Wazzapedia.

As with most things I’ve done in life, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. I thought I did. I thought I understood the magnitude of what I was about to do, but really?

Twenty-one years old. I’d lived a sheltered life, working in the family business from the age of thirteen, and full-time from fifteen. I’d continue to work there for another five years.

Eight months before. The second of July, 1995. I was volunteering at a Christian campsite during the winter season. There were four of us arrived that day. The odd blonde girl wearing a Cookie Monster T-shirt and singing Sesame Street songs at the Lodge for her first winter season. A guy and a girl from the 1994 winter staff team. I’d had a crush on her since the previous winter season.

We all went out for dinner that evening. My crush made it very clear that evening that she wasn’t interested.

I ended up working shifts in the kitchen with the odd blonde girl. A week later we started dating.

Three weeks after we met, I asked her to marry me. It wasn’t a terribly romantic proposal (or relationship). Heading back to Cooma after spending the weekend visiting her parents; I asked her as we drove past Pheasant’s Nest on the F5. She later told me she thought I was joking, so she said yes.

I wasn’t joking. Suddenly we were caught up in the whirlwind.

Eight months to the day from when we met, on the second of March 1996, I stood next to my brothers in a sweltering church. It was the day John Howard was elected; he’d go on to govern the country for twelve years. I voted for him. I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

We stood in a sweltering church Anglican church in Castle Hill, and exchanged vows in front of a church full of people, most of whom I barely knew. Hell, I barely knew the nineteen year old I was exchanging wedding vows with. I barely knew myself. And we didn’t know each other. How quaint, in this day and age. Virgins on our wedding day.

I made promises in front of God and a group of people I barely knew, that I was convinced I would keep. I was twenty-one years old. There were a lot of things I was convinced I knew; I was wrong about most of them. No-one knew what the future would bring, but we believed we’d make it; we promised we would.

There were whispers at the wedding reception. “They’re too young”. “It won’t last”. Not to said to us, but to those closest to us.

Perhaps we were too young. We were both broken people. We each had a load of hurt we were carrying around, and it didn’t take long before we unleashed it on each other. How could we have really understood what we were saying when we promised “for better or for worse; for richer or poorer; in sickness and in health…”

My poor financial skills were already visible, if you knew where to look. Who could predict my mental health issues? Her physical health issues? Neither of us realised that we had no clue about conflict resolution, and conflicts would go unresolved. For better or worse indeed. There were some good times, but a lot of “worse”. No point in pointing fingers; we both shared the blame.

And yet…

Perhaps it was sheer stubbornness, that neither of us were willing to be the first one to throw in the towel. Love can grow in the rockiest of soils. That shared experiences, even shared pain, can become part of something greater; this is something that seems difficult to grasp these days.

Some couples start out great, attuned to each other, sharing everything. But they grow apart. Maybe they chose to put themselves first, their happiness first. Maybe something happened that changed everything. One day they’re two strangers sharing a house, maybe a bed.

Some couples start out badly. Everything falls apart, and it seems the more you try and stick it back together, the worse it breaks. But you both keep going; trying again and again, in spite of your mistakes. Over time, you find that things are starting to stick. Sure, it might not look great from the outside, and maybe even worse from the inside, but you keep patching the broken things up, and you just keep moving forward.

One day, you look back and realise that years have passed. That each of those days – good, bad and fair-to-middling – have added up to something greater than the sum of its parts. Through the brokenness, you’ve built something… beautiful.

It was never very Hollywood. Television and movies tell stories about love. If you just feel that spark, you just look into each others eyes, you’ll just know. That warm feeling will carry you through the hardest of times.

Hollywood lies. Love can start with romance, but romance isn’t love. Neither is sex. Sex can be the glue that can hold a marriage together or without love it can tear a marriage apart. The warm romantic fuzzies go away; romance is a paper boat in a perfect storm. Romance isn’t built for sickness or mental illness; car accidents or broken dreams; miscarriages and difficult pregnancies; temptation or financial strife.

Love is when you keep going in spite of everything inside you screaming “GIVE UP NOW! IT’S NOT WORTH IT ANY MORE”. Persevering for the sake of the other, and maybe in that moment, you find yourself. Love grows in and through those experiences, if you let it.

Real love gets knocked down by life and gets right back up and screams “IS THAT ALL YOU’VE GOT?!?”

Fourteen years ago I stood in front of a group of people, most of whom I didn’t know, and a nineteen year-old woman I barely knew and was asked by an old family friend “Do you take this woman, to be your wife, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, for as long as you both shall live?”

I still do.

I love you, Tan. Happy anniversary.

Tomorrow I return to work. This holiday doesn’t feel like it was long enough; these days they never do.

It’s not like summer holidays when I was a kid. My strongest memories of summer holidays are of lying on our old lounge, in a lounge room tinged green from the sun reflecting on the underside of the pull-down canvas blinds. The TV is on in the background with never-ending cricket matches (which I hated) competing with the rumble from the wall-mounted air conditioner vainly struggling to bring the fibro-clad tin-roofed house to a reasonable temperature. The cicadas are the endless background barely audible above the TV & aircon.

I was bored out of my skull in this little country town; too much of a goody-two-shoes to go and make mischief, too nerdy and uncoordinated to go and play with the other kids.

It seemed like those summers, like my boredom, would never end.

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I’ve been doing a lot of reading recently. I’ve got two books on the go (The Reason for God and 11), and I’ve subscribed to a few different blogs.

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I was going to write another post about depression for Blue Day, but in the end I seemed to be rehashing my post from last month, and I have no intention of turning this into a “depression” blog.

However, October is Anxiety and Depression Awareness Month, and today, October 10th is World Mental Health Day.

Blue Day 2008 is a site put together by a number of people in the Australian social media and tech communities in support of World Mental Health day. Some of us have experienced it, and most have known someone who has. According to Beyond Blue, one in five people will experience depression at some stage of their lives.

A group of Twitterers (including myself) have turned our twitter icons blue in support, and have tagged our related posts with #blueday2008.

The reality is depression will touch you or someone in your life. Most of us who experience it don’t want to stay there, living in it – no matter how it seems from the outside.

Sometimes we just need someone to listen and point us in the right direction, sometimes we need more help. Like any other illness, healing takes time, and some of us will never be “100%”. Some will require medication permanently, just like a diabetic. For others, it will be like a broken leg, and the medication and counselling are the cast and crutch to get back on our feet.

There is still a stigma around mental illness, but with knowledge and understanding, together we can make that a thing of the past.

If you want to get involved in Blue Day 2008, I suggest the following:

• If you don’t have a blog or a podcast, register on this site and submit a post that will appear on the Submitted Posts page.
• Change your avatars on your favourite social networking site Twitter/Facebook/FriendFeed/etc to something blue, download one of our pre-built ones
• Follow us on Twitter
• Modify your blog theme to be mainly blue
• Run a Second Life event, or attend the jokaydia event
• Wear blue for the day
• Organising a meet ups on the day, currently organised:
  • Melbourne – Oct 10 from 5.30pm at Fad Gallery (more details - http://tinyurl.com/blueday)
  • Sydney – Oct 10 from around 5pm, will be a STUB event and part of Official Friday Drinks at Grace77Bar on the Mezzanine level, cnr King and York
  • Adelaide – details TBD
  • Brisbane – details TBD
  • Perth – Oct 10 from 7pm at Queens Hotel – 520 Beaufort Street, Highgate
  • Canberra – details TBD
• Tag your photos/posts/tweets with BlueDay2008
• Become a fan on FaceBook

Wow. I didn’t expect anything like the responses I had to my last post. I want to explain some things.

I was diagnosed with clinical depression in late 2000-early 2001. I didn’t go to the doctor looking for a diagnosis, the doctor just started asking questions. I’d had a breakdown a couple of years earlier, and never “dealt” with it. I was put on anti-depressants, and went off them six months later, against doctor’s orders.

I had another breakdown in the middle of 2006. I was in a high-stress job, and eventually came apart at the seams. I was put on anti-depressants again, which I ceased taking on Good Friday this year. While they helped me get sorted out again, for me the side effects were ultimately worse than the cure.

One of the comments claimed that depression is a ‘modern invention’. There’s an element of truth to what he’s saying, but it’s wrapped in a attitude that’s the kind of response (in my experience) that causes many mentally ill people keep their mouths shut and “deal with it” in silence. 

I don’t shirk my responsibilities. I’ve been employed since I left high school. I’m raising a family, mindful that my attitudes and response to this illness have had an effect, and will have an effect on my children. Mindful of a family history of depression.

My grandfather drank himself to death. My grandmother was on lithium for part of her life. My cousin blew his brains out. My paternal grandfather was an alcoholic who dried out in his seventies. I had a shrink once describe it to me as “you lost the genetic lotto”.

Please understand why I wrote that post. I’m don’t want your pity, and I’m not a hero. I’m just a guy, trying to live my life and raise my family. My younger brother is extremely visually impaired; to me he’s a hero for just living through what he’s had to live through, and still keeping a cheesy grin on his face.

I wrote that post because I was finally able to put into words what has been rolling around inside my head for ages, trying to come out. I wanted something to be able to point people to if they ask what it’s like to live with depression, to explain what it’s like from the inside.

I’m not sitting on my couch waiting to die, crying into my cornflakes “woe is me”. I’m trying to live. To appreciate my life, and the blessings I have. I have an illness that won’t go away through wishful thinking, or just “deciding to stop”. However, there are things I can do to deal with the blackest days and that is what I choose to do. Some days I succeed, some days I fail.

But please, please, PLEASE – don’t use my post as an excuse to sit on your couch, crying into YOUR cornflakes. If you’re in a situation to read these posts, you’re likely to be financially in the top 20% of the world population. You ARE blessed. Live life. Don’t let it just wash over you.

It’s hard; I understand just how hard it can be. Maybe you’re like me and “lost the genetic lotto”. Maybe you suffered through experiences that have caused your brain to break. Maybe you’ve been pushed (or pushed yourself) to the edge, and then went over.

In 2008, you don’t have an excuse to suffer in silence, or feel sorry for yourself over your illness. Get help. Talk to people. Look after yourself, and take responsibility for dealing with your illness. In my experience, people are a lot more likely to be willing to look out for you if you’re being proactive about dealing with it.

Be gentle with yourself, allow for the fact that you’ll have black days. But remember, there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and however briefly you pass into that light, and you may enter a tunnel again, that light is unlikely to be an oncoming train.

pps. 23rd Sept.

One more thing. Get out there and start creating. Write, paint, sing, just start something. I can only speak from my experience, but of the people I’ve met who suffer depression, there seems to be a much higher percentage of them that have incredible creative talents. Almost like the other side of the coin. I don’t know, I only have circumstantial evidence, and it might even warrant another post.

It seems to me that creating stuff (particularly stuff that’s not focussed on depression) seems to provide an outlet for something buried inside. Maybe I do need to write another post

“Try for a moment to imagine a personal world drained of emotion, a world where perspective disappears. Where strangers, friends, family, and lovers are all held in similar affection, where the events of the day have no obvious priority. There is no guide to deciding which task is most important, which dress to wear, what food to eat. Life is without meaning and with meaning has gone motivation. This colorless state of being—the very antithesis of the emotional outpouring experienced in grief—is exactly what happens to some victims of severe melancholic depression. Emotion drains away to be replaced by a visceral void.” — A Mood Apart — Peter C. Whybrow, MD

…actually, I’m still sorting through my feelings.

I’ve been playing MMORPGs for about five years, and the last three years of that was playing WoW. A few weeks ago, I cancelled my account, but missed the renewal date by three days, which left me with a month of playtime. It’s not the first time I’ve cancelled my account, but it’s going to be the last.

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Massive storms swept through Melbourne this afternoon.

I work in Nunawading. Thought the roof was going to lift off. Could be worse though.
You could work for Origin Energy a few doors up from our office.

That’s my car. I tried to check it for damage, but was waved off from moving it because it was ‘unsafe’.