Lost Self

"Don't lose yourself. You have the map to yourself. You just need to find your way back." 

Where do I begin? 

I haven't written one of these in quite a while. It isn't because I haven't had anything to say or because I am not inspired. It isn't because I have given up reading and learning. It isn't because I stopped listening to music and hearing the still small voice in my soul. 

So, you might ask, why so long between posts.

It would be easy to say that I got lazy or lax in my writing. That is the easy thing to say. But it wouldn't be the right thing to say. It wouldn't be the honest thing to say. 

I haven't written anything because I have been hiding. Hiding? If you have ever seen me, you'd probably say it is hard for a guy like me to hide.  

My depression and anxiety have been kicking my ass for the last 9-10 months. I am a walking example of a man who can look like he has it all together on the outside and be curled in a ball in the corner. I do an excellent job of hiding it. Always have. But tonight, I will take the veil down and share my heart with you. Not for sympathy, but because I know someone out there is feeling the same way I am right now. 

Someone asked me today when I knew I was suffering from depression or when I was diagnosed with anxiety. I told them this, "My whole life." When I was a little fella, I was scared a lot. I didn't know why, but I was fearful. Not because I was raised in a dangerous or unsafe home, quite the contrary. My folks were good people. They were strict with us but fair. I was punished when I did wrong, and never was a hand laid on me in anger. But for whatever reason, I was afraid. I am not sure that I will ever figure that one out. But it is something I have dealt with my entire life; at different points, it has been crippling. It has kept me from making hard choices and doing hard things. And every time it happens, I move a little farther away from who I am. 

Depression is a different story. It started to rear its ugly head right after I lost my wife in 2014. About 15 months after she passed, I found myself sitting on a pier on Logan Martin Lake 3/4 drunk from a fifth of Jack Daniels and a loaded .357 magnum Smith & Wesson in either hand. I was at the lowest of lows right at that moment. I was alone. Or so I thought. 

As I was sitting on that pier, contemplating taking my life. I thought I would be doing everyone a favor in my hurting heart and broken mind. I had life insurance that would provide for my kid's future, and my job would replace me quickly. I was all alone on that pier at 3 in the morning. Not a soul around. Crying and arguing with myself about the reasons why and why not. Then my phone started to buzz on the deck of the pier. I kept ignoring it, but it just kept on humming. I finally sat the bottle down and picked up the phone. It was my dad. My mom and dad only lived a few miles down the road from me, but I wasn't talking to them much during that time. I had totally isolated myself. I didn't feel worthy of anyone's company. 

I answered the phone, and my dad said, "Son, I know you are down at the pier. Would you mind walking up here and talking to me?" I took the phone from my ear and began to look around. Above my home, my driveway was elevated, and I could see headlights sitting in my driveway. It was my dad. I don't know how long he had been there, but I was sure he couldn't see what I was doing from that distance (it was 300 yards downhill through trees). I laid the bottle and the gun down on the pier and walked up the hill to the truck. There sat my dad in his old Ford truck. He didn't chastise me for being drunk or even ask me what I was doing. He simply told me he couldn't sleep and wanted to ensure I was ok. He was worried about his only son. That night in 2015, my dad saved my life. He passed away in 2018, and I never told him what I was doing, and he never asked. It is one of my biggest regrets not telling him he saved my life that night. 

I fight the battles with depression and anxiety every single day. I wake up every morning to fight the same demons that left me exhausted and spent the night before. I am told to do so is bravery, but honestly, I don't know. I would say I am just a broken man, living in a damaged and broken world. I am trying to ensure I don't lose myself along the way. I have learned in my journey and the war within my mind that you can't fix someone who doesn't know they are broken. And it isn't my responsibility to fix them either. Broken people hurt people sometimes. And healed people help others too. I just want to leave others better than I found them.

We are all broken in different ways, and we are all healed in different ways. We must have the courage to share our experiences without fear of judgment or reprisal. It is how we use these collective experiences that matter the most. It is what we can count on as a GPS of sorts to help us when we are deep in the mire of depression or backed into the corner by anxiety. 

My depression is natural. My anxiety is real. All I ask is this: if you know me, love me, like me, or even if you hate me, check on me from time to time. Ask how I am doing. I promise I will do the same thing for you. Someday, I will look back on this post, as I have with many of my others, and I will know exactly why I have felt this way and see the lessons I have learned accurately and tangibly.