Happy Mental Health Month! (this one is personal)

A few years back, I had a bad day. My heart was beating faster than normal, I was not in a good mood, feeling sad and angry, my hands were shaking, and I was kind of dizzy. These things happen. Everyone has a bad day every now and then. But this day was different. Whenever I have a day like this, I can usually figure out what put me in this mood. But this day was different. I don't know what triggered all this. I could point to someone who was being rude, not getting enough sleep, or a fight with someone. But on this day, none of those things happened. I was just feeling weird.

I wasn't sure what to think, so I did what most people do when they are feeling weird: I googled my symptoms.

Just so you know, I am not the kind of person who spends his time on WebMD trying to figure out if I have some rare form of cancer. If I look up a symptom, I see what I most likely might be, and see my doctor just to confirm it's hemorrhoids, and not colon cancer. I don't go worst-case scenario when I'm sick, and tend to stay pretty level headed.

Since I was shaking and had a higher heart-rate, I thought this might be some sort of panic attack. So I googled "signs of anxiety." Before the site I clicked gave the "12 Signs of Anxiety," it said "If you experience any of the following symptoms on a regular basis, you may want to talk with your doctor." With that noted, I jumped in.

1. Excessive worry
   On some days, who doesn't?
2. Sleep problems
   No more then anyone else.
3. Irrational fears
   I don't like spiders? But I don't run away from them and think they are out to get me.
4. Muscle tension
   Nope.
5. Chronic indigestion
   Only when I don't eat right.
6. Stage fright
   Oh yeah. But I have been doing it for so long, overcoming it turns into a high.
7. Self-consciousness
   Yeah, but no more than normal.
8. Panic
   If I ever do, I'm pretty good at keeping it under control.
9. Flashbacks
   I'd say this one is right.
10. Perfectionism
    Hah! Not hardly.
11. Compulsive behaviors
    Sometimes, but not really
12. Self-doubt
    I'm a musician. It comes with the territory.

So no anxiety.

Then I saw a link for the next article saying "12 Signs of Depression," and I thought, I already dove in, so why not swim a little longer?

1. Fatigue
   Like always.

2. Sleeping too much or too little
   I'll either sleep for 10 hours, or stay up all night and only sleep for 2.

3. Stomachache or backache
   Backache to the point of always keeping Ibuprofen on hand.

4. Irritability
   Yeah, but I keep it to myself...for the most part.

5. Difficulty concentrating
   Friends have told me in the past that I have to have ADHD, it's not that bad. However, school was rough, and I'd often start studying, and then just stray off somewhere else.

6. Anger or hostility
   Oh yeah. But only around people I've been around a lot. So Michelle would know this to be true.

7. Stress
   Yeah. Put too much on myself sometimes.

8. Anxiety
   Well I was shaking and my heart was jumping.

9. Substance abuse
   No. I've always known my limits with alcohol. 

10. Sexual dysfunction
    That is kind of personal, but no.

11. Indecision
    I always take too long making any decision. When it comes to picking a place to eat, I'm the stereotypical girlfriend/wife. "Where do you wanna eat?"

12. Suicidal thoughts
    No. Not really. While driving I'll sometimes wonder what it would be like to drive off a cliff, but don't really want to because, well, I'd die, and I don't want to die.

After reading this list, not only could I relate to it, but it almost read like a laundry list of my life.

I remembered time when I was younger, just taking out my anger and frustration on a video game, yelling at the aliens I was shooting. "Die! Take that! Take that stupid! You stupid idiot!" Just yelling at the top of my lungs. My oldest brother walks in from outside saying "Sam! Stop yelling so much! It sounds like you're beating someone up, and the neighbors will think something is wrong."
I stopped what I was doing, and just wondered why I had such a crazy outburst.

Another time when I didn't have enough money for a trip, and my parents said they would buy my car back from me so I can use that money and still go on the tour. This should have been a good thing, but for me it was worth screaming and crying in front of my parents shop. My dad tells me to calm down because it sounds like they're beating me up. I realize it does, and start reeling it in, and regaining some sort of composure, pull myself off the ground.

And another time, while walking through the streets of Chicago with tour mates, I had an overwhelming feeling of sadness come over me. I put in the headphones on my iPod, and shuffled everything because I couldn't figure out what to listen to. I was having a great day in here with friends that I had spent years getting to know, and weeks in a van learning to love, walking around after having Deep Dish Pizza at Gino's East, and I felt terrible. Looking back at that, I can see darkness robbing me of that moment.

I texted Michelle the link asking her if this sounded like me.

She didn't reply right away.

Eventually I asked again, but on the phone, and she admitted it did, and it kind of freaked her out a bit.

I realized I needed to talk to my doctor. I told Michelle the next time I see the doctor, because I was going pretty much every other month, that I will bring this up.

So I avoided going to the doctor for a year.

Eventually I had to go in order to get a prescription refilled, and with my heartbeat racing, hands shaking, I asked him about depression, and how I might have it. He said that would explain why my blood pressure was higher this visit.

He handed me a form with the familiar questions above, but this one was a little different. Instead of asking if I ever felt a certain way, it asked how often I felt that way (on a scale from 0-4, 0 being not at all, and 4 being every day), and under "Thought's of Suicide" it added "or thoughts of self-harm." Like I said above, I don't really have thoughts of killing myself. But hurting myself? 

Every. 

Damn. 

Day.

(Talking with Michelle about it afterwards, I found out it's not normal to every day get so frustrated with life/work/school that you have the urge to smash your head up against a wall to see what breaks first...)

My score was high, which meant that I was undoubtedly depressed. 

We started off with a smaller dose of an antidepressant. The way it works, because I looked into it, you start off taking a smaller dosage, and then it doubles after a few weeks, and then doubles again until you have the right amount. And you won't know the effects for at least two weeks.

I'll admit, I was scared. I couldn't get it out of my head. I was afraid of what might happen. Does being on these meds mean I'm admitting I'm crazy? Will these pills change who I am? Will I start to become numb? Will I stop feeling like me? What if the pills work the opposite way and I actually become suicidal? Am I crazy?

I was supposed to have practice that night with Alex, and I told him I couldn't make it, but that I'd stop by. I bought a beer, and told him and his wife Samantha that I was about to start some antidepressants, and I my mind was so occupied with that, I don't think I'd be able to concentrate on music. Both Sam and Alex were completely understanding, and I couldn't ask for better friends to talk to about it with.

I went home that night and started my first dose of 37.5mg Effexor.

Those two weeks sucked. Not because everything started changing though. It was because nothing was happening.

Like I said earlier, it takes at least two weeks before you start to feel anything, and I was growing impatient.

I remember going out with Michelle and being completely frustrated that she couldn't figure out where she wanted to eat. We were in front of The Maya Cinemas watching all the people waiting in line to see Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice on it's opening night, and I was mad because I needed to go out driving with Uber and Lyft to make some money, and we were just sitting around, and Michelle couldn't make up her mind about dinner, and I was slowly getting pissed off. I couldn't understand how Michelle didn't understand that I needed to be out driving in order to make money, and sometimes that was during nights when she wanted to go out. And I didn't know if I was being unreasonable, or if Michelle was really just being selfish. It made me feel very alone, even though Michelle was right there. 

This was a fairly normal thing for me. Michelle and I would say I was "in a funk." Sometimes I had reasons why, and sometimes I just was. But when it happened, Michelle would usually not talk to me because anything she said or did could trigger an emotional fit, with either me crying, her crying, or both of us trying to figure out how we got here.

Also note, when I got to this point, prayer and faith didn't help much. Because when you're that far gone, it's not hard to start believing while you're praying, God is "remembering the Sabbath," and your words are falling on deaf ears. Or worse, I'm getting what I deserve, or that everything isn't going right because of me. My sin being the main cause for the suffering of my family and friends isn't foreign to me, and would often keep me up at night as a kid. Thinking I did something wrong being why my sister is sick, or why my brother broke up with his girlfriend, or my parents business slowing down would make sense to my teenage mind.

That night, I was in a deep funk. I couldn't tell you if I was more angry, sad, lonely, depressed, betrayed, or annoyed, but it was a terrible cocktail of emotions that I was more then sure was not my fault. This was ten days into taking pills, and it was the last time I remember this feeling that strong.

Two weeks after I started the meds, I had a followup with my doctor, and he asked if I noticed anything different.

At that time, the only thing I could surely point to that was better was how much easier it was to get up in the morning. I wasn't laying in bed until I only had five minutes to leave for work and still need to shower (I'll just wash my hair and put on deodorant and cologne, and blame it on traffic or a train).

He said this was signs of improvement, and showed that the medication was working, and how we should double to dosage up to 75mg, and eventually to 150mg.

A month later, went back for another followup and filled out the same questionnaire, but noticed the numbers were lower. He asked me if I noticed anything different. I said I guess so. Getting up is easier, but I can't really tell if I'm emotionally any better. "I guess I feel better, but I'm not sure how to tell." He told me I should ask my wife and see if she's noticed anything different.

I brought it up to Michelle, thinking maybe she didn't notice anything new, but she shocked me instead.

"You don't get mad at me anymore over stupid things."

I stopped to take inventory over what that meant.

I would often unload on Michelle over something she'd done, often saying how she didn't seem to care because of something she did. I would have my feelings hurt, and she would be upset because she doesn't know why I should be mad, like that "Lonely Night at Maya" mentioned above. 

A great example Michelle reminded me of was one time when she clean the bathroom, including "my side" of the counter. She organized the mess a bit but left it for me to rearrange how I'd want it. And I was lost it. I started crying because I told her I'd take care of it (a month ago) and she didn't listen to me. She crossed a line (literally and metaphorically) and I was pissed. Why doesn't she trust me? Why can't she just listen to me?

But really, all she did was clean up the bathroom a little, and not make my side look like a disaster.


And that pretty much stopped. 

From that moment on, I knew it was working.

If I feel some wave of emotion, or feel myself slipping into "a funk", I can acknowledge it, and process my way through it. My depression is no longer something that controls and robs me, but instead it's on a leash, and able to be controlled. Sometimes it can get out of hand (I can usually tell when I have a hard time getting out of bed), but I feel like it's manageable. Like I tell when a darkness is coming, and when it's my depression trying to take over. I know I was afraid of the drugs making me feel like someone else, but really, they make me feel more like myself.

Yeah I'll still have bad days, but they don't control me anymore.

So I'm not sharing this story to try and gain sympathy, or even tell people how great I am. 

The main reason I'm sharing this is I'm tired of people not wanting to talk about mental health issues. People talk about depression, and it scares everyone. No one wants to talk openly about how crippling their anxiety is, because they don't want people to think something is wrong with them.

I know my fear is that people will somehow start thinking that since I'm depressed they should watch over me all the time in case I become suicidal. "Maybe Sam shouldn't be in the kitchen with the sharp knives...", "Don't leave Sam alone with in the pool..." and so forth. But don't worry about me. I'm in a good place right now.

But this is something we as a society need to talk about. I'll share one story real quick that hit me personally.

I had a coworker, who I'll call L, a few years back that wasn't doing a good job. L was new, and younger than most people in our line of work, and it wasn't working for her. However, she was a sweetheart. She was into hunting, and I asked her if she'd ever be able to bring some Bambi Burgers or Bambi Jerky (if you haven't had it, you don't know what you are missing). L said she would sometime, but she was fired before she got the chance to. We became friends on Facebook, so I kept in touch with her. 

Months go by, and she shares this post on her wall...

I saw the post, but I didn't do anything about it. People share these things all the time, and I don't really care much for them. It's just another form of the chain mail we would get in our email inboxes and LiveJournal posts, and I very rarely would give them a second glance.

The next day, while checking Facebook, I saw many of her friends commenting on her wall. Post after post after post talking to her. But it didn't say it was her birthday. I read one of them, then another, then another, and they all said the same thing: 

"Why did you have to kill yourself?"

She posted this note, and then killed herself. No one saw it coming.

Things like this don't need to happen. 

The stigma that comes with mental illness needs to stop. 

I'm tired of the only time people are willing to talk about mental health issues being after a mass shooting or suicide. I hate it because then when people only bring it up after someone snapped and killed themselves or others, those of us that have something wrong don't want to say anything because we get associated with it. If you think that's not true, check out the talking heads on news outlets next time it happens and get back to me. Every time something goes wrong, it's because "we need to talk about mental health issues," but no one wants to be the first to say "I think something is wrong with me," because they're afraid they'll be put on some watch list or have family members think they'll go on a shooting rampage, when really they just want help without the attention. 

When we start associating mental health issues with tragedies, it only increases the stigma attached to it, which means people don't talk about it, stuff goes untreated, and we end up with more people, like L, killing themselves.

So I'm starting now.

I'm not hiding my depression anymore.

This is who I am.

I have depression. 

Depression does not have me.

I have good days.

I have bad days.

But I'm better.

And I will get better.