Depression (part two)
Between 1988 and 1990, when I was making some effort to abstain, I experienced fairly frequent “dark moods”. I don’t remember much about it. Mostly I recall being “agitated by life” at those times. I tend to think I was experiencing the proverbial “dry drunk”, but there may have been more to it than that.
After I finally “saw the light” concerning my substance abuse, and which I wrote about in Recovery (part three), I was about to come in contact with reality for sustained times and with a new attitude. It would be about a year and a half before I experienced depression in the form that I know today. The symptoms were being easily agitated and extreme fatigue, both physically and emotionally. (I was 29 at the time and had been sober for about 18 months.) I quit my job. At the time I didn’t really understand it. I just knew I had to get the hell out of there. (Why I can’t say because I don’t know.) Today I can only recall being extremely frustrated and agitated by pretty much everything. My 12-step sponsor diagnosed my condition as “dry drunk.” Yet by this time I had worked the steps, and had absolutely no conscious desire to return to drinking and drugging. In hindsight it’s pretty easy for me to see what was really going on. I was clinically depressed.
The only external thing that I can think of that my have facilitated my depression’s onset was having broken up with Becky several months before. She was living in Birmingham and me in Memphis, and the long distance thing just wasn’t working for me. Still, at least I was managing to get laid every month or so, in as much as we trekked back in forth quite a lot. After we split, I was unable to replace her, or even to try and do so. It’s possible that my breaking up with her had to do with the early stages of depression, but I can’t say for sure. The point is that, when I was younger, I think it’s possible that when I wasn’t having relatively frequent sex, the lack thereof may have fed my depression. Becky and my relationship was more complicated than just sex, but the sex was certainly a huge part of it, at least for me.
At any rate, a few months later, I was more or less at what I’ve come to call rock bottom. I’d quit my job. I rarely went to 12-step meetings. I rarely had any contact with anybody, besides my grandmother who I was living with. Being tired, sad, feeling hopeless and worthless were big parts of my condition. It went on for several months.
On afternoon during the summer of 1992 I was trying to sleep both because I was exhausted and to shut the world out, or escape. As I lay there drifting in and out, I heard a ruckus outside. We lived in a little house in a fairly crappy area. The house was close to the street and as a result anyone walking by sounded like they were in my room with me. So I hear this commotion, got up, and look out my window. There were a group of redneck kids ranging in age from six to 10 or so, and they were howling with laughter as they watched two mongrel dogs copulate. That scene pretty much sums up where I was emotionally.
I let everything go during that depressive episode. Becky, 12-step meetings, my job, and my primary hobby, playing the guitar. At the time I had some really nice instruments and a killer amp. In the past few years I’d spend countless hours playing, picking things up from disc, and just practicing in general. I loved music and the guitar in particular. A day rarely went by when I didn’t at least pick it up for few minutes. But during this episode I barely touched it.
Eventually it started to pass. Feeling better, more confident, I decided to try and get back together with Becky. We really liked it each other, a lot, and it was wonderful being back with her, even though we lived several hours apart. Things rocked along for nine or 10 months and went well. I started a lawn care business and I supplemented that income with scalping concert and sporting event tickets. Money wasn’t a problem.
At some point, probably six or so months after the depression abated, I started spending a lot money. If I saw it and I liked it I bought it. This was way out of character for me, and at the risk of psychobabbling, I think I was doing it to make myself feel better. It was a bad strategy if that is in fact that’s what was going on. In my case, the more I buy, the more I want. It’s a very vicious cycle.
The spending didn’t work, except to alarm Becky. I think it was dawning on her what a squirrel I was turning out to be. When we’d first met I was talking up the law school or graduate school plan. By this time I was way off on the entrepreneur plan, and she wasn’t up for that. As it turned out, neither was I. I think I was just getting off on the thrill of the money chase. At any rate, Becky began to pull away slightly. I over-reacted, as I’m want to do, and began shutting her out. She deserved much better.
At some point, probably less than a year after my depression abated, I shelved my recovery program. I was pretty full of myself at that time and decided I didn’t need it. Within a few weeks I went on a secret bender. It didn’t really scare me though, so instead of redoubling my recovery efforts, I ignored it. Within a couple of months I experienced a devastating relapse. Over the course of the next year and a half, my brothers started calling me the “barelyist man alive”. It fit all to well.
