I still remember the shock of September 1st last
year and hearing the news that yet another former NHLer was dead because of
suicide. Wade Belak had never played for a team that I particularly liked, but
his grittiness, willingness to drop the gloves, never say die attitude and
infectious smile had made me a fan from the moment I watched him play. The link
between mental illness and suicide hadn’t been made for me at this point. I was
more caught up in believing what the media was saying about there being a
correlation between the type of hockey players that Rick Rypien, Derek Boogard,
and Wade Belak were and their decisions to take their lives. Michael
Landsberg’s article on TSN.ca changed my perception on not only that, but
exactly how I looked at myself.
I read the article the day that it was published, and
watched earnestly as Landsberg spoke about his struggles with chronic clinical
depression and anxiety, and his relationship with Wade Belak as well as Belak’s
struggles with depression. It moved me, but not because of the sympathy I felt
for Belak’s family and friends, but because of the empathy I felt for those
three players who chose to take their lives, as well as for Landsberg. The
feelings that were described both in the article and on air were some that I
recognized within myself. I didn’t mention this to anyone and after a few days,
even forgot about it, only to find myself consumed with it come late November
of 2011.
I was bullied growing up. No, I’m not saying this expecting
people to feel sympathy for me. It’s a fact. Bullying is a major problem in
today’s society, especially with children and I was a victim. It was so bad
that in grade six, my sister and I were pulled out of our elementary school and
transferred to a different one because of the things that were happening. For a
while it made things better, but then it started again. I blamed myself for it.
Between the bullying I was going through in the dressing room at hockey and the
treatment I was receiving at not one, but two elementary schools, I felt as if
I was the problem. Of course I would never say that out loud, but the things
people were saying about me I started to believe. I was never a problem child,
but I undoubtedly gave my parents premature grey hairs because of my responses
to what was going on at school and at the rink. I made decisions on and off the
ice that probably should never have been made, but have also made me who I am
today.
In grade 8 I saw a therapist for the first time to deal with
some anger issues. This was on the tail of schoolyard fights and increasing
aggression in not only hockey games, but practices as well. I was a smart 14
year old though. I said all the things the therapist wanted to hear and
weaseled my way out of opening up to what the problems really were. Maybe that
was because I didn’t actually know what those problems were. I quit hockey
after that year. The torment had become too much for me, to the point where I
walked off the bench in the middle of a game.
High school was no better but I had found a new outlet –
cross country running. I threw myself into it head first and soon found myself
neck deep in training, racing, and becoming the best I could be. The endorphins
I experienced when running hard and fast made me feel alive. It was as if I finally
felt normal. But the bullying and the constant questioning was still there. I
lived and died with questions that ran through my head. Always asking myself
why no one liked me, why I was never invited anywhere, why people treated me
the way I did. It all came back to the things that were ingrained in my head. I
was nobody, worth nothing, and useless. All I had going for me was running it
seemed and I was able to lose myself in that.
When I was 16 I experienced my first failure with running
and found myself lost and feeling as though I was living underwater. I had
failed to advance to OFSAA Track and Field, and for two months afterwards I
felt no desire to get out of bed every day. This was the first of many extreme
low points I felt over the next 5 years, but no one could tell. I was putting
on a mask for those in my life, acting as if I was the happy kid that everyone
thought they knew. Inside though I was tormented. I didn’t know why but there
were only bad days and worse days for me. I didn’t know what ‘good’ felt like.
I became motivated though. I trained like a mad man in the summer of 2007 and
entered grade eleven cross-country season in the best shape of my life and
ready to take on the world. That feeling didn’t last long however, as an injury
sidelined me for most the season and sent me back to a long period of
depression that only lifted when I began dating my current girlfriend. She was
able to numb the pain for me. I was finally able to be me around her and forget
about what other people were saying. Sure, there were still bad days where I
didn’t want to get out of bed, but I found them to be fewer and far between.
I went almost a full year living what I thought was a normal
life. I began to make and keep friends, and I achieved things through track and
field that made me feel worthy. That quickly vanished in October of 2008 when I
became sick and had to drop out of a major cross country meet. I tried to
ignore the things people were saying about me, but I heard them and again the
voices in my head were telling me all of the things that I had tried to push
away. Even my girlfriend wasn’t able to keep things at bay for me anymore as I
began to find myself not wanting to get out of bed more and more frequently. I
would find myself feeling exceptionally alone even if I was in a crowded room
of people. I was experiencing clinical depression and I didn’t know it. No one
did. In late January of 2009 I hit what was rock bottom for me up to that
point. After over a year of dating, my girlfriend broke up with me and I was
physically sick. I was unable to move for five days, and failed two exams
because of the things that were going through my head. Luckily enough we got
back together, and I was briefly lifted out of that mood. Signing my National
Letter of Intent with Charleston Southern University also gave me what I
thought was a light at the end of the tunnel, and in the fall of 2009 I began
my university career as an NCAA Division 1 athlete.
Over the next two years I experienced ups and downs that showed
me what the highest of highs and lowest of lows felt like. The feelings of
loneliness, anxiety, doubt, and torment never went away. They were only subdued
by my small personal triumphs, and were multiplied by anything negative in my
life. As much as it hurt me to do so, I had to make the decision to leave my
life as a runner behind and pursue my education back in Canada where I had
hoped things would be better for me. And they were for a time. I spent the
summer in 2011 happy and carefree; finally able to be a normal 20 year old. The
dark days were there, and I noticed them, but once again they seemed few and
far between.
That September I read Michael Landsberg’s words on mental
health and clinical depression and for a fleeting moment I asked myself if that
was me. I brushed it off and forgot about it for the time being, but without
fail, all of my old demons came back but this time they were being pushed and
prodded by something more.
When I made the decision to leave Charleston Southern, I was
not only leaving behind running, but my identity as well. For my whole life I
had been an elite athlete – whether it be AAA hockey or national level running.
Now I didn’t know who I was. I no longer had something firm to cling to and it
seemed like the floor caved in and I was falling deeper and deeper and deeper.
I tried to remedy it with alcohol. I drank a lot, but bars and parties were no
refuge. I still felt alone. No matter how many people were with me, I was alone. The partying left me only with a body that was bigger than
what I was used to. No longer being an athlete I lost the muscular definition
that I had taken for granted and again, more fuel was added to the fire burning
in my head. Stress, anxiety, loneliness, identity, worthlessness, and my future
were all I could think about. I watched the hands on the clock tick by as I
asked myself what was wrong with me. For the first time I seriously began to
believe I may be mentally ill. There were many nights I spent crying in bed
trying to answer the questions I had. My sleep pattern was lost. I would go 3,
maybe 4 days without sleep at a time. Finally I worked up the courage to tell
my girlfriend that I thought something was wrong, and eventually in late
November of 2011 I picked up the phone, and in between sobs I said to my
mother “I need help. I think I have depression”.
On February 22, 2012, in Sarnia, Ontario, I was diagnosed
with Chronic Clinical Depression and handed a prescription that I am still on
to this day. It was then I learned that I had a chemical imbalance in my brain.
My serotonin levels were off, and that’s why for the longest time I had the
hardest time distinguishing between what was good, and what was bad. For the
last 6 years of my life, I had lived not knowing what normal was. Or at least
what normal for other people was. In April I started seeing a therapist, and
between the medication and the talk therapy, I could feel myself getting
better. The bad days were still there, but the bad days weren’t as bad and
there weren’t as many of them. One of the most frequent questions I was asked
by both doctors and people who cared about me was if I had ever thought of
committing suicide. My answer remains the same to this day. No. I have never
thought about ending my own life, but I have been down so low – last week on
Sunday November 11th for example – where I finally understood where
people like Wade Belak were at when they made the decision to take their own
lives.
I will never be cured of this illness. It is going to be
with me for the rest of my life, but I am able to control it now because I know
that there are resources out there for me. I wouldn’t have known this though if
it weren’t for a man I respect greatly. If it weren’t for Landsberg’s article
and eventually his documentary and Bell Canada’s “Lets Talk” awareness day
about Mental Health, there is a significant chance that I would have taken, or
attempted to take my life.
This is because I didn’t know any different than the stigmas
that were projected about mental health. In fact, one of the first things I
said to my mom about it was that I was afraid people were going to look at me
differently because of it. I was afraid I was going to be ‘labeled’ and known
as a freak. I thought my place was on the psychiatric ward of a hospital. By
reaching out to everyone, and being so candid about his struggles, Michael
Landsberg made me aware that I wasn’t so different, that in fact I was part of
the 1 in 3 people that suffer from some sort of mental illness. This comforted
me, and helped me embrace the fact that I wasn’t different at all. It made me want
to take on the disease and help other people who were like me – afraid to
acknowledge it or do anything about it.
I wish someone had said to me earlier in life “Hey, is
everything okay? Is there anything you want to talk about?” While there
certainly were people who said this to me, I wasn’t aware that all they were
doing was looking to help me. I, like most teenagers (especially boys) thought
that authority figures were there to hurt, not help me. God, do I wish I had
known differently.
Like I said earlier – this story of mine is not meant to
elicit sympathy from anyone. In fact I wrote it simply because I know what I
know now. I know that all someone needs is a helping hand, someone to ask them
if they are feeling okay or if they want to talk. All we as a society need to
do is be an ear to listen, a shoulder to cry on, or a friend when a friend is
needed. I’m not different from any other 16 year old boy who has questions
about life. In fact I was in those shoes and I know what is going through their
heads. No, I’m not qualified to be an expert on depression or mental health,
but I am qualified to point someone in the direction of getting help. Most of
the time, that is all anyone needs.
Please, if you think someone you know or love is suffering
from a mental illness, please speak to him or her about it, and offer to help,
even if it is only pointing them to the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
or Kid’s Help Phone. At the bottom of this page is a link to various resources that
can be accessed for those who may be suffering.
Thank you to Michael Landsberg for giving me the knowledge
that there was help for me, and the courage to not only speak up about my
mental health, but also to write about it in the hopes of helping others.
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| Honour and Privilege - Michael Landsberg (R) and Me (L) |
