many of the relationships I’d created as a result of my writing endeavors crumbled under my indecision and constantly shifting moods.  In the midst of all that, VRI, got a new job and moved two hours away. I helped him pack boxes the night before the moving truck came and took his stuff away. It was the last time I saw him. We went through periods of talking and not talking over the next year and a half before I finally told him that we’d be better off being completely out of one another’s lives.

Things took a long time-years, in fact-to get better (and I say that with the understanding that “better” is a relative term.) Not that “better” was ever a guarantee for me or anyone who has this or a similar experience. Happy endings are great for movies, but rarely do they apply to life, as VRI remarked to me after viewing my reaction to Silver Linings Playbook, a film we saw together about a month before my hospitalization. Things could just as easily have gotten worse-I’d argue that for the remainder of 2013, things did get worse. 

 Last year, around this time, I found myself in a very similar place. Work was still not giving me what I needed. Reading the news and social media was driving me crazy-especially during a period of time when it seemed like it was open season on Black folks. The amount of stupidity I was encountering every time I logged into my computer was discouraging, and there was nothing to counteract that in the 3-D world. For all the fraternity implied in protesting, there didn’t seem to be much real connection at the rallies I went to. I was inching closer to middle age, and still in search of inner peace, a good network of friends, and creative fulfillment. In addition, my cat, the only pet I’d had as an adult and my constant (and in many cases: sole) companion for the last 14 years was sick. With the anniversary of my hospitalization fresh in my mind, I wondered if it might be time to go back. I’d received some high-powered painkillers as a result of dental surgery and an infection in my mouth, and I was taking them multiple times a day just to numb myself. I’d get up on a non-work day, shuffle around for a bit, pop a pill, then go to bed. I may have even called out sick to work one day just because I couldn’t deal; a rarity for me. On top of my personal malaise, were in the midst of the worst winter of my adult life. Feet of snow were on the ground outside. No one was going to come over and check on me. I could barely leave the house myself. Giving up was heavy on my mind. At my lowest ebb, I texted something cryptic to my therapist. He called back, and told me to come in the next day. I’m pretty sure I threatened to quit therapy that day (as I had several times before), but something (including my therapist himself-who was a quietly persistent motherfucker) convinced me to come back after that. And after that. And so on. 

In March, after about 18 months off of meds, I decided that I wanted to try something very specific, which I’d picked up on via a recommendation from someone I’d met on OKCupid. My therapist referred me to a prescribing psychiatrist barely half a mile from his office, and I started on that medication the day before I went to the vet to put my cat to sleep. Coming into my apartment with that empty carrier in my hand, I felt completely tapped out. But…slowly, things began to change. Actually, things had already begun to change. I was socializing more, thanks to a great group of local friends. I’d grown a fair amount of confidence in the last few months, at least partially due to my participation in those protests. I’d begun to meet people in communities that were much more open-minded in regards to things like cultural identity and sexual identity, and realized that I might not be as much of an alien as I thought I was. I’d started running again (after doing it for a couple of months in 2014, I stopped after developing chronic bronchitis). In the (almost) year since that mini-meltdown, I’ve undergone perhaps the best stretch of my life, mental-health wise. I’m responding well to meds for the first time ever. I received a promotion and a transfer and am feeling positively challenged by my job, I’m back home in New York City and actually feeling good about it. My physical health has improved, I’ve lost weight and developed a new confidence in my body and looks. I’ve become more accepting of my quirks and faults and realizing that those quirks and faults don’t make me defective (and maybe have also become more accepting of other peoples’ quirks and faults too). I’ve started meditating, I’m going out of my way to socialize more (and am taking care to connect with people who seem supportive of (or at least non-judgmental of) the things that make me me. I’ve worked on living more in the moment, being a more honest version of me (a very difficult thing for someone who’s always gone out of his way to minimize parts of himself in order to get people to like him), and operating with the knowledge that this is the only life I have, and that it’s up to me-not fate, not God, not any human being-to do the best I can with the moment I’m in. It’s-I’m- a work in progress, one that’ll continue till the day I die. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that I haven’t learned shit. We’re evolutionary beings, whether we choose to be or not. If we keep an open mind, commit to learning about ourselves and one another, and try to keep a positive mind-set (something that folks who don’t deal with depression may not realize can sometimes be a VERY active and difficult process), things might get better.

Or they might not. Or they might for a short time and might not. Or they might for a short time, and then they won’t for a short time and then they might again…and so on, and so on, and so on. The last thing I wanna do is act like this is a triumphant story and now I’m standing on Mount Happiness, dispensing my knowledge. Despite what seems like a reversal of fortune, I still struggle. I’ve had days when I wanted to pull the covers over my head and forget about the world. I still have shitty periods. I’m still racked with self-doubt. I still second-guess just about everything I say or do. I’ve been second-guessing writing this since I made the decision to write this. The police have showed up at my apartment since that day (strangely-one of the cops recognized me. They didn’t bring me into the hospital that time, and they didn’t need to.)  I’m fully aware that my particular story’s not over yet, and that tides will change. I do think I’m better equipped to handle the rougher tides when they show up, though. As it stands, I’ve made it through a period of significant life change with my sanity relatively intact. I turn forty in a few months and am actually looking forward to it. Three years ago, I would’ve placed the odds at 50/50 that I’d even make it to forty. And while I’d like to think that I’m not a particularly self-congratulatory person, I have no shame about patting myself on the back for this. Getting out of bed in the morning and facing each day doesn’t come easy to some people, and it doesn’t always come easy to me. Being true to oneself and doing so in a manner that doesn’t take people down as collateral damage isn’t something a lot of folks can master (or even try to master, to be honest). I’d like to think that I at least make an effort most days, and often times I succeed, relative to what one would say is success in regards to things that can’t be quantified. And self-congratulating aside, I’m well aware of the fact that I don’t get through any day with my head on straight without the many challenging (in a good way), supportive people in my life.

Why am I writing this? There’s something self-serving in sharing a story of triumph, no matter my realization that this triumph may be temporary or fleeting. But being self-serving isn’t necessarily bad. After all, if we don’t congratulate ourselves, who else will? Beyond that, though, I know there are a lot of folks out there who find themselves in dire straits emotionally. First off, I want to let them know that there’s no shame in getting help because you feel like you’re sinking. I want to underline that especially for men, and double especially for men of color. The image of the man as having to suffer in silence or “be strong” is thankfully fading, but it’s also still the prevalent image of masculinity in American culture. I grew up in a family where the occasionally spoken rule was “don’t go telling our business to strangers”, and I think that is a pretty common rule in families of color and in families of different cultures.  While I certainly don’t advocate sharing your personal business to anyone and everyone, I also don’t advocate holding potentially damaging pain or emotions in when there are productive outlets available. Even with everything else I’ve done, the best decision I made was to start seeing a therapist. It’s not a quick fix-I went through four therapists in six years before finding someone who was really helpful. It takes work, and it is an ongoing process, but it’s not impossible to deal with the shit you hold on to and move on. Hiding pain or ignoring it doesn’t constitute strength. Acknowledging it and doing something active about it (hiding/ignoring it isn’t active behavior, fyi) is strong. And not only will it pay positive dividends for you, it will pay positive dividends for your job, your family, and your friends. If I’m gonna stand on a mountain top and scream anything it’s this: TALK TO A MOTHERFUCKING THERAPIST. Or a trusted friend. Or-if you’re of a religious bent-clergy. Although I will now editiorialize and add that many religions seem to advocate repression/conscious ignorance of the issues that cause most people to struggle emotionally, so…I dunno. Maybe don’t talk to a clergyman. Or talk to one but don’t necessarily take their advice?

I needed help, and I got it. When the help I sought out wasn’t enough, I was forced into getting more help, thanks to people who cared about me (never hesitate to reach out to people. You may get rejected, but I guarantee there’s at least one person out there who cares. Go find them.) And I continued to show up, and I didn’t let the bastards beat me down and I’m still here (don’t give up. I won’t say that things will definitely change, but they always have the capability to change.) I don’t know if I was really on the verge of taking my own life (I’ve never seriously tried, not least because I’ve always worried that I’d screw it up), but I look back on all of the cool shit that I would’ve missed had I gone that route and my heart hurts for friends like Tyler, who will never get a chance to re-write his story (whether he would’ve been able to or not is another story entirely.) Thinking about him (as I do often, his profile still pops up on my Facebook page) fills me with lots of things: regret, guilt (which I’d imagine many people who’ve lost someone close to them to suicide feel), hurt for his family and girlfriend. But also the desire to move forward no matter how dark things may get. 

Remember a few paragraphs ago where I mentioned that paper passed around my first day in the partial program? I kept it. Actually, I taped it to my fridge, so that means that everyone who’s gotten something out of my refrigerator since 2013 has gotten at least a glimpse of that note. No one ever asked about it-although I’m sure some of my visitors made the connection. When I moved last fall, I untaped the paper from my fridge and remembered something. After everyone in the group got the chance to write something, the counselor that headed up that first session asked us to conclude the exercise by writing something about ourselves.

On the other side of the faded scrawls complimenting my shoe selection and advocating for cats over dogs were three words that made me smile as I folded the paper up and put it into a box to bring to New York.

I. Am. Resilient.

It could’ve been any other cliched phrase, right? Like “it gets better”. I remember when that was the big catchphrase, probably around the same time I was making my hospital tour of New England. It felt like a fucking lie. It still does, in a way (despite the best intentions of those who coined the phrase). Because it may not necessarily get better. Life can be really cruel to people. However, there’s no chance of anything getting better if you’re not willing to put in the work to make things better.  Lean on that person for help, even if it scares you to do so. Get out of that unfulfilling relationship or job, even if the immediate aftermath will shake you out of your comfort zone and you may have to struggle for a minute. Ditch people who aren’t good for you. Try to stay away from negative energy (and negative people) as much as possible. If you make a mistake while doing that, the really good friends you have will understand and welcome you back when you realize your error. Hell, you might get lucky and all of the doubt and doom you’ve built up in your head may turn out to be a figment of your imagination.

And it should end there, right? It does-for now. And even though I’m trying to focus more on “now” than I’ve ever tried to do before, there’s still the future. And I’ve got to remember to get out of bed every morning and fight the good fight as best I can. There will be days when that’s not as easy as it’s been for the last several months. Hopefully, when those days occur, I’ll remember those words. If I don’t, I hope someone out there reading this will remind me.

(for those of you who haven’t read Ned Vizzini’s It’s Kind Of A Funny Story, it’s highly recommended–even though it’s technically a young adult novel. When I read it a year and a half ago, I was amazed at how much his story mirrored my own. I’m deeply saddened that I will never get the chance to tell him in person how much I was able to relate to his book and how much it meant to me in the midst of my own ongoing struggles.)