Thursday 29 September 2011

Coming out

Coming out is an interesting thing to do.  I am sure everyone's story is different in a lot of ways, but there is one way that seems to be common.  It seems that everyone has said that coming out is freeing.

I know for me coming to term with my sexuality, realizing that I am gay and accepting it, has been one of the best and worst experiences for me.  The worst because it is scary.  There is still a lot of stigma and prejudice around being gay.  There are still incidents where people are bullied, hurt or even killed because of it.  So, there is good reason to be scared.  It was also a hard thing to tell a lot of people in my life.  I can't imagine it's an easy thing for most people to tell their parents.  And I used to be part of a religious group where it is considered unacceptable. I wasn't sure what to expect from some of my friends from that group.

Now for the best part.  My parents have been great.  Still not sure how my dad feels about it all but, as expected, he hasn't treated me any differently.  My mum is more vocal so I know how she feels.  In the end they have been so supportive and have let me know how much they love me.  Really knowing they are in my corner, even when things are hard, has been a huge source of strength. What more could you ask for? My sister also has been amazing and supportive.  And my friends, great.  I really didn't need to be afraid of reactions of the people in my life at all.

Now for the even better part.  Coming out has lifted a humungous weight off my shoulders.  You know when you have a secret to keep how hard it is?  Well, I have been burying this secret for 25 years.  In hindsight I am amazed at the methods I devised to even convince myself that I was straight.  But, now that the truth is out, I can see that they were all just coping mechanisms to keep this out of sight.  

For the first time since I was a kid, I feel really connected to who I am.  I feel like I am able to really be myself.  I don't need elaborate coping mechanisms to keep myself going.  I can be authentic and real.  It is so much less work and such a better way to live.  I am me and I feel free.  It's an incredible feeling really.


Amazed

I was out walking today and got to thinking about my life a year ago and now.

I am still so often amazed at how different things are now.  I really never would have believed that life wasn't that hard, that everything wasn't crappy.  When I think on it, I must have had the depression for a long, long time because I don't really remember life being any different, I just thought that's the way things were.  It didn't seem to matter what I did, or how hard I tried I couldn't make things better.

Now I see how ill I really was.  I find myself now looking at some of the things I do and being amazed that I even can.  I managed to ask for and get a change to my work hours to 4 days.  I never would have thought that possible.  And the truth is this seems a bit against what society tells us to do and yet, I don't care.  I have managed to come to terms with my sexuality.  That to me is hard to fathom still.  I really did that, I was really able to see myself and what matters to me and then do something about it.  I was well practiced in the art of hiding so to come out of hiding is so "wow" for me.  I see myself more and more really caring about what matters to me and doing something about it.  Most often it is not big, but I am standing up for myself.  The bigger thing behind this is knowing what matters to me.  I never really knew that before.  I just went along to get along, but in the end that was destroying.  These are a few examples.

I am so in awe of myself in so many ways.  I can't believe I am able to do all of this and that really it is not that hard.  I assume this is what "normal" feels like (without depression).  It's just so amazing to me that life can be like this.

Monday 26 September 2011

Stress and Depression

Lately I've been feeling pretty down again.  Not as bad as I was once, but still not great.  My job has also had a lot going on.  I've been trying not to let it get to me, but I haven't been succeeding.

When things are going ok, or are pretty low key I seem to be able to manage just fine.  When things get difficult or stressful, I find I am having a hard time letting the stress go.  This is turn makes it harder for me to cope with things.  I've been trying to tell myself that it is just work and that it is not causing me stress.  Ha ha, nice try.

What I can see though is progress.  I am thinking about this and wondering what to do, instead of feeling just plain awful.  When I can see myself doing this, it makes me feel better in some ways because I know that even though I am feeling down and feeling like I am having a tough time coping, I am better in some ways.

So then, I guess the next question is what to do?  How to manage this situation in order to feel better?  Recognizing what is going on is the first step.  Knowing that the deadlines and the intensity at work is getting to me is critical in the path forward.  Remember what importance and value I put on work is also important.  Remembering that while work is a good thing, it is not everything and I don't need to let it be everything.  Remembering that I care about my job, but it is not at the top of my list of things to care about.  Remembering that I am doing the best that I can and that just has to be good enough.  And knowing that this situation is temporary.

Ok, this is helping.  It is helping me to see that my reaction is not entirely about the current situation, some of it has to do with some previous trauma in my life.  It is also helping me remember that I value lots of things in my life, a number of them way more than my job.

Friday 23 September 2011

Checking back into life

I just finished reading Portia de Rossi's memoire about her struggle with anorexia and being gay, called "Unbearable Lightness".   There is a line in the epilogue that really struck a chord with me.  It goes, "Being sick allows you to check out of life.  Getting well again means you have to check back in."

For me, a lot of my depression came, and still comes, when I feel ignored, or invisible.  For so long I only wanted someone to notice me and yet I did everything in my power to make sure that no one did.  It's twisted, I know, but it's a mental illness and that's the way it works.  When I finally was diagnosed with depression I found that I all of a sudden got lots of attention.  People were worried, I guess rightly so actually.  I ate up the attention.  But I still didn't really believe I deserved it.

The challenge is how to live being well and not feel the same feelings.  How do I get the attention I need, but in a positive way, is a better way to ask.  So much of it for me is being aware of my needs and asking others to consider them.  This usually isn't a big thing, but when you are used to being invisible asking for anything is hard.  Some little examples; when scheduling an event that you want me to be at, please consider my schedule; making sure I am part of conversations if I have something to say; expressing my preference of restaurants, movies, activities... etc...  The list goes on.

I am getting a lot better at these things.  So much of it isn't about practice, but about believing that I deserve to have my needs and wants considered.  I still have moments when I crave attention, but generally I am better about going out and finding it.  I will make a point of visiting my parents or my sister instead of staying home alone.  I'll call a friend.  I'll write an email or a blog.  And when I do all of these things I am slowly, slowly getting better at telling people when I am hurting, instead of pretending that everything is ok.  It's a process that starts with paying attention to myself and continues with letting other people care for me when I need it.

Sunday 18 September 2011

Relapse, sort of

A friend of mine recently told me she was glad to see the changes in me, so I asked her what kind of changes she saw.  She said I seem happier and also more nervous when I talk.  In her view this wasn't anything bad.  In my view it is not bad, but it the nervousness is a sign that things aren't quite right with me.

In so many ways things are better than they were, but there has also been a lot of change in the last 9 months or so.  Most of the change is good change, but it is still hard to grasp it all and really know what to do with it.  I know myself better in a lot of ways.  I know I am gay, I know I have a tendency to put myself last and not even consider that I have my own needs to be met, I know that I feel things with other people - I can't be a bystander to others emotions and I know that my old ways of being and coping are not healthy in a lot of ways and lead me to a bad place.

What I see now though is a me that doesn't quite know how to act in a lot of situations.  When I feel off or insecure I find myself falling back to a lot of my old coping mechanisms.  The major one is to be all chipper and outgoing and laugh a lot.  Not that any of these things are bad, but they can also come across as nervous and likely this is what my friend is seeing in me.  I also know that for me acting like this is an act, an act I use to hide how I really feel.  I know that on some level we all do this, but for me it is exhausting because it is often so far from what is really going on with me.  It also means that in the moment I am not really aware of my feelings, which can lead to bad situations sometimes.  

In the end if often feels like I am back to square one.  I know this is not true, but it doesn't change how I feel.  After an evening of acting like this, like last night, I feel drained, down, depressed and desperately in need of time alone to recover.  I know from this that I need to find a different way to handle situations where I am feeling insecure and not quite sure of how to be.

So, what to do about it?  I guess just articulating that this is what I am doing is the first step.  How to move forward?  Not too sure.  Guess it is something to think about.  Any suggestions, experiences or thoughts?

Friday 16 September 2011

Fear and Hope

Mental illness is scary.  Being diagnosed with depression and anxiety scared the crap out of me.  And to make matter worse, the diagnosis came when I was at a point where I couldn't cope anymore, so my brain really wasn't working in a normal way.  I was scared to take medications, scared to tell people, scared to keep going, scared to stop, just plain scared.

Mental illness is also scary for people who don't have it.  It is unknown, it makes people act in unpredictable ways.  Depression can so often take over an ability to be rational and to problem solve so people will look like drama kings and queens.  It is scary to watch someone change and act is strange ways.  Because mental illness is not well understood it is scary and hard to know what to do.

So how do we make it better?  How do we provide hope, both for those with mental illness and those who care about them?  I really believe sharing our stories, caring about other people, really listening, making a point of knowing each other will help.  I write this blog and share my story publicly partially because it helps me, but also I hope because it helps others.  I hope it gives hope to other people that things won't always be horrible, or that they are not alone or whatever it is that they need.  I know that having people in my corner has been such a critical piece of feeling better and I want other people to know that there are people who will be in their corner.  I will if you need.

Depression doesn't really scare me anymore.  I live with it everyday.  Will I ever be cured?  Who knows?  At some point I will attempt to stop taking the anti-depressants and see if I can manage.  If I can awesome, if not I will keep taking them.  Can I manage my depression and live with it in a way that means depression doesn't define my everyday?  I really believe I can.  I am learning some of the triggers for me and I have also dealt with so much of the stuff that contributed to it.

Everyday I choose to find a way to be better, to live in a good way, to know that depression isn't all of me.  I am bigger than that.  On bad days, it is pretty overwhelming, but most days are good.  For me it's a choice I have to make over and over and over again.  It would be easy to let myself be depressed but I know that there is a better way.

A great article

This article explains so well what depression feels like.  I am so glad to see that people are talking, but it makes me sad that it took a suicide to inspire this one.

http://www.tsn.ca/story/?id=375694

Tuesday 13 September 2011

Interactions

I was talking to someone at work today about how we treat people, especially those we work with and it was interesting.  We got to talking about how organizations are set up so people are at different levels in the organization.  I see that somehow this, to a lot of people, means we treat people differently depending on where they are.  I learned a long time ago that this is not the way I want to be with others.  In any work environment everyone is there because they have a role to play in the success of the organization.  I truly believe we need to treat people that way.  My co-worker was talking about how everyone wants to feel like they are contributing and respected no matter what level they are at.  I love this way of looking at things.

By extension, I got to thinking about how we treat anyone we think is better or worse than us. The truth is that we all have our stories to tell and we all have joy and sorrow in our stories.  This is often hard to remember and it is oh so tempting to look down on people or be intimidated by people for no reason other then their "place" in society.

Now that I find myself part of at least 2 groups of people that are often looked down on - those with mental illness and gay people - my conviction that we should treat people as people is stronger.  It's not that we need to be friends with everyone, or even accept their choices, but just to know that we will never know the whole story behind who they are.  This to me is a critical piece of how I want to view the world.  I know from my own experience that the essential of who I am hasn't changed because of better understanding myself and I am sure this is true of others as well.

Sunday 11 September 2011

How?

Another bit of writing about old stuff that is slowly working its way out.

Today was so hard
How do I make myself get up and do it again tomorrow?
No chance of sleeping much, too much anxiety for that.
What will she do tomorrow?
Will she yell, belittle, intimidate?
Who will she do it in front of this time?
Why me?
What information will she keep from me?
How will I make it through?
How will I meet the unrealistic expectations?
Why won't anyone listen to me or do anything?
Surely they must see what she does.
I feel so alone and helpless.
One of these days I will have to get out of here.
If no one will help, I will have to find a way myself.
But how?
I hope it is soon.  I'm not sure how much longer I can hold on.

Emotions Part 2

I have found myself to be very emotional the last couple of days.  All the 9/11 talk and reliving the weirdness of that and I found out yesterday that someone I used to know quite well died about a month ago at the age of 47.

When I have strong emotions I really don't know how to handle them.  It seems very overwhelming to me to feel anything that strongly and to know what to do.  The struggle for me is to keep feeling the emotions and not bury them because it is difficult to manage.  They say practice makes perfect and I have never had a lot of practice with feeling emotions, not strong ones anyhow.  I guess I will have to keep letting myself feel them to know how it is that I react to that.

Even now as I write this I find myself feeling very sad.  Sad that I don't really know what to do with emotions, sad for lost time, sad for the me that felt so bad for so long, sad for the family of the person I used to know.  I will let myself feel sad and know that the grieving process is normal, but for me it is going to be very challenging for awhile as I have never really had any practice.

Supporting and being supported

I've been trying to figure out for a bit today how to write about my day yesterday.  It brought me face to face with my own growth and strength and acceptance of my life and so it seems important to write about, at least it is important for me to sort through it.

I went for a coffee with a lady who is struggling very hard with her sexuality and really seems to have no one to talk to.  Her situation is much more complicated than mine was in that she is married (to a man) and has a son, but is pretty sure she is gay.  

Anyhow, talking to her made me realize how non-traumatic my own acceptance of being gay has been.  Really, accepting that I had depression and would need medications to sort that out was much harder.  Once I really could see that I am gay, I haven't really had any trouble accepting it or knowing it to be true.  I never had a sense that this was a problem, only that I wanted to be sure.  I also really never contemplated that I had a lot to lose by coming out.

The last bit speaks of two things.  The first, I believe, is that I was ready to be myself and stop hiding and so was able to be open about what was going on.  The second speaks to the people I have surrounded myself with.  I wasn't really concerned about losing friends or support networks.  There were a few people I was more nervous to tell than others, but even their reactions have been just fine.

I can see how much I have come to understand about what I need to be happy.  I need to feel free to be me, free express myself, my joys and sorrows, my successes, failures and challenges etc... I need to be able to tell my story when it is relevant and feel like it is ok to have this story.

It's funny in a way, because after I met up with her, I went to visit some other ladies who are a couple and have been out for a long time.  I wanted to talk to them to be supported in my journey.  It is so nice for me to talk to people who are settled in their lives and settled about being gay.  I can see that for now, because it is new, it feels big and important.  While it will always be a part of who I am I like to see that it is really not the big deal it feels at the beginning.  It is so nice to have a sense that my own acceptance of it is normal and moving onward and upward is really all there is left to do.

Friday 9 September 2011

Taking stock

Wow, I realized today that I've been writing this blog for 6 months already.  Where does the time go?  It seems like a good time to look back and take stock of things.

When I look at how I felt 6 months ago, and 1 year ago, I'm amazed at how far I've come.  I was so depressed, so sad, so numb, so unable to cope.  I had no idea how I was feeling at any given moment, I didn't pay any attention to what I needed, I didn't know I was gay.  That's a lot of things that have changed.   A lot of successes.  It certainly hasn't been easy, and a lot of the time it hasn't been fun.  I've had to feel and sort through all sorts of emotions, some of them old hurts.  Frankly, this process was often terrible.

I've learned and grown and gained a lot of strength from this process.  I have learned so much about who I am and what it is that I need and what makes me happy.  I'm learning to stand up and ask to have my needs met, I'm learning to take my space in the world.  I'm learning that I deserve to have my needs met and I don't have to pretend that I don't have any.  I'm learning that if I am truly being myself in a situation and it isn't working then it is the situation that needs to change, not me.  I am learning to feel my feelings, good, bad or ugly and not pretend like I don't have any.  (As I write this section I find myself in tears).

I have rediscovered some of my friends through this and made some new ones.  I am continually amazed at what other people will do to help and how much people really do care about me.  At one point before all of this, I never would have believed that there could be so much care and love in my life.  I am grateful for that and for the support I have received so far.

There are still bad days, still bad moments, still times when I actually wonder if things are better.  Of late I feel like I am processing so many of the hard emotions from depression (as you will see from some previous posts).  It's not so much that I feel like that, but I need to find a way to express what was for so long impossible for me to express.  It feels good to be able to put words to things that were so awful for me.

I have a feeling that this journey is not over, but I am well on my way.  I no longer see myself in the same way and I have a hope and joy that I never could have imagined.

I agree

I agree with this article that discussion and conversation are critically important.  Thank-you all for being a part of my discussions.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2011/09/09/suicide-prevention-concert.html

Monday 5 September 2011

Say nothing

I will preface this bit of writing to sat that it is working through old feelings and does not represent how I feel today.

Look at me.  I'm here.
And yet I say nothing.
I'm not invisible, am I?
And yet I say nothing.
Don't notice me because you might see me hurt.
And yet I say nothing.
I'm hurting so much.  I want you to notice and care.
And yet I say nothing.
I want you to notice even though I purposely hide it.
And yet I say nothing.
I need you to tell me it's going to be ok.
And yet I say nothing.
I need you to tell me this pain will end.
And yet I say nothing.
I don't know how much longer I can take the pain.
And yet I say nothing.
I can't see how this will ever be better or different.
And yet I say nothing.
Maybe death is a way out, it must be easier.
And yet I say nothing.
I could walk in front of that truck right now.
And yet I say nothing.
I'm so scared, I don't want to die.
And yet I say nothing.
I can't go on living, no only existing, like this.
And yet I say nothing.
I don't know what to do.
And yet I say nothing.
I'm so scared, so scared.
And so I do nothing.

Thursday 1 September 2011

Invisible

I feel invisible, like people don't even notice I am there.
I don't take up my own space in the world.
If I am invisible, then I can't get hurt.
I am invisible to myself though, and this hurts a lot.

It's like you see me, but look right past me.
My being there is irrelevant to you.
I don't stand up and say "look at me, I matter".
I don't believe I matter.

Slowly I start to believe I matter.
I am no longer invisible to myself, but I am unknown.
Look at me, listen to me, pay attention to me.
I  have some space in this world and I will learn to occupy  it.

I am visible, I will  make you see me.
My being there will be relevant, whether you like it or not.
I am visible, I matter, I will ask to be recognized.
I see myself, you see me, I am not longer invisible.

Providing hope

When I saw the news today of yet another NHL player dead, through an apparent suicide, it made me want to write.  Hockey players are public figures and so we hear about their actions.  I wonder how many everyday people are also at the end of their rope, trying suicide, contemplating it?  I know that I have been at the edge of my rope and close to ready to end it all.  It is a scary and lonely place to be.  Thankfully for me, some part of me remembered that there are people out there who care about me, even if I was struggling with really feeling it at that moment.

I wonder perhaps if we all need to take it on ourselves to pay more attention to others.  We so often assume that if people are having a hard time they will reach out for help.  My experience with depression has shown me that so often that is exactly when we are unable to reach out.  I know I would have loved for someone to ask me what was going on.  I felt invisible and yet was not able to make myself visible.  I needed other people to be strong for me.  I am not really sure what the solution to all this is, but talking about our struggles, finding safe places to be ourselves, totally and completely, letting the people who care about us be strong for us sometimes, letting people know that we don't hold any stigma on mental illness and they can talk, letting people know they are not invisible.  I suspect how to do all of this, and whatever else will help, will be unique to each person, but it needs to be done.

It makes me so sad to know that people are hurting so much and are so out of hope that they end it all.  I know, especially now, that there is hope.  Even on my rough days now, I know that things will be better and that there is hope and love in the world.  My wish is that this blog will in some small way help others know that also.