Sometimes Things Aren't What They Seem

          When I first started writing this blog I had no intention of turning it into an autobiography. My intention was to write a few of the things I have gone through in the hopes it would help someone avoid some of the mistakes I made. Somehow however it has turned into a long walk down memory lane, and although some memories are better left alone I can not tell the story of my journey and leave any thing out. The things I have seen and the things I have done will probably shock some people but if it helps them avoid some of the places I have been to, well that's a good thing. When I speak of my alcohol and drug addiction at this point in the story we are still at the beginning which was 15 years ago. I was just beginning my journey into addiction and homelessness and was still unaware that I was suffering from severe depression. I have read and watched on TV stories about depression about drug and alcohol abuse and the homeless and believe me most of the so called experts have no clue. I have traveled the road from Key West, Fl. to Seattle Wa. sleeping outside and in homeless shelters  in from one to another and all points in between. So here we go.
        I remember the ride from the VA hospital to the Mental Institution. It was about 30 miles away and they had some nurse in the back of the ambulance watching me.I guess they thought I was going to try something on the trip but they had pumped so much Thorazine into me I could not take a piss by myself let alone kill myself. I just remember this nurse sating next to me holding a syringe in her hand the whole trip. I guess she thought the sight of it would keep me in place. She was right.  The one thing  remember most about my first trip to the Lock-up as we called it, they lock you on a floor and only you out 2 times a day. Supervised smoke breaks, if you don't smoke you will start just to go outside. Anyway the thing that sticks out the moist was my roommate. He would spend 2-3 hours every night having a conversation with the door knob. One night while he was talking to the door knob one of the orderlies came in and when he opened the door my roommate got mad and jumped on the orderly. I guess he was mad that the orderly interrupted his conversation and went nuts. What I didn't know was that my roomate was a professional kick boxer. About 15 minutes and 20 orderlies later they were able  to get him down and shoot him up full of Thorazine. They took him to the T-room (room were they took people to tie down and medicate) and that was the last I ever saw of him. I heard that they shipped him off to the permanent Mental Institution. They kept me there for two weeks and then one day woke me up and said it was time to go. When I told them I had no where to go they looked at me and said not there problem. Thus begins my journey into the world of homelessness.

Living with Depression - One of Those Days

        Hard to describe what today feels like. This is one of those days when tomorrow seems so far, far away. Had one of those attacks this morning where fear of the outside world took over. It's hard to describe but it feels like the world is on fire and if I step outside I will be burned alive. Every time I get close to the door I feel these small needles poking into my skin, feels like rubbing a Brillo pad across my arm. The new medication my doctor gave me makes me want to get up and move around but does nothing for the depression and the parts of my mind it controls. I have had a difficult time lately with a lack of energy. For those of you not familiar with severe depression and think like I used to, that depression was only when you were sad about something, one of the effects of Severe Depression is a lack of energy, a lack of any desire to get up and accomplish anything. There are also quite a few more problems depression causes both mental and physical but we will not get into them just yet. Anyway my doctor thought it might be a good idea to boost me up a little so she decided to subscribe a new medication that does just that. The problem however, she didn't take into account the panic attacks that seem to come more often these days. So here I am full of get up and go in the middle of a panic attack. Sometimes they will last for 3-4 days, hope not this time.
         Most people think that when you suffer from and attack like this suicide what I think about, to be honest there has been a couple of times when that was true. I've been locked up three times in a psychiatric hospital with my belt and shoe laces taken away from me. The first time they kept me in the emergency room for almost two days before they shipped me off to the loony bin. One thing everyone needs to know about me is I am not politically correct, and I no longer harbour thoughts of suicide.  Now I know the disease I suffer with and accept it for what it is. I understand everyday is a battle and some days are better than others. At the beginning though I was ignorant to my condition and ignorant to Severe Depression and the problems it causes. As I talked about yesterday I had turned to drugs to try to fill the hole that was inside of me and when crack cocaine and meth took every thing I owned and left me standing in the street that cold February night I thought life was over. At that moment in time I looked for life in me and found none. I was a dead man walking around looking for a place to lay down. Thank God for family and friends and a couple of good paramedics.
         When I say crack cocaine and meth to every thing away from me I do not mean to lay the blame on anything but myself. In my journey through the world of the homeless in the United States I encountered to many how blamed everyone and everything but themselves. On the the thing that contributed the most to my trip to the loony farm was my blaming nothing but myself. I believed that if I was so weak as to loose everything to drug addiction I did not deserve to live. Anyone who blow it all just to get high was worthless, or so I thought. I have since learned to forgive myself and although I still blame myself a great deal for how my life has turned out I now know that depression had a lot to do with it. Tomorrow we will get into that first trip to the farm and see the world of the mentally ill from the inside. See you guys there.    

Gateway To Nowhere

              I've heard that alcohol is not a gateway drug. I figured it must have been someone who either had never had a problem with addiction or someone in the middle of addiction who started this romor and rumor is what it is. you have to ask yourself what lead to the problem in the first place. If, as most alcoholics do, the reason for drinking in the first place is to cover up something such as pain, loneliness, a feeling of no self worth , or fear believe me when I say it will not be long before alcohol will not be enough. It's like covering a hole with a thin blanket and as the storms come and the wind blows sooner or later the blanket starts to tear and small holes appear. As we try to cover these holes we just can't keep up with the storms and larger and larger holes begin to appear and when we realize the covering we are using is no longer strong enough we reach for something stronger. I am the hole, Deppression is my storm, drugs and alcohol is my blanket

             I often wonder how many of those society classifies as addicts are people suffering from mental illness. The bigger question is how many of them are even aware they suffer from mental illness. I had no idea I suffered from depression until my primary care physician told me and no idea how severe until I visited the Mental Health Facility at the VA.  My next question would be if they did know and found a treatment that worked would they still be addicts. I mean if you filled the hole would you still need the blanket. How many people go through 12 step programs and rehab programs that only repair the blanke and does nothing to fill the hole. I have fallen off the wagon so many times I finally stoped trying to get back on. Was afraid I'd get run over by one of the wheels.
           I remember when alcohol was no longer enough to cover the hole. I started with pot and was snorting coke before to long. Being high was the only way I could go out in public and have what I thought was a good time. I believed what I was doing was normal because all the people I was now hanging around with doing it. You know, going along with the crowd. I know now that the people I was hanging around with werejust as messed up as I was. People who were lonely, people who were afraid of life. I think the thing that attracted me o this crowd was the fact nobody asked questions. If I went to a party and sat in the corner by myself nobody would ask any questions. I think the ዎርሰ day in my life was the day someone introduced me to crack cocaine. What I thought was bad was about to get a whole lot worse. Depression is a master at hiding behind alcohol and drugs ad I believe it is depression that opens the gate. Depression is the gateway that leads to nowhere.
          
               

Sometimes Dark is Ok

        I often wonder how I would react if I was every to wake up and find myself normal again. What is normal anyway, maybe i am normal and everyone else is nuts. I don't know if normal is something to wish for or something to hide from. I watch all the NORMAL people walk around everyday and ask myself is this what I used to be like. I guess the saying, you never know how much you miss something until you loose it. It's the freedom from fear that I miss. I was watching a show on TV about the deeps of the Pacific Ocean and they showed these fish with these huge eyes. These particular fish live at the bottom of the ocean and over time have mutated to be able to see in the dark of the deep ocean. They said if one of these fish were to make it to the surface they would not be able to survive. They have lived in the dark so long they would not be able to live in the dark. I wonder if I have that same problem. Have I lived in the deeps for so long I will not be able to survive if I ever make make it to the surface. Do I cling on to the dark like and old friend because it has been with me for so long.
        Sitting in that dark, smelly bar for the first time I remember thinking to myself , is it always this dark in here? What a perfect description of life, walking out of a nice, warm, sunny day into a dark den of sadness. have you ever walked into a small local dive and really looked at the faces of the people that frequent the place. Faces filed with loneliness, hurt, and pain hiding behind alcohol and drug created smiles. What makes us believe that alcohol and drugs will make better will make all the pain go away. The crazy part is that we keep trying over and over again even when we know it does not work. I thought if I drank enough my fear of crowds would disappear. I forgot to mention that in a very short period of time my fear of standing in front of a crowd turned into a raging fear of any crowds. I found myself avoiding any gathering of humans without even realizing what I was doing. It was at a Super Walmart at 2:30 in the morning that I realized what I was doing. I was doing my weekly grocery shopping and I stopped and looked around and noticed I was practically alone. I had never done any shopping at 2:30 in my life. At first I thought it was my new found fondness for beer that was the cause. Later I would discover it was something much worse.
       

Who Turned Off The Light

           It was like one minute I was standing in the light, a warm comforting light much like standing in a warm bright sunlight on a clear spring day. The next minute it was like someone turned off the lights and I was standing all alone in a deep unpreventable darkness. A darkness that reminded me off one of those carnival shows they have at the state fair every year. One of those tents where you walk in and all of a sudden it gets so dark you can't see your hand in front of your face. One day I was living what I thought was  good life, a good job, active in my church, surrounded by many good friends or a least I thought so at the time, we'll get to that later, then the next minute all gone. One moment living in a good home the next sleeping in the back of my car. One moment a good job the next standing in line at the soup kitchen for my daily meal. One moment spending all my spare time working with my beloved church the next spending all my time at the local bar, on the days I could scrounge up enough money for beer. It didn't actually happen that fast it only seems that way now.
         Funny how days that seem to last forever always seem to have flown by 2 days later. When you find yourself afraid of every thing that moves not because you are actually afraid of them but because you are afraid of living. The hardest thing to express is fear. Fear of life is even harder. Some days I find myself so afraid that if I walk out the door something horrible is going to happen. Hard to understand being so afraid of dying you become to afraid to live. When I first discovered something was wrong on the inside of me I had no idea what it was or who to turn to. As I said earlier it was at a prison ministry and a christian youth group that fear first raised its ugly head. My wonderful friend seemed to take pride in telling me that I must have done something wrong and this was Gods punishment. An old preacher I used to listen to in my youth used to say God save me from the Christians. I now understand what he was talking about. The bad part is what I didn't know was things were only going to get worse from here.
        Memory is something that always amazes me. There are so many things about my life that I do not remember. I do remember however the first day I walked into that small bar on pass road. For a long time I thought that was the day every thing started to go bad. I blamed myself over and over for all the things that would follow and to some extent I still do. I am not now nor ever have been one to try to lay blame on everyone and everything but myself. As I have learned more about my condition and become more educated about mental illness I can look at myself in the mirror now without hollering at myself. some days are OK and some days are not, but I now know what the root cause is and take medication. Tomorrow We will continue on this journey into yesterday. My therapist tells me that this is good for me and I figure what harm can it do. See you guys on the morrow.           

A Walk Through Tomorrow

              If your not already depressed try moving. I just finished moving from Texas back home to Alabama. Funny, I how the place we grew up will always be home. I haven't lived in Alabama in 25 years yet it will aways be home. Maybe it's because most of my family still lives here or maybe it's because most of my fondest memories are here moving threw the trees like a sow fog. Seems to me that the older I get to more I cling to those memories of my youth. The days I thought I had something to worry about, the days that I used to think were going b to slowly. How I long for the days of hanging out at the standard gas station on Friday and Saturday night. The days of swimming in the pond just off that old country dirt road,but mostly the days when the word depression was meant for someone else.
             I was looking at a picture of myself this morning. I was 4 years old according to the writing on the back. I do not remember taking that picture but I could from the background that I was in my Grandparents backyard. I don't remember ever looking in a mirror and seeing that 4 year old face looking back at me. I noticed however,  a smile on my face that I do remember.  It was a smile that spoke of a time in my life that said all is right in the world, a smile that said the world is mine to conquer. Then my mind was drawn back to that group of young men and women and my new found discovery that all of a sudden I was scared to death of standing in front of crowds. Little did I know that this new discovery was just the beginning of a journey thru a darkness that few experience. A journey of alcohol, drugs, and homelessness.
           For a long time I thought the homeless was just something you saw on TV. Growing up in a small rural town in central Alabama homelessness was not something I had any experience with. This was something that only happen in the large cities in this country. A had a stereotypical few of the homeless as a old white male, long dirty white or grey hair, long unkempt greying beard, torn dirty rags as clothes. I could vision this person lying in a alley somewhere with a empty bottle of cheap wine. I would learn that it's mental illness that most homeless people suffer with. I now know that my struggles with alcohol and drug addictions was a direct result of my mental illness. I am happy to finally finish my moving and am trying to get accustomed to the changes that have occured in the last 25 years. I have learned that sometimes a walk through yesterday is what I need to get through today. Now that I have move I can return to writing about my struggle with severe depression and I hope you will make this walk with me. Till next time.

How Far is Tomorrow - In a Land Far Away

          So I have had my first experience with depression, if this is your first time here it would be a good idea to read the posting prior to this one, the only problem is I have not yet realized that it is depression I am dealing with. My mind is still stuck in the past, the past that tells me I can not be suffering from mental disease because I'm not locked up in any mental institution. My past tells me it must be something else. I keep telling myself that it is probably being locked in a room with a bunch of violent men that triggered this moment where I froze up. Some pent up fear that was laying dormant like a bear hibernating in the winter waiting for that perfect moment to rise up and announce its presence to the world. Maybe there was a hidden fear of where I was that had been in hiding just waiting to rear up and say here I am and there is nothing you can do about it. i convinced myself that must be it. So what do I do now. The one and only thing I could think of was to jump back in. What I don't realize is the many other signs that are screaming at me like a mother who screams when she first sees her child in trouble. I have since nothing is so blinding, nothing is so deafening than the past. Nothing keeps the world living in ignorance like the past. It can cover the present, it can cloak the future, it can be like a large chain tied around our bodies preventing us from new knowledge and new learning.  Don't believe me, ask the next person you meet about Mental Illness and what it means and you will see that the majority of the people in this country still live in the 60's and 70's. I must admit, if I was not having my own battle with depression I would still believe mental illness was something that affected only a few people and they where locked up in a home somewhere. I used to think, like 8 out of 10 in this country do, that depression was something that happened to a person when an event like a divorce or death caused that person to feel sad and they would get over it sooner or later.
          I remember about 2 or 3 days after my experience at the prison I had all but forgotten it. The following Thursday night I was to speak to a youth group at a local church. Beside speaking every Sunday at the county jail I would also speak at various youth groups around the local area. Speaking to young men and women was a responsibility I took very serious. On this particular Thursday evening I had prepared what I thought was a very good presentation. I had read and reread, rehearsed over and over and was really excited about standing in front of a group of young men and young women. When it was my time to speak I swiftly stood up, I now realize I was in a hurry to prove my previous problem just a one time thing, I walked swiftly to the stage, and started up the short stairway to the podium. I walked right up to that podium, set my notes down happy that every thing was back to normal. I looked out over the audience to see a group of eager faces ready to here what I had for them, I had spoken to this particular group on several occasions, And as soon as I opened my mouth I froze. Like a statue I stood there. So overcome with fear I could barely utter a word. I immediately turned around a walked back down the steps and proceeded to leave through the back door.  Now it had happened twice. The big problem however was I still did not recognize what was happening.What would happen next would shape my life for a very long time. That however is for another day.

Will We Ever Get There?

         I have always thought depression was something that made someone sad and how sad depended on how bad the depression was. I have learned this is not the case. I have learned depression is a illness just like any other illness. It comes in many different is is an expert at masking itself. It is believed that 1 out every 5 people in the United States suffer from some form of depression. Sometimes it is short lived and some times it last a lifetime. I can remember a time when standing in front of a crowd, large or small did not bother me at all. As a matter of fact I used to speak to groups of people, (some large, some small) on a weekly basis. Not to brag but I considered myself pretty good at it. I point to the fact that they kept asking me back. Back then I was involved in a prison ministry and would spend every Sunday afternoon at the county prison. This particular county prison held about 1300 inmates. It was something I enjoyed very much and use to look forward to all week. This particular prison was divided into 4 parts which they called blocks. A block, B block, C block, and D block. B block was where the violent felons and had been closed off to the prison ministry for 15 years. One Sunday  right before the service was about to start the prison chaplain called me over and asked me if I was interested in going into cell block B. Seems the warden was impressed with what I was doing and decided to open cell block B to the prison ministry. I said of course and remember how excited I was. From that point on every Sunday I would go into cell block B to hold services. It was the most rewarding time of my life. Every thing seemed to be going great until one Sunday I got up in front of the prisoners, about 75, and I was terrified. I could not move, I could not speak, it was like I was frozen. What I was terrified of I could not tell you, I just remember this feeling of complete dread. I said a few words I'm sure nobody could understand and got out of there as fast as I could. This was the first time I knew something was wrong, and thus began my journey of living life with depression. I'm sharing this and will continue to each day in the hope that if someone is suffering as I was and have not been able to figure out what's wrong, this will help them seek the help they need. There are many out there willing to help and I believe education about this sickness will help more than anything else. Have a good night I'll see ya later.

I Think I Missed It.

         I don't think a day goes by that I don't ask myself that question, how far is tomorrow. Some days it seems so far away that no matter how fast or how long I drive I'll never get there. Some days tomorrow seems like it's just around the corner, and some days it's like a little small town you sometimes drive through and your past it before you even knew you where there. Many many days I wake up and discover that tomorrow has become yesterday and I must have had my eyes closed because I missed it altogether. You see I suffer with Major Depression and according to my doctors I have for a very long time. Sometimes I think they tell me that just so they can make me more appointments ans subscribe more medications. That way they can justify there jobs. Most days however, I know what they tell me is true. Most people think that depression is something that makes someone sad and makes people think about suicide.  In some cases like mine it is completely the opposite. Before I talk about that I want to go back a little. growing up mental illness was one of those words you used to mask something else. Whenever you heard the words mental illness to describe someone that meant that person was crazy. When I was very young i lived in a neighborhood that had a place that was built much like an apartment complex is today. I remember asking my father what that place was and he told me it was the crazy house. Back then places of this sort were commonly referred to as the crazy house or the nut house.  So I grew up believing if someone was mentally ill that meant they were crazy or as we use to say retarded. So in my mind if someone suffered from mental illness that meant they went to live at a crazy house and if someone didn't live at one of those places that meant there was nothing wrong with them. I believe that it was these ideas that was planted into my head that caused me to go so long before I decided to see a doctor. I have decided to set down and write this blog in the hope that if there is anyone like me they will take something from this and come to understand there is hope. Many days I sit here in this small apartment in the middle of Texas to afraid to walk to the door, open it up and walk outside.I sit on my couch sometimes with the tv on sometimes without. Sometimes I can sit for days by myself no tv no radio no computer and just stare at the door. I sit there wondering about whats on the other side. I think I know how Alice felt when she was staring through the looking glass wondering what's on the other side. I listen to the cars go by, the people walk by, searching for the courage to get up and walk outside. What is it I'm so afraid of. Now that I know i can talk about it however that is for another nite.