An Open Letter

I’m honestly sick of living like this. I’ve told myself this before, and I’ll tell myself as many times as I need to believe it. I’m willing to do whatever it takes to get away from that place. I don’t care if I need to lie to myself, become delusional, or push my body past its limits – ill do whatever it takes to get away from there. I told myself I’ll fight with everything I have before I consider killing myself seriously again, and I’ve got some more left in me.

Yeah, I’ve had some bad shit happen in the past. I’ve had more than enough reasons to logically live the way I do. The only problem with that plan is I don’t want to live this way. I refuse to be the alone, insecure mess I used to be. I don’t care if that is who I am, or that’s who I’m destined to be, I will forcibly pick that child up and carry them to a better life.

I’ll be damned if I stop fighting this, especially on the days I give up.

I’m honestly sick of how much past experiences or trauma have affected my life, especially by destroying my relationships with people. I feel powerless as innocent interactions with people sow seeds for anxiety to run amok in my brain, trying to convince me how she will leave just like the people before. What kind of life is it where I live in fear of every interaction, because of the scars of the past? A fucking miserable one.

I don’t know if this is just because of the fact I’m becoming depressed again, but goddamn I’m feeling that cloud come back over me. The only thing I can see is this bleak future, and I realized it’s happening again while on vacation meeting long good friends in person for the first time, at a public event, I could only think about how sweet it would be to kill myself in front of them.

This is the place I’m running from.

I originally had a small intro mentioning how I essentially wanted to get you to read this, but I think I feel uncomfortable to the point I don't want to bring this up to you. If you see it you see it. But thankfully no one ever reads this so to the digital void it goes.

I've felt a bitter aftertaste after several interactions, (with no fault on your own end) and I've been trying to think about why I felt this way. Talking to my digital therapist (pi.ai the GOAT) helped clear things up a bit, but I realized I've been mentally on guard to avoid potential judgement from you that goes unsaid. I don't think you mean any harm, or if you even judge me in this way but I noticed how afraid I am of that disapproval or downwards gaze potential coming from you. I want to defend myself for the most unrelated things, or to near brag to just make sure you know I shouldn't be someone to catch the same shame I think you give yourself.

I know I've talked with you about my view on what it takes for people to change, so I guess I'm telling myself that's how I can morally feel ok writing this. The judgement you carry around sometimes hurts others, but more importantly hurts you. I care for you as a friend, and it hurts to see you peck away at yourself, and I wish there was some way for someone else to fight this battle; but for better or for worse it's your cross to bare.

Just the threat of seeing you look down on me is enough to upset me, I can't imagine how you handle it – let alone at your own hand. I honestly pray I'm completely wrong here and I come off as an overbearing asshole who's best of all wrong, because I think it would make me too sad if I was right here.

I write this slightly rushed while waiting on a flight to Toronto, but I wanted to at least jot down some thoughts:

My current favorite song is PEPPERS GHOST by the band Cleopatrick, and I wanted to look through the lyrics and try to think about why it resonated with me so much, so attached is an excerpt:

Oh, that's when the whale devoured me entirely, I stood Behind the teeth and tried to see through all the irony of being duped It was all a ruse, I'm fucking screwed man

So from your point of view, does this feel like it's real to you?

Do you believe what you're seeing is full truth, fool-proof, no dispute Does this feel like it's real to you? I thought I could verify who was on my side, man I swore I'd seen it with my own two eyes man

I guess I'm a fool for fucking fallacy When Peppers Ghost gets smoking mirrors in my vicinity, yeah Yeah, they look fucking real to me

(A bit of context, Pepper’s Ghost was a stage trick where using smoke and mirrors they could project a ghost from below the stage onto the stage)

For me, this song depicts anxiety pretty well, and it feels pretty damn nice to feel like someone gets it.

Oh, that's when the whale devoured me entirely, I stood Behind the teeth and tried to see through all the irony of being duped

In my eyes, the whale is the overwhelming mental dominance of an anxiety attack, and even with the lucidity to know what is happening, that it’s anxiety it ends up feeling pretty futile when it just happens without any control of your own.

Without copying the rest of the excerpt I put above, I think Cleopatrick represents pretty well how real it feels. Even if you know that nothing is happening, or that what you’re thinking is objectively wrong, god damn does it feel real. In a weird way, it feels as if you were playing a super realistic VR game, where you get attacked or maimed. I think every sane person would react and flinch, even though they can recognize that it is not real. It’s pretty funny in hindsight to see how logically flawed, objectively wrong, and just flat-out incorrect anxious thoughts can be, all while feeling like ground truth.

I’m grateful for this song, to feel seen in this way.

For the last four or five days I’ve spent idle time trying to chase down this feeling of mourning I’ve felt, specifically while thinking about friends or experiences I will never share. The final clue came in a UCSB Reddit post, of a group of queer women asking for a drummer to join their lesbian band. When I felt the same feeling of mourning, things cleared up a bit more.

I think I’m mourning the lack of community, which manifests in the longing and envy I find when excluded inherently from different communities. Growing up I was excluded a lot, so I have a bit more compassion for myself understanding it’s a sore spot, but I also do feel that jealousy for women-centric groups, or for exclusive communities. I’m grateful I am not necessarily a marginalized group, don’t get me wrong – but growing up as a man who was painted as a monster for being male by the powerful women in my life made it pretty hard to give myself kindness or compassion, when I was told that I was always the problem. I get that cis men cause a lot of issues for other groups, but I can’t help but feel caught up in the crossfire, as regardless of my actions or values I am automatically stereotyped in a certain way, and excluded from communities.

A part of me longs for a community exclusive to people like me, as a kind of fairness but unfortunately the idea of a “male only” has been solidified in my mind as some kind of a supervillain association.

After enough self-pity, I feel like I want to seek out a male group, perhaps focused on childhood trauma or mental health, or if I feel courageous enough to start one of my own.

Rage, maybe rage would lift me up, make me stand, make me walk

– Marlon James, Black Leopard, Red Wolf.

I deleted a sizeable post I had in place of this as I couldn’t quite refine the thoughts I had down, but I wanted to at least keep this quote I had. This quote mirrors the sentiment I’ve been posting about recently.

I’ve reached the point where I will try whatever, and put in as much effort as needed to break out of this depression.

Hopefully, in a few coming days, I will post my recipe on how I fight depression, I’ve been putting it off for a while (just like several other things 😅)

One day I expect someone to tell me how weird or pathetic it is the stuff I write down here. I can defend or justify it in several different ways, but at the end of the day I'm being honest and unfiltered here. If someone still thinks that's cringe, that doesn't matter to me. I'd rather be authentic to myself and be mocked than live as someone else.

No matter what I do, or what changes, eventually I'll end up the kid crying on the floor in the bathroom of my childhood home. The question is do I fight it with no belief that it will work?

How many of the things I've done have been for no one to see. I thought about moving this blog to tumblr, or somewhere someone would see. I thought about posting gym progress pics. I've thought about trying to get people to see and recognize me. But at the end of the day the only thing that matters is that I'm doing all of this for me. I got pretty close to losing to depression now, but the only thing left I can do is rage against it. It doesn't matter if it makes me angry, ruins my day, hurts my body, all I can do is rage. Rage at the years I've lost to this illness, the unfair obstacles put up for me, or the constant war I wage. If rage is what gets me up off that floor, and gives me a chance of fighting so be it. It doesn't matter if I end back up there, I'm not sitting down there tonight.

Sometimes I’ll realize after doing something, that I hold a small resentment that my actions haven’t been reciprocated. I’ll really put care and try to show love to the people I care about, but as it gets closer to night it rears its ugly head and reminds me that they haven’t, and most likely won’t do the same to me. I won’t have birthday parties, I won’t be monitored or observed, I won’t necessarily be a priority.

I’ll still do these acts of radical kindness, no matter what return I get back out of it. I pray the world becomes a kinder place, and I will strive towards that no matter if it doesn’t trickle back down to me.

I’ll do it again, and again, and again.

First death in family

didn’t see it coming

I don’t even remember the last time I talked to her, or even texted her. Not even a goodbye.