The only person besides my doctor who knows about any of this is my wife. None of my family, my friends, nor my co-workers, know this level of detail I’m about to provide.
I know I stole this title, but before reading this entry, please read the following blog entry by Wil Wheaton, My name is Wil Wheaton. I Live With Chronic Depression and Generalized Anxiety. I Am Not Ashamed. It’s about an 18-minute read, but it has helped me significantly over the years. I have had this post open as a tab in Chrome on my phone to help me get through my depression and anxiety.
In a previous blog, I mentioned that my family took a trip to Mexico. What I didn’t say is on the second day, my wife had to take the kids out to do activities because I was stuck in my room due to anxiety and could hardly function. I read Wil Wheatons’ blog entry to get me functioning again, and we had a wonderful week afterwards.
I’m also going to post the same disclaimer Wil Wheaton had in his blog post.
Before I begin, I want to warn you that this talk touches on many triggering subjects, including self-harm and suicide. I also want you to know that I’m speaking from my personal experience, and that if you or someone you know may be living with mental illness, please talk to a licensed and qualified medical professional, because I am not a doctor.
When I first started noticing something was different
My father passed away unexpectedly in March 2015. We were living in Pennsylvania at the time and had traveled back home to North Carolina for the funeral. While we were in NC, we had lunch/dinner with my wifes’ friend and her husband. While we were talking, I started noticing a weird sensation in my chest, I wasn’t sure what was happening. It felt like I was having trouble breathing. I would later discover this was me having an anxiety attack.
While my father was alive, I never worried about a single thing. He always could give me an answer that would make me feel better. And after his passing, things changed. I wasn’t sure what it was right away, but over time I realized I was trying to cope with depression & anxiety.
Before my father passed, we had already decided we were moving back to NC and hadn’t informed anybody of our decision. After we moved, I started having episodes more often, and I wasn’t sure what was the cause.
Initial Diagnosis - Headaches
I started having episodes more frequently, and I wasn’t sure what the cause was. One of the symptoms besides the weird chest pain/breathing issue, was a headache. This headache was weird because taking Advil/Excedrin didn’t help make it go away. After several meetings with my primary care provider, we decided to have me see a cardiologist.
In October 2015, I met with the cardiologist to have a stress test done. I ran the full 15 minutes on the treadmill and according to the cardiologist, everything looked great. Yet, we still didn’t know why I was having these weird episodes of chest pain/breathing issues. My primary care doctor ended up giving me medication to deal with headaches. I knew this still wasn’t the correct diagnosis as I continued to have the headaches.
First time I told anyone anything I was feeling
I can remember the exact date, June 11, 2017, that I said anything about how I was feeling. It was at my nephews’ birthday party, and time to go home. My kids weren’t listening about getting ready to leave. I started having an anxiety attack and panicking about getting them ready to go home. My sister and step-mom were trying to tell me how I needed to “calm down” and “chill out” because of how I was acting. I can’t remember the exact words, but I told them something to the effect of, “you don’t know what I’m dealing with, so don’t tell me to calm down.”
Once we all got in the car to go home, my wife didn’t understand why I had acted the way I had and asked me what was going on. I ended up telling her that, “you don’t feel like killing yourself, do you?” She was visibly stunned, and I could tell she was unprepared for what I had just told her. Our kids were 6 & 3 at the time, and she hoped that they hadn’t heard my declaration. We didn’t talk much on that ride home, but discussed what I said after we had put the kids to bed. I don’t remember much of the details. I know we cried a lot during that time, then didn’t talk about it much afterwards.
Affecting my work
In February 2019, I had started a new job as a Site Reliability Engineer. It was new field at the time and nothing like what I had done before in my career. It wasn’t the job I wanted, but I was desperate at the time, so I took what I could get. Shortly after starting this position, I met with my doctors some more about the headaches and that anxiety may be causing what I had been experiencing. I was referred to a psychiatrist, but couldn’t be seen until June.
A few months later, I realized this wasn’t what I wanted to do. I started having performance issues due to my anxiety. I was under a lot of pressure to deliver due to my title/position. One day, I made a mistake and messed up our production environment and didn’t realize it right away. I was later questioned as to what happened, and I didn’t really show any emotion about the entire situation. I had shut myself down to feelings and my superiors assumed that I didn’t care or accept responsibility for my actions. That was not the case, I just had gotten to a point where I didn’t want to show any emotions while in the workplace.
By June, my supervisor was regularly bullying me and trying to find a reason to fire me. I was trying to be seen by a psychiatrist as soon as possible so that I could have some protection under the Americans with Disabilities Act. That didn’t happen and my bully of a manager had me fired in July, even though I had told him and HR that I was dealing with anxiety and depression.
Getting Better
By September 2019, I began working with a new company as a contractor. I had also started taking medication that was improving the way I felt, and my life was beginning to get better.
Had it not been for COVID-19, I would have been hired full-time after 7 months. Instead, I needed to wait until just after 9 months to be hired. I felt great with the work I was doing and had a trusting manager at a much larger enterprise corporation, where environment and company made a huge difference.
Over the next months/years, I started feeling like my managers (and their managers) gained my trust (and they gained mine). I got to a point where I felt comfortable enough to tell them about my anxiety & depression. They were very understanding and would work with me on making sure we were all comfortable.
Unexpected Medical Issues
In early 2022, I had a couple of medical emergencies. The first was emergency stomach surgery to fix a hernia. The second was a heart attack where I received a couple of stents. Needless to say, I was not planning on these medical emergencies.
It was hard to cope with the first issue, but adding the second was even more difficult. My father, my uncle, & their father had all passed from heart attacks. I struggled at times with surviving my health issues and thought that maybe I should I have died from either event.
I would later return to life/work, it was weird sometimes talking to family/friends/neighbors/co-workers about what I had been through. I didn’t really have anyone I could relate to on what I had gone through.
I’m doing fine or so I felt
Eventually (July 2022), things felt like they were getting back to normal and that I was doing fine. Everything seemed well, I just didn’t feel happy. I discussed this with my wife about how it had been so long since I had felt happy, that I couldn’t remember what the feeling felt like.
I called to make an appointment with my psychiatrist and told him what I had been experiencing. He told me that there is medication that gives you a boost on top of the normal depression medications.
Since getting the change in medication, I feel totally different. My family and I went on a trip to Seattle, WA & Alaska, and it was absolutely amazing. I now feel like I have a purpose with what I want to do with my career and life.
Needing Help?
If you feel like you’re needing help. In the US, call 988 or go to 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. They have experts on hand to give you the help you are looking for. If you or someone you know needs help, please do something, you may just save a life.