mental health

May 4, 2022

The Soundtrack of My Life – 17 – (KR) Cube

One thing I have come to understand, at my very core, is that human beings are idiots. It takes us entirely too long, with far too many required lessons, for us to learn something. We have to be repeatedly told or shown a fact until it finally sinks in. And no one is more guilty of that fact than me. It doesn’t matter how self-aware I am, how much self reflection/analysis I do on a daily basis, or how clever I become, I am not. Without a doubt. Yesterday, in my inescapable whirlpool of rage, I screamed at the top of my lungs (while on the phone with my husband) that I have zero control over my life. And I fucking hate that. What’s ridiculous about that statement is that no one does. There is merely the illusion of it, but the cold hard fact about life is we don’t. Everything we have can be taken in an instant.

I chose this song because it comes from a time when I didn’t even have an “illusion.” My life was absolute chaos. The only goal being survival, because it was a “character building” path. What I gained from the experience was personal growth.

It’s eerie to me how even current events can align itself with even my own personal narrative. I had planned on doing “KR Cube” prior to the recent supreme court leak as it was the next logical step from the previous post about my first boyfriend. Yet, here I am once again having zero control over life.

Unfortunately I don’t speak Japanese. Even after the solid year I listened to Dir En Grey, I still couldn’t tell you what any of the songs were about. The lyrics come easy enough. I can spout off some without any accompaniment, but the meaning is lost entirely. I could have chosen their one English song from that time, but that’s too easy. (Although, “Child Prey” remains one of my most favorite.) What spoke to me through these songs was the music. It was loud, high tempo, erratic, and unpredictable. Then the band itself is hardcore death metal, where blood and almost “occult” ritual showmanship was the “perfect balance” to my prior Christian life.

The gore that accompanied Dir En Grey genuinely scared me when I was first introduced to them, the same day of my “first date” with Sergio. This group of friends identified as “goth.” They dressed all in black, listened to “counter culture” tunes, and was obsessed with the “occult.” They were rebelling against their parents and most of all society. I was entranced.

Up until this day I was a “goody two shoes.” I only ever fought with my parents over bad grades and missed assignments. This also came on the heels of my obsession with anything associated with the 1950’s. My dress and demeanor accompanied this self imagined “essence” of the time. So, when I watched the lead singer, Kyo, stick his index fingers as hooks into his mouth and “cut” himself, convulse, and spit out a mouthful of blood I was more than shocked.

Do I really want to go down this road? I thought to myself.

It turns out, I did. I was chasing a boy. And one does stupid things for “love.”

From these “goth” friends I ventured forth into uncharted musical territory. In addition to Dir En Grey, I listened to Slipknot, Korn, Staind, Bad Religion, System of a Down… anything that appealed to the constant anger dwelling just below the surface. This genre of music only appeals to me in these specific circumstances. Otherwise I cannot tolerate it. It’s grating and irritating. I like a voice I can hear and understand.

The ability to not comprehend what Dir En Grey was singing drove me crazy. I wanted to know what I was listening to. I am an audiophile and while I loved the music, I needed the lyrics to match the mood it was painting. At least, I did until I didn’t. Becky insisted on putting them on whenever we got into the car. In particular I remember her listening to KR Cube, from the passenger seat, and doing the same choreography the lead singer did from the concert DVD she watched daily.

So, my only choice was to go with the flow.

I spent every non-school moment with these friends, primarily Becky and Jose. She was my best gal-pal and we hung out constantly and when I got there, she would immediately call him to join us. I would chauffer her over to his mom’s apartment to pick him up. She had the biggest crush on him and the two are still the best of friends, while I am just a casual acquaintance. It was Jose, nicknamed Amie-sama, who introduced J-rock and anime into Becky’s and my lives.

While she took off at a sprint enjoying one series after another I genuinely struggled. I so wanted to like anime but try as I might I really do not. I can appreciate the art style and the cohesive story structure, but that’s where it ends. At least in regards to animated series. Later, when these two weren’t as prominent, I became obsessed with manga. It just sucks that it wasn’t when I could have enjoyed it with them.

It didn’t occur to me until I was ruminating on what to write about in this blog the other day, that this period of my life was only about six months. At the time it felt so much longer, and prior to breaking it down I would have sworn it had been at least two years. I don’t know if that speaks to the ease of that time or the struggle.

As I previously mentioned, this was a journey for character building.

While Becky and I were very similar (both late in life babies, only children, who went to Christian school) where we were most alike was mental health. I had undiagnosed depression and she was (also undiagnosed) bipolar. She has made leaps and bounds with her mental health and honestly is not the same person. I wish I could say the same.

I don’t want you to get the impression that she was some kind of monster. Far from it. It’s just not ever having been around someone struggling with mental health can be a lot to handle. During this time her mood swings were wide but I learned to move with them. This is where I learned to love someone despite what they said and did. Being around her 95% of the time was an absolute blast. No one can make me laugh like she can, truly. But, there were some dark moments when he anger got the best of us. In turn I became angry too.

Dealing with my first true heartbreak, my own and others mood swings, and knowing my mother would be appalled to know I was a faguette, held me in this constant state of anger. Like the buzz of electricity through high voltage power lines. This was only exacerbated due to my inner struggle fighting against the current of my previously held religious beliefs. Nothing is harder to undo than the years of religious brainwashing. I’m still dealing with it and I haven’t believed since I was 17. But once I held Sergio’s hand for the first time, I ditched them without a second thought. I refused to associate with something that would keep me from feeling the love and acceptance I felt just being with who I wanted.

An awesome highlight from this time was that I got so many traffic tickets with my provisional license that I lost it for 6 months. One time I ran a red light, a couple blocks from where I work today, and nearly went head-on into a cop car. What made that traffic stop EXTRA FUN was the giant, bright orange construction cones I had in the back seat of my car, with “Property of Kern County” spray painted onto the sides. The cop joked with me about having a “fuzzy navel” or a “Sex on the beach” but didn’t make a peep about the cones.

The final traffic ticket that suspended my license was from doing 85 in a 65, on the way home with Becky and her then boyfriend. My car at the time was a station wagon and the speedometer maxed out at… 85. The cop claimed to have clocked me doing 90, but wrote 80 on the ticket. This had happened out of town and I was sure he wouldn’t show up to my court date. However, come the day of my trial, the judge sat and WAITED for him to get there. The judge and I had become quite familiar with each other.

Since then I have gotten maybe 2 tickets and I avoid traffic court at all costs because of the anxiety it brings me.

May 15, 2020

The Circus Came to Town

Two days ago I had a moment of pure depression cross like thick nimbostratus over my brain. My heart sunk in the shadows and I lost all hope. I was left with next to nothing but these feelings of unsurpassed dread and hopelessness. And in that moment I didn’t care anymore. I didn’t care about living.

Now, I could never kill myself. (Well… never say never) But in my lowest moments I still have so much ego that I can’t fathom ending my own life. And since I have been through this circus many times before, I understand that this sideshow will eventually pull up stakes and leave town. It is that last piece of knowledge that curbs any thoughts of suicide. Yet, it does remind me that living with depression is literally one thought away from death.

After taking a short reprieve from twitter and the news, I have found myself again. I am not my usual manic happy, but I am better than where I was. I still am having a difficult time seeing the point in life, but that is it’s biggest and unanswerable question.

I have nothing of note to offer you here, unfortunately. All I can do is share my experience and offer a reminder that (if you have depression) you CAN get through it. It just so happens that I am lucky enough to have swings that are usually VERY broad and very fast. (The down swings don’t typically last for very long.) So at least I have that going for me.  Well, that and the quartz belief that “this too shall pass.” Nothing in life is permanent.

September 12, 2019

Midnight Terror

These trials of error with my mother living “on her own” are proving my initial response to be the only course of action.

That past few days she’s missed her anti-psychotic pill. Either it gets caught in the crook of her finger and she misses it, or she’s deliberately not taking it. I don’t believe it is the second because she’s very good when given instruction. Regardless, it has brought back some of the hallucinations.

The woman we hired to intermittently care for my mother throughout the day informed me this morning that my mother told her that she awoke to a man standing in the room and a disembodied female voice telling her “he’s not supposed to be here.” This little episode holds true to a video I previously viewed last night.

After Jessica (the caretaker) spoke to me on the phone about the missed medications, I went back through the recordings to see if she had woken up at any odd hours, which indeed did happen. I noticed that she had awoken at a quarter to one, and when I viewed it I saw my mother panicked, rushing from the bathroom whispering “oh, god. Oh, god.” She hurriedly climbed into bed and wrapped the blanket around her. The video ends there. So I don’t know what else had occurred after until the next video showed my mother moving in her room at 3:30 that same morning. Upon reviewing those I just saw her organizing the things in her bedroom, which she tends to do during a manic episode.

There was only one video from last night where she awoke, again, around 3 A.M. In it she is standing at the edge of her bed looking around at what seems to be an unfamiliar place. There is panic etched into her ghostly white face. Again, the video stops recording before I see what she does next. However I can only conclude she got back into bed because the next video recording isn’t until 6 A.M.

All of this could be remedied by getting her into an assisted care facility. I haven’t broached that subject with her (even still) because she is adamant, without hearing the term “facility” or “home,” that she wants to be at her house. And I understand that. She wants familiarity during a time when she’s lost the man she spent 24/7 with while simultaneously navigating losing her identity. I want to give her what she wants but… At what cost? Either I pay an insane amount of money for her to share a room in an unfamiliar place, which would cause terror, or continue on this current path and have her terrified there.

Every day I curse “god” and life for laying this bullshit at my feet. I am caught between what should happen and what my mother wants. I want her to be happy, but in the end nothing seems to make her happy. The one thing I dread doing is moving the husband, the K-9 brood, and myself into the house. That I absolutely refuse to fucking do. I keep telling myself “I want to live in MY house,” but isn’t my mother saying the same thing?

June 20, 2019

Historic Parallels

I need to write. It has been some time and I feel all of these emotions welling up inside of me. In usual “Josh” fashion I will decompress by letting some of it out for mental relief.

Last night, when I was attempting to sleep, I would slowly drift off and then wake up in an abrupt panic. To what I can remember, one of them was that someone was in my bedroom and then the other was about my mother. After the one regarding mom I turned on my ringer, just in case.

My mother has been having delusions. She had them awhile ago in the form of thinking that my cousin, her nephew, is dead. Legitimately no longer among the living. I had to video chat with him to prove he wasn’t. My mother was elated that he wasn’t gone, however even among that proof her brain somehow turned his death into “in prison.” For whatever reason, with a few more days under our belt, that all went away and she never spoke of it again.

After her brain scan, showing the substantial decrease in brain mass, the doctor prescribed her something for the delusions. But first we had to get her off the Lexapro the previous nurse practitioner had prescribed for the misdiagnosis of “stress and depression.” Once she was weened off of that we began these. That was a nightmare.

After just the second 1/3 of the actual dose, she was becoming aggressive and manic. As a knee jerk reaction I told my father to stop it and we would try again down the road.

For awhile she was okay, but not good. It wasn’t until this past Saturday when my mother was explaining to me about seeing people in the mirror, who moved and talked, that I decided it was best to try again.

This had the same result as it had before. So much so that my father tossed one of his xanax down her throat to calm her down, because she would not sit still, would not stop crying, and was basically “freaking out” (per my dad.)

I went over to visit her the day he called and she was there, happy as a clam. I guess after getting some sleep she was doing alright and had mellowed out. We then decided to try again, but this time at night (which should have been last night.) My biggest worry is that she freaks out again, and my secondary being my father not even giving it to her because of how she had responded. The second I absolutely understand. I don’t know how I would have handled the situation at all. Especially since I don’t have a bevvy of pills at my disposal. Thank god my dad is a prescription drug addict.

Whats funny is I have been in this reality once before.  When I was six, my father had a mental breakdown and ended up in a mental hospital. He was seeing demons coming out of the mirror and was out in the backyard swinging around a broom trying to kill them. He did the second for so long that he gave himself blisters and had to wear kitchen gloves to keep going.

When I brought this up to my mother about her seeing people in the mirror, she dismissed me out of hand. She said something to the effect of “yeah but that’s the physical realm.” The woman can barely find the words she wants to use to express what she wants to say, but she pops off with “physical realm.” (Jesus… shoot me.)

When the husband and I visited her on Tuesday, she was herself. Calm and collected. She even understood how “crazy” she had been. What we also learned is that her cousin (who she explained had been born a couple months before her and was her best childhood friend) is not long for this world, from alzheimers.

I remember my mother coming home and explaining how her cousin had acted weird at he and his wife’s 50 year wedding anniversary. It wasn’t long after that, that he was diagnosed with alzheimers. Now, he’s dying. The beginning of this tale was maybe 2 years ago. Now… He’s dying.

This last part feeds into my own diagnosis. I estimated my mother maybe had a year or 2 years left. I concluded this just by the brain scan and seeing how quickly her mental health is declining. And then hearing this… Maybe I’m not far off.