Tales from the Darkside

I’ve written about my mood swings from time to time but more often than not I simply disappear from view while I am flailing on the darkside. Sometimes writing indirectly about my struggles helps a lot. I was in the throes of a week-long depression when I wrote the previous post on Father’s Day and rereading it now I can see my desperate attempt to stay above water in every line. These days I tend to avoid writing about the “causes” of my depression for several reasons. One, I want to maintain some level of decorum on this blog, believe it or not, and refrain from spewing personal details about things that may involve other people. Two, I worry that I’d scare people away (including potential employers and the California electorate should I decide to run for governor one day—hey, you never know!) if I reveal the ugly, dark fears that overtake me when I’m feeling so out of control and full of self-loathing. Three, and most important, I’m more aware than ever that my external reality is NOT the cause of my depression at all. It may provide certain triggers that facilitate the downward spiral but it’s not the “cause.” I can have the same triggers another week and not be affected in the least. No, there’s some combination of panic, anxiety, inability to express emotion, and overwhelming terror that takes hold of me from time to time and I start to feel like a bug trapped in amber, unable to emerge from the total encasement that prevents me from experiencing joy, pleasure, or the belief that I’ll ever feel content again. I also tend to ramble when I’m feeling that way in an attempt to talk my way out of the Black Hole, but as my therapist and others have pointed out, “I hear a lot of words, but you’re not saying anything.” Oy, not exactly a great place to blog from (or maybe that’s the perfect description of blogging?).

It is amazing to me that a few days ago I could feel such despair and hopelessness, and now, still facing the same life challenges, I feel perfectly “normal” and excited about the future. It’s probably only in these moments while I’m “on the way back” that I would ever even talk about this stuff. I can already feel my Blog Character reasserting himself and clicking his tongue at any narcissistic ravings about my PROCESS, more than a little embarrassed at the self-indulgence of trying to explain my own emotional difficulties. Sometimes I think my Blog Character is a bit like Hillary Clinton. He keeps most of those real and messy feelings tightly under wraps, convinced that he needs to present a Positive Image to the outside world. He’s increasingly aware of his vulnerabilities but he is very concerned about presenting them in the most palatable way, so as not to alienate the public or make anyone, including himself, uncomfortable.

When I was a kid, I somehow took on the role of the “good boy,” the one people didn’t have to worry about. I remember the very few occasions when I got in trouble at school with burning shame. In fact, I could say that the only memory I have of Kindergarten is when Mrs. Reid singled me out one day as we were lining up to go down the indoor slide in our classroom. The Kindergarten teacher said that I couldn’t join the others on the slide because of some infraction that I was completely unaware of. It felt like the world as I knew it was coming to an end, in that moment I completely redefined myself based on Mrs. Reid’s disapproval.

I could barely relate one moment from my entire fifth grade year except for the day when Mrs. Seidman was marking report cards at the front of the class and we were supposed to be sitting silently behind our desks for the whole period. At one point, Louie Fishbein tapped me on the shoulder to ask me a question and when I turned around to see what he wanted, Mrs. Seidman flew into a rage, grabbed my report card, and gave me an “F” for that semester, the only one I ever received in my entire school career. It’s funny how these moments are always accompanied by a total feeling of powerlessness and a self-righteous indignation that a huge injustice had been committed. I so needed to be the perfect, good little boy that the few times I got publicly called on the carpet, my memory is that my punishment was completely unjustified. I have little reason to believe that my memories of these events are totally skewed (I think anyone who went to my school would agree that Mrs. Seidman was a borderline sociopath), but what’s interesting to me is how my whole world would come tumbling down whenever I fell off my self-constructed pedestal.

As I got older, I still had an urgent need to maintain my good boy persona, but I started developing ways to secretly rebel and express my bad side. I'm sure that my goody-two-shoes school personality contributed to the raunchy mouth I mentioned in a recent post that I developed outside of class as well as other acts of civil disobedience in high school like my decision to take every Wednesday off during senior year, just daring the administration to notice (they never did since I made sure I still got straight As).

Decades later, I’m still struggling with good boy syndrome and my desperate need to be perceived in a way that does not acknowledge difficult feelings, failures, or struggles of any kind. “Everything’s fine” is a familiar phrase to me, and one that I often believe even when why my blood pressure is racing and my eyes are rolling back into my head. While on the one hand I usually strive to avoid a “scene” at all costs, I have often found myself reviewing painful family episodes from the past and envying the family members who had the freedom to completely “lose it” in those moments, whether they were screaming, slamming doors, or barking under the table like a dog. There has always been a part of me that has secretly admired the mentally ill because they seemed so FREE. I know that this is a distorted view, but when you’re wound up as tight as I am and living with so many rigid self-imposed rules about what behavior and thoughts are acceptable, a “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” mental ward can seem like a fantasy playground!

I would say that until I was in my mid-20s, I had very little understanding of my emotions. When a feeling of any kind, particularly one I judged as “negative,” would rear its ugly head, I would simply slam the door and rationalize it away using my PhD in Denial or some New Age twaddle I picked up about “seeing the bigger picture.” I remember old girlfriends begging me to discuss problems in our relationships. I would gaze at them with total pity and a little scorn, thinking to myself, “Why are these crazy women making this stuff up? There is absolutely nothing wrong with our freaking relationship!” By my late-20s I was so out of touch and miserable that I knew I had to start looking at my shit. With much fear and trepidation, I started going to therapy. I remember mentioning this in passing during one Friday night dinner at my grandparents’ house and being met with an urgent chant from my mother and grandmother who shouted in unison: “But YOU don’t need therapy!!” I felt like Charlie Brown when Lucy yells at him and the sheer force of her words sends him somersaulting backwards. “That’s exactly why I DOOOOO need it,” I screamed furiously to myself.

I’ve noticed in my creative nonfiction writing group how often I get the feedback to delete the last paragraphs of my essays. I’ve come to see that when I do write about real, difficult stuff, my tendency is still to tie it up with a nice bow and say that now everything is great, all that ugliness is in the past. So I’ll resist the urge to do that here and simply state something that we all know: Life is hard. Sometimes it’s harder. Sometimes it seems fucking intolerable. But real growth and maturity is moving through it anyway, experiencing the pain, and waiting for those glorious moments when the sun peeks through the clouds again.

Comments

[Rurality]

Danny I love your blog whether you're trying to be a "good boy" or not. I'd give it an A+. :)

[Emily]

Boy, this all sounds eerily familiar: periods of despair (and when I'm in them, I know I can say, "you won't feel this way next week. Just wait a week," and will immediately answer right back, "that's a load of crap. This could go on forever you know. You'll never come out of it. Life is always going to suck, because it does" etc.); the "good girl" syndrome and rebelling against it in my teens; remembering the very few instances in school in which I was punished, always unjustly in those memories; and carrying that "everything is okay" attitude even into my blog. I'm beginning to wonder if it isn't just all part and parcel of being a writer. We (or better yet, we create others to do so) express all those all-so-tightly controlled emotions on the page, where we can still control them (note your tendency to tie it up with a bow), but where they are also far more acceptable. And you're right: sometimes life seems fucking intolerable. But, then it will suddenly be MORE than fucking AMAZING, and those times are what make it all worthwhile.

[Elaine Soloway]

Very moving piece, Danny. I can relate to the "devastated by a teacher's reprimand." My memoir recalls a time when my beloved 6th grade teacher chastised me for speaking during an assembly. (I was asking my friend if I could borrow her glasses so I could see the stage.)

Imagine how humbling that was to have remembered it for over 60 years! So, you're not alone.

I do hope your latest dark days have lightened up. But do know your readers cherish you no matter your mood.
Love,

[Heidicrafts]

I have a righteous indignation story about each one of my elementary school teachers, and I'm now 40.

I rail against the unfairness of the accusation (and the accused was not always me) and that the matter could have been cleared up on the spot if the accuser would only have taken the time to listen. Like the example above about asking for glasses.

I try to remember that feeling when teaching or parenting or in other positions of authority.

[rachel]

Oh - Danny - I can SO relate to this.
Thank you for writing it down.

[Wendi Goodman]

The only two teachers I was ever deathly afraid of were Mrs. Seidman & Mrs. Geib. I transferred to Peterson on the first day of 5th grade & we were in that class together. Just the thought of those two can give me nightmares.

I feel your pain, Danny. That's why I take my daily dose of Effexor. Thank goodness for "happy pills."

Whatever happened to Louie?

[Wendy]

I love this post. I AM this post. I struggle with the same exact thing. I am so afraid to be real sometimes but see what happens when you share these feelings? People relate so unbelievably to what you are saying. Thank you for writing this, Danny.

[Vicki Forman]

I've thought about this post for days now, and all I can say is that I am glad your writers group is teaching you to cut off the last "it will all be fine" paragraph. You are doing great work simply by listening and knowing how to do that.

[deborah]

Oh, Danny
This blog is so gorgeously expressed and so true. Are there actually people who don't believe that the way they are feeling one minute is the way they will feel forever? I am always amazed when even a cut heals, let alone a depression lifting.

I don't want you to feel this terrible darkness, but if you should happen to feel this darkness, you should definitely pick up a pen (not a gun, just a pen) and write, because the writing feels so deep and true. And you are a good boy, a very very good boy. I actually make gary tell me "you are a good girl, you are a very good girl," when I'm trying to fall asleep at night. Apparently Anne Sexton needed to hear the same thing at night when she was trying to fall asleep. But she could be a very bad girl and sleep with all sorts of people other than her husband. Anyway,thanks for this amazing blog. And it really is all right for you to show the world the bad, angry, dark, out of control Danny; we will love him just as much.

[churlita]

What a thoughtful and honest post. I've actually been seriously thinking about getting some therapy. I think my running keeps me from experiencing true, prolonged depression. My big problems are self-esteem related and staying in unhealthy relationships. I guess we all have our stuff.

[tamar]

A great post and one that took tons of guts to write... How would I know?;-)

It is an honor to read what you share, and I'm glad you feel better. This business of making a human connection in a typically impersonal world boggles my mind. I’m struck by the absolute intimacy achieved by someone sitting alone with a computer and connecting with others, sharing thoughts and feelings in the vast blogosphere.

You write, "I worry that I’d scare people away... [with talk about causes of the depression]." Well, I think your worries are partially valid and are probably based on what you observe about how people usually respond to such sharing. MOST peeps shun others in rough patches (death, divorce, cancer, MS, depression, infertility, job loss, as examples). After my divorce, I observed disappearances of longtime “good friends.” In one case, years later, I wrote to one, “Where were you? Her reply: “I didn’t know what to say.” We can all cite similar examples of disappearances and reasons given (if asked or if provided).

The teachers you cite are awful. During my dozen years’ working in schools nationwide, I found most teachers (and 99 percent administrators) behave toward kids in hating, hateful ways... These adults wound the youngest of each generation, punishing them cruelly for crimes of being children. I am so sorry for what your teachers inflicted on you.

Last, though you are a Jewish male (sometimes considered relatively in touch with feeeeeling (Woody Allen, as an extreme example), your whole being and universe command: be strong, macho, cool (i.e., absent feelings).

I agree with the message of previous comments: you are fine exactly as you are.

[Dave]

Danny, it's okay to end your comments about life with "sometimes it feels fucking intolerable." Because, honestly, while there are so many great things, great people and terrific aspects to the world in which we live. It's also true, that sometimes, it is just fucking intolerable.

And thank you for letting me feel that I'm not the only one who, from time to time, screams in what turns out to be a very soft whimper.

[Kerstin]

That was a great post. I agree with everybody! It seems like we all have some sort of horrific teacher-from-hell story. I know I do. When I look back, it really blows my mind that some of these people were allowed to even be around children, let alone put in hugely powerful positions that could potentially do so much damage to little psyches.

[Pearl]

Danny, thanks for drawing back that curtain for us. We can see things clearer that way...as can you.
I always admire your honesty and openness with us -- that, in itself, is a great achievement.
May the sun always peek out for you, even if for only short intervals!

[Neil]

Danny, here's where I think us men can take a cue from the women. Have you noticed how many female bloggers openly talk about their depression and the downers of their lives, while the men tend to either be jokey or "experts?" I'm sure most men feel very similar to you at times, including myself, but it just doesn't feel natural expressing these feelings, because as a man you are always supposed to be "on the ball."

[OldOldLady Of The Hills]

I can only say, Amen, Amen, my dear....There are no bows to tie up lousy shitty feelings...And I do believe growth comes from them..BUT, while it is happening, it is just horrendous!
So, Amen, Amen, my dear Danny.

[Laurie]

Danny,

My strongest memory of elementary school is the prinicpal screaming at me. I don't remember her name, but I still remember her looking HUGE--and my horror and humiliation.

I was in the bathroom during the fire drill and did not hear the bell. I came out and everyone had left the school.

Later when we all went back to class, the principal came in and made me stand up in front of the the class and started screaming about how I could have been killed and asking what was wrong with me. I don't ever remember being given a chance to explain what happened.

That was a defining moment in my life.

Now as a 52 year old woman, I am still learning how to deal with others' anger. Some times I do better than others.

Honoring our feelings and that inner child who is still there is crucial.

Thank you for your eloquent, beautiful writing. It is so relatable and touches my heart. I am so glad you are in my life.

[Mindy]

Do you think our culture plays a role in our belief that we're supposed to be happy all the time?

I had a Russian gymnastics coach who commented on the American tendency to say everything's fine even when your mother just died. She said in Russia, when someone asks how you are, people say the Russian equivalent of "so-so" because life in Russia wasn't that great, especially for the Russian Jew, as she was.

Some cultures even have places where a person can go to ride out their depression. Depression is looked upon as a natural part of life and is to be expected. Hmmmmm...

[beer de job]

My mind is like an empty room. Nothing seems worth thinking about. More or less not much noteworthy happening worth mentioning, but it's not important. I guess it doesn't bother me. I've just been letting everything wash over me lately.