Big Boys Do Cry

It’s an odd phenomenon, feeling good about feeling bad. To some it’s a perverted masochistic trait where deviant pleasure is derived from pain inflicted by others. To others it’s a trait of Borderline personality disorder where someone harms themself to relieve anxiety or attract attention. Pain can be emotional or physical but I prefer the good cry over self-flagellation.

A good cry: an oxymoron? No, it feels good to cry, to let out the pent up emotion, to let your sadness stream down your face. Shakespeare called it sweet sorrow. At times the grief is so complete it controls more than your tear ducts. A powerful hand reaches inside, grabs your organs and squeezes. The only possible reaction is to curl up and moan. Remember to breathe, it’ll pass, just hang on. It ebbs and with a shake a broader perspective returns and with it a calm that comes with knowing you took it full on and survived. A pat on the back, a congratulatory nod to your survival skills and on to the next moment. It’s not unlike a comfy housecoat after a sauna and cold shower.

I’ve been crying daily for as long as I can remember. Wait. That’s not true; I remember not crying. I remember confidence and calm, energy and anger. I remember feeling I was at the helm of my ship, using the winds and controlling the rudder. And then life started to rush past me, tossing me in its wake and leaving me bobbing in a rough ocean with sails down. I began to doubt myself. Maybe I’m not capable, maybe I’m not lovable, maybe I don’t count. I thought about killing myself. It was the mid ‘80’s.

In psychiatry the suicide assessment is routine: “Any thoughts of harming yourself?” “How would you do it?” “Do you have the means? Intent?” Yes to any of the above would warrant further investigation and a contract that would require the would-be suicidee to promise to contact the interviewer prior to any self harm. Failing that assurance it’s off to the hospital but there was no-one to assess me because I told no-one.

A few years of daily musing made it feel normal. A form of entertainment that people indulged in like “what would I do if I won the lottery” or “what would people say at my funeral”. I thought everyone thought that way. I shared it with someone once and the look on her face told me I was wrong. “Hmmm”, I thought, “Thinking about hanging yourself with piano wire isn’t common...but it’s so damn comforting...” If things ever got soooo bad, I could always leave, punishing myself on the way out.

In psychiatry, clinical depression is viewed separately from situational depression. The clinical variety arrives for no apparent reason and hangs around for a long time. It’s thought to be caused by an excess amount of Serotonin, a neurotransmitter and it's an awful - but treatable - disease. Situational depression, on the other hand, is something we’ve all felt and is the subject of most country music tunes. The dog dies or your wife leaves and your life goes off kilter for a while. You walk under dark clouds for a bit but they start to thin out and eventually the new, more-interesting you goes about your business. The clinical variety is treated with medication, psychotherapy and in extreme cases, ECT (shock treatment), the situational is treated by the individual.

In the mid ‘80’s I left the business my father gave me and began selling real estate at which I was not immediately successful. The move was initiated by the company’s failing fortunes and a desire for change. My inability to sustain and grow the successful business Dad had given me cut into my self-esteem and the accompanying financial difficulties meant I lost my house. This change of fortune was difficult on the ex who packed up the kids and headed for greener pastures and with that I lost my identity.

So a couple of significant losses: my house, wife, kids, money, self-esteem. All still very situational but cumulative and becoming chronic. And the worst was yet to come.

At 9:05 AM, October 31st, 1981 I lifted my dead son out of his crib. He’d died sometime in the night, a victim of the statistic that one in 1000 babies die before their sixth month. There’s no apparent reason, they just die. We call it crib death because they die in their sleep but that’s all we know. I got angry, stopped believing in God but accepted the randomness and moved on. For a while things actually improved. We moved immediately and as business was still doing well we bought a house. And then we bought another one, just to rent out.

In retrospect, it may have been losing Nathan that planted the seed that life was not only unfair and random, it was going to be more difficult than I thought. I started seeing the business as too difficult and myself as incapable of withstanding the forces against me. Some were easily identified; my competitors, labour and material costs. Others were more ethereal; God?, The Universe?

On March 6th, 1984 Rachel was born. That’s her, 21 years later, in the picture at the top of this blog. She wasn’t healthy however, and having lost one we did everything we could to prevent it happening again. I remember driving out to a farm to buy goat’s milk because it was suggested she may be allergic to Mom’s/cow’s milk and formula. The doctors kept offering suggestions and running tests but it wasn’t until she was three months old that we got the diagnosis: cystic fibrosis. And twenty-one years of eulogy rehearsals began.

At 3AM, April 23rd, 2005 Rachel died. Years of grieving the inevitable came to an end and a lifetime of grieving the loss began. Tomorrow we’ll celebrate her birthday with sushi (her favourite food) and share stories of her life. If you have a story about Rae you’d like to share, please add your comment below; I’d love to hear it.

In my next piece I’m going to write about what those 21 years were like and more importantly, how I coped. There are strategies we can employ to help us through the worst life can present and I’m hopeful that what I learned and will share can be useful to others. I want to end here with this thought. The problem with something that feels good (like pain) is you can get stuck; ask anyone with an addiction. And I learned this:

Dreams can and do come true. So do nightmares.