on Mental Health: Therapy

After a weird month, I’m still sitting here with Connie. Connie is my therapist, but it’s not my first trip to a mental health professional. This is my second resort – my previous efforts, forced upon me at 13 years old after my dad passed, ended in confusion and anger. This time the trip is completely voluntary; I know that this is necessary, but I still feel defensive about all of it. I still feel like I’m here against my will.

My twenties were weird. I was a workaholic. So much so that I missed a lot of special moments with family. I started my own company. It crashed and burned. I casually dated. The girls mostly ghosted me after a couple months. I worked for a high-profile agency. I only lasted 1.5 years there. I was very social. It was mostly with the wrong crowds. I never really felt I belonged in any room I was in.

I feel like most strong-willed people would have shrugged it off, but I have let it affect me so much that a couple of my closest friends had suggested I seek help. They could tell that I was not in a good place. The breaking point was when I lost my job at said agency. Simply put, I cracked at the immense pressures of the job, unable to handle and balance them with my personal issues at home. I decided to leave the company at the worst possible moment: in the middle of a massive project with a new client, I called my boss and quit over the phone, cancelled my flights, and left my work shit at the office front door. From there, it spiraled further: I could not communicate with friends or family. I was drinking so damn much, spending nights alone at bars talking to anyone within earshot, faking smiles and laughter while getting absolutely destroyed. I’d call the rowdiest, most drug-fueled friends, knowing that they were looking to get into trouble, asking to meet up and join in. After months of not really having any sense of hope, purpose or fulfillment, two friends pushed me to talk to someone. They had witnessed the shit I was doing and knew it was not going to end well.

So here I am in my therapist’s office. Connie has been helping me compile and reorder my thoughts better than I’ve been able to on my own lately. I thoroughly enjoyed writing in my early twenties, then considered it a chore somewhere around 26. That lasted almost 2 years until eventually, sitting in Connie’s office at 28, she asked me to write again. It felt like homework. For too long, I hadn’t talked – not openly, honestly or particularly constructively. Now I had to do it while also meeting a deadline.

“What is your goal for therapy?” asked Connie. “Write it down and we will discuss it next week.”

I sat quietly at my computer, at first thinking about giving an answer I should give rather than try to communicate my internalized, built-up thoughts. I ultimately settled on:

“I want to think about myself and my world differently. I want to be more content with myself, with my place among friends and my family. I don’t want to feel disappointed about myself, or self-conscious when I look in the mirror. I want to be able to get out of bed every day, instead of having to make some mental hurdle just to put some pants on and walk out the front door. I want to have a sense of humor again.”

Connie listened. We met every week for 6 weeks. She suggested that I may have a mild form of depression and possibly bipolar disorder. She prescribed Lexapro. At first, it was great. I didn’t feel sad! I was able to set a regimen and stick to it. Then things got weird. I became numb without realizing it. A friend of mine had gone through a traumatic experience, and I stared blankly at him as he described what he was going through. I wanted to care, but I had no emotional output. I thought that was weird, but continued taking the drug. A couple weeks later, I had to leave Chicago for work. I would be gone for 10 weeks. My sister sobbed uncontrollably, not wanting me to leave. Again, I stared blankly, glassy-eyed, and unemotional. That’s when I knew I couldn’t be on this drug anymore. The thought of that day still turns my stomach. I realized that feeling anything was better than feeling nothing.

Back to Connie I went.

I never get nervous, but my appointment had me worried. What the hell was I going to do now? In some way, I hinged on this session. I wanted answers and solutions, even though I knew I probably wouldn’t get any straight away. My first appointment back seemed, at first, to be going well. Connie listened, absorbed, and acknowledged me. I noticed her lean forward when I mentioned certain trigger words, or things I’d experienced while on Lexapro.

Connie didn’t suggest another drug, which was a good thing. I wanted help, not pills.

She suggested that I read Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life and download a mood-tracking app to identify any behavioral patterns.

That, apparently, was the key to all of my woes—a fucking book and an app. Connie said that Peterson had some ideas I might find useful, but offered little guidance beyond that. She also told me that it would be “unusual” if I didn’t have some emotional trauma from my dad dying when I was a kid. She sent me on my way out, and said to set up a follow-up appointment a month away.

This shit ain’t cheap. $325 per session. Another $1,200 in total for the pills. I never went back to Connie.

What I wish someone had told me before going to therapy is that it’s not a quick fix. I guess, in some level of naivety, I thought conditions like this have simple answers. The one thing Connie told me that felt useful was that a lot of mental health advice can boil down to trying to find single events or moments in someone’s life that defines everything thereafter, but it’s not usually that clear cut. I think it must be something a lot of people in my situation do – spend what feels like forever in stasis, only to then finally ask for help, and then think that one single appointment is going to fix all your issues. If you’re reading this, feeling like you have that same hope of changing your world overnight – don’t. Instead, adjust your expectations a little. It’s better to treat each appointment, meeting, or conversation as a stepping stone. This is a process, and you’re best off getting your balance and learning to walk instead of expecting warp-speed and getting disheartened when it stutters.

It wasn’t all for nothing. I did learn how to communicate what I was feeling. I talk to my family and friends on a weekly basis now. My reluctance to have the dialogue wasn’t out of some antiquated idea that men shouldn’t talk about how they feel. I’ve never been like that, although I can see how that kind of reluctance to admit weakness can weaponize itself like a virus in some people. I just was not naturally forthcoming, and really struggled to verbalize any negative aspects of my life. When my family or friends would ask how I was doing, I’d say I was fine and move on to the next topic. I didn’t want anyone worrying about me, even though they could tell how bad I was doing just from looking at me.

Turns out, my family and friends are brilliant with help, once I asked for it. It was getting to that point that was difficult.

To Goos, Pat, Freddy, Vinny, Jack, Tony, Leo, Poe, Kim, Oli, Vanessa, Erica, Stella, and my mom: Thanks for listening. Thanks for being there. Let’s keep the dialogue going.

This piece is the third in an ongoing series about mental health, my experiences seeking professional help, and the process of getting better.