Month: October 2021

Breakdown art

My wife and I watched a movie last night – “Joe Bell” – that blew me up. I’ve been teetering emotionally for a while, but Joe Bell broke me. I needed to pause the movie for a while because I needed a mental health break for a little while. I cried, a lot, which isn’t unusual, but this time it tore a gaping hole in my defenses. And when I was out this morning walking the dogs, I came home and broke down, hard.

There’s a lot of underlying emotions and thoughts of course; it wasn’t the movie itself. But it was the push over the edge of the waterfall I’ve tried so long to avoid.

This morning I was lucky enough to summon the self-awareness to be breaking down, feeling, and know what I needed to do to stay in the safe zone. I breathed into a bag; I ate something. I made tea. I cried. And I found some pencils and sketched a daisy. And I admitted to myself that I wasn’t in control. I admitted that I’m vulnerable.

When it comes to sketching, I’m not great. But I don’t care; I draw because I want to. It’s for me. In this case I was aware that I needed to stay in the present, and drawing helped me to not disassociate.

I posted it to Twitter with a note about my mental state and a couple of my Twitter pals responded with some support – and that was greatly appreciated.

So here I am today, building this blog, writing whilst I sit in my child’s room that they graciously let me occupy. It’s quiet, I have my tea, some chips, and the room is full of the familiar clutter only a fellow ADHDer can appreciate. Also it has an Echo – and I had K.D. Lang’s version of Hallelujah on repeat. Over and over it played while I wrote, and I cried, and I let the tears stream down my face.

It’s been a very raw day. Thoughts of my children, feelings for all the traumas they’re enduring, thankfulness for Chloe telling me to fill out the ADHD self-assessment last year. There’s at least four of us in the household. I’ve been thinking about my brother Mark, who I now understand clearly had profound ADHD. And my brother Brian, who passed away seven weeks ago. And my brother Dale. It’s just the two of us left. Brian’s passing has very deeply affected him, more than he says, and we talk quite a bit.

So while I’m trying to process my own emotions and traumas, I know full well that my entire family is also doing the same thing. I love you all and we’re all in this together.

I’ll end this with a tweet I saw tonight, which I think can’t be said any clearer:

Published
Categorized as The Diary

The Mountain

I spent a great deal of my life atop a mountain I made. A mountain of stones I built to protect myself. An enormous mound of invulnerability that I added to throughout my life.

My children and both of my wives have suffered from my bullshit invulnerability. Some of my friends have too. “I can do it all myself, thanks very much.” I wouldn’t let people help me.

There are lots of stones in the mountain of self-reliance I built for myself. I stood there, protected from the assholes that picked on me in school, protected from the lingering effects of childhood arthritis, saying “Fuck Cancer”, saying “fuck you” to Guillaine-Barre Syndrome and how it trashed my legs, and denying that any of this hurt me – because “I’m at the top of the fucking mountain – none of you, none of that – can hurt me.”

I stood on the top of that mountain, congratulating myself on building a company, on how great it was (at least in the old days) to be able to brilliantly produce things and do good for people. That that I wasn’t an asshole; that most of my best friends were women; that I was a truly nice guy. Some kind of great dad.

What a fucking charade.

With every one of my moves, some of the those stones would shift a little, a few rolling down the hill. If we were lucky, the hill was just shifted a little. “I’m still balanced.” But the rosy view from the top didn’t let me see what was happening. The stones barreled down the hill, hitting the people I love.

Friends who just wanted to help — because that’s what friends do — couldn’t. I wouldn’t let them.

My wives – my ex, and my current wife, “C”, couldn’t help me. To “CV”, my first wife, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for closing myself off, shutting down, all those times when all you wanted to do was help me.

To “C”, I’m sorry I repeated that again with you. We may be lucky enough to weather this storm; I know we’re better equipped than in the past and we both have better tools to work through it. And I know I have a fuck of a lot of work to do on myself.

The worst of it all is the effect I had on my children. My relationship with my oldest, Emma, is broken. I have hope that maybe one day we can repair it, but the truth is that I need to repair it. And I’m scared that I won’t be able to.

Emma, I’m sorry. I’m broken – and I broke us. All those times you just wanted to spend time with me, but I was “too busy working.”  Too stressed out to be a kind, loving father. I’m sorry I lost my temper so much. I’m sorry I didn’t understand all the things you were going through, and that I didn’t learn to be able communicate with you.  We had it, but I fucked it up. I know you needed to get out of an environment that was toxic to you, and I promised you that we’d see other still and I’d make time to hang out and be your Dad. But where the hell has your Dad been? Not with you. The truth? I don’t know how to connect with you. I want to call, I want to see you, but I’m afraid.  And it’s a stupid version of being afraid. You’re my daughter and I’m your dad and nothing will change that. But I don’t know how to call. I’m so heartbroken with how I wrecked our relationship that I can’t find the path back to you. I know it’s there and it hurts to just acknowledge that. But I can tell you that I’m trying to find that path, through all the broken rubble.

Ashley and Olivia – we have a bond that we all like to think is unbreakable. You two really are the guardian angels that the psychic told me sat on my shoulders when I was 20. I’m sorry as well, for all those things that stretched that bond to the limit. My temper again; my “work work work.” The who-knows-how-many times I lost my mind trying to help you with homework. All the times I was too overwhelmed to be present for you. Thank you for being there with me, through thick and thin.

Chloe and Chelbie – I know this has been a weird, stressful, strange trip moving in here when your mom and I got together. I’m sorry that I’m not the man right now that you met 5 years ago. You two are my daughters in my heart as much as Olivia, Ashley and Emma are. I worry just as much; I love you just as much.

I love all of you. 

Expressions in progress

My mind races, dozens of thoughts at once usually. Trying to focus is sometimes easy, laced with brilliance. Sometimes it’s just impossible. ADHD definitely is a factor. Working with a truly excellent counsellor (Kara) is a factor; all those carefully packed boxes in my mind with labels; “Fragile”, “Memories”, “Love”, “Trauma”, “DO NOT FUCKING OPEN THIS BOX”.

You know what I mean.

Anyway, I digress… My mind races – whether it’s emotional racing, work racing (I own my own business), regrets, future plans, learning, loving, helping. I can’t stop it; it’s who I am. So this blog is probably going to be a collection of short stories, edits galore, addendums, footnotes and maybe, just a maybe, a few “ah ha!” moments.

 

The Line Between Sanity and Madness

I am purposefully trying to straddle the line between sanity and madness for this writing journey.

I’ve spent much of my life in a state of invincibility, of being in control. And it’s only now that I’ve reached my mid-fifties, and see how much of a negative effect it’s had on my children (that includes my step-children), my wife, my ex-wife, and on myself. 

Over the years, during the times I’m been depressed, anxious or otherwise stressed-out, I worked hard to maintain self-control, to avoid, to redirect my attention to work — which is my default mode, my “safe” zone. Now I still don’t think this is always a bad thing, but far too often I didn’t let myself feel.

Well that’s not entirely true of course. I’ve cried a lot in front of my children. I’m getting better at crying in front of my friends. I’ve always cried during movies, and sometimes I let myself cry in front of my wife. The feeling of vulnerability is still like a weird foreign friend; she’s been missing from my life a long time and while it’s sure nice to see her once in a while, well shit, “V”, do you have to come over all the time now?

I don’t know where this blog is going to go. I need a space to vent, to apologize, to talk about mental health and ADHD and just let it all hang out – the good, the bad, and the ugly. 

I can’t do that when I’m “in control”. I can’t do it either in the middle of a breakdown. But we’ll see. I think I understand why it seems like so many really good writers have demons. That came to me today like a bit of an epiphany.

“Hello, wee demons. Welcome to my self. Come, help me write.”