Tag: mental health

Summer’s Ending

This entire summer has been a journey through territory I’ve never traversed before. Quitting my steady, stable, union job back on June 1 was the first step into a whole new world for me. Suddenly, I found myself facing down the world and future without a guaranteed income, or plan for what to do after six months was up.

I also found myself at a massive crossroad with my relationships to others, especially with my former husband. I knew change needed to happen, and that I needed to face down something that had been nagging at me for a long time.

In the act of clearing the decks, in taking stock and making fundamental changes to my life in order to be a healthier, happier me, I stumbled, kind of haphazardly, into a deeper relationship. David, who returned to the house, and my life, all around the time that I was quitting my job and my marriage, has been by my side through this summer of realization and recovery, and continues to be an element of my life that I can’t quite put my finger on. Something there, here, between us, feels authentic in a way I haven’t fully realized or wrapped my arms around. I’m getting there.

On top of all of this, there’s my coaching. I’ve had a summer of taking on a few clients at a health club I started working at back at the end of May. It’s been some time getting my feet under me there, figuring out how to best find my place in the community there, and what skills and abilities to bring to the table while I’ve got my uniform on and I’m working with clients. It’s still all a little wobbly, but with each passing week, I’m meeting new and renewing clients there, and feeling much more confident in what I’m doing. I will be teaching a class there, later this fall, which will be for people who are nervous about weight lifting, and how to lift safely and with confidence.

Today, I’m coming up with a new pitch to gain clients on one of the coaching platforms I’m part of. I’m retooling my own approach (digitally) to ensure that the kinds of clients I’m getting are the kinds of clients I want – ready and willing to make changes, trust in the process, and let me hold them accountable. I’m also coming to terms with the fact that the money I had set aside to ride on while I got my wind in my sails is just about gone.

Soon, in the next thirty days or so, I’m going to be at another crossroads.

Will I be able to afford to continue on as a coach, full time, doing the thing that has brought me utter joy and a feeling of purpose unlike any other profession I’ve been a part of? Or will I need to sure myself up with a regular (albeit part time) job where I’m on someone else’s calendar and clock?

The fact is, I don’t know.

I don’t know if I’ll make it, but I do know that I’m trying.

I *do* know that I’m just going to have to give up and let the Universe guide me forward. Already, just this week, I’ve identified some of the barriers that stand between me and doing this sustainably and for the rest of my days, and it’s my own self-confidence in what and who I am.

The rest of Summer, and on into early Fall, and right up to my Birthday, this is my focus. Finding my self-confidence again, and getting myself to a place where I don’t need to rely on David, or anyone, to keep my head afloat and in the groove I’m in.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , , , , , ,

Independence

Every year since 2010, I’ve had a cold dead rock of emotion inside me on Independence Day.

It was the day my first husband ended my first marriage. It was under the banner of fireworks and pyrotechnics on the banks of the Charles River in Boston, the most Freedom Day place in America on the most Freedom Day of the year.

I was given my freedom, indeed, but felt the cage of all of those demons, that I’d entrusted my marriage to keep me safe from, open wide, and start chewing on me again.

I hadn’t faced down my darkened childhood. I hadn’t take steps to come to terms with my busted first relationship, that had been full of violence and toxicity. I hadn’t even really faced down my own self-destructive nature around food and exercise. Instead, I’d put all of my focus into my marriage, and into being someone’s something, rather than being my anything, at all.

And I started running. For my life.

First, it was running back to Maine, tail between my legs. Then it was actual running – ten miles every other day or so. Then it was to the bar, and drowning out my anxious self, slipping into that time and space that has no feeling and all physicality. Then, it was running on the open road in my car, clear to Denver. I barely paused there, and found myself doing the same sort of running, only this time at altitude – where the air is thin and suffocating all at once.

I finally ran to Portland, and it’s been here where I’ve come to rest. Nearly ten years with Ray meant slowing down, taking stock, and finally, for the first time, pivoting to face the things I could not, physically or emotionally run away from any longer. Hitting forty years of age was the fulcrum point, and since then, nothing’s been the same.

I got my eating and exercise in order. I made steps to embrace my need for mental health help. Now, more recently, I’ve set myself free from a job I hated because it was killing me day by day. I’ve got a massive new love in my life who’s showing that he wants to be here, and be present, even though he’s also stumbling a bit as well.

Tomorrow is the 13th anniversary of my Independence Day.

I’m going to make it a simple and gentle as possible, and remain thankful for the freedom I have in my life now.

I’m a little more free of my past, my demons, my bad choices, and a lot more free to make better, stronger, healthier choices for myself going forward. I have a lot more freedom to love in a way that suits me, and not just for the appeasement of others. I am free to smile in the sunshine, or smile when the rains hit my bald head. I am more free in my spirit than I have been in my whole life.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Yuletide Morning

Our little tree, a living being in a bright red pot I bought at the grocery store for under $20, stands wrapped in bright lights on top of the second-hand bookshelf by the front door.

Upstairs, the dog and my boys are snoring, slumbering into the morning.

Soon, there will be the pitter-patter of dog-paws, as it’s near time for his morning piss and breakfast. As per usual. Like clockwork. He’s as regular as breathing and a heartbeat. His consistency has become something I lean on for my own regularity. I didn’t know I was adopting a life coach and therapist when I scooped up the pup from the shelter, a fortieth birthday gift to myself, over five years ago.

This morning, my thoughts are all over the map. I keep wondering when my life will return to the simplicity of my childhood, except now, and especially after 2022’s revelations and therapy sessions, I’m realizing that childhood was fraught and those moments of simple living are but pages and sections, and not the full story. I wonder what simplicity I am actually chasing?

What would my life be without credit card debt, student loans, that check engine light, the empty spaces in the cupboards? What would my world feel like without the multitude of plates that I’m responsible for? Is that the escape I keep dreaming about? That world where time is measured in coffee cups and cloud patterns?

This will be my 45th Yule. This will be my 45th dip into the darkest part of the year, and my 45th attempt at setting reasonable, measurable, achievable goals for myself and the year to follow. As though I can set intention for the unknown future. As though I have any semblance of control over what the Universe will throw my way over the next twelve months. I suppose, if anything, I’ve learned to be reasonable about what I set for myself.

Perhaps this time, I’ll set my sights a little lower. Instead of massive changes in my current situation, be it with my overall health, or finances, or living arrangements, I’ll keep things on a longer time-scale. I have twenty years until the government has determined I’m not as viable as a worker as I’ve been so far. In the time I have left, I need to take and make concrete steps towards the kind of freedom I want my last years on this planet to be full of. I want a retirement full of trees and paths and magic and calm. To get there, I need to set small goals, incremental in nature, and stick to them daily.

In the meantime, I probably ought to really separate out the things that I can control and alter, and the things that really live outside of my scope of influence. I don’t know who is going to come or go, into or out of, my life. I don’t know what state or shape the community I live in will be in, come this time next year. I don’t know, and I have no control over, who’ll be in charge or what they’ll decree as law or process. I don’t know and cannot control the pressures that will be placed upon my mind and body.

I can control my reactions to these changes, though. If I continue to shrink my lens a bit, narrow my focus down, maybe I’ll feel less overwhelmed by this time next year.

Maybe this time next year, by the light of the tiny tree, I’ll feel like I’m a bit closer to the simple bliss of my post-adulthood life, and a bit closer to that boy I left on that rocky outcropping back in Maine on that warm summer day, staring to the west and dreaming of a better life.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , , ,

One Month

David arrived on October 5th, with the intent of attending a job interview with a shipping company here in Portland. His intent: get to Portland, back to the PNW, and to be closer to me.

The job? Well, the company had misrepresented themselves in the ad, and David passed on that interview. But, he still arrived, eager to make a go of a new life, and a new love, in a new place, ready to engage with a new chapter for himself, and for us.

One month on, and I can honestly say that Dad could not be more contented. Daily, he and I connect, giggle, kiss, and are genuinely affectionate with each other. Daily, we talk about our mental health status, the challenges we are facing, and realizing slowly that we’ve got each other to lean on now, and for as long as we want to do so.

In this last month, I’ve learned that I have so much more healing and personal growth to undertake. Because of David’s persistent affection and presence, with so many huge hugs, deep kisses, belly rubs, and all the rest, I am learning that I still don’t love myself, my body, and my mind nearly enough. I don’t appreciate all that I am capable of, nor do I count myself as worthy of many of the amazing and wonderful aspects of my life. I have to be kinder, gentler, more loving, to myself, if I really ever expect myself to be able to love as big as my heart requires.

Taking care of the Boy while he gets his feet under him has been such an undertaking, and has left me feeling like there’s so much more I could and should be doing. I want to do more of this, too. I want to be more of a caregiver, a nurturer, a source of peace, love, and comfort for more of my community. In order to be that guy, though, I have to get my own affairs in order. I have to be better with my resources, and how I use them, and how I meter them out. I have to be smarter, wiser, and kinder.

I still have so much more growth to undertake, even now, after the midpoint of my physical life has arrived. It’s amazing, really.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , , , , , , , ,

Mental Health Days

I grew up in a world where mental health concerns were the stuff of humor and ridicule. Mental health hospitals were deemed terms like “looney bin” and “psycho ward” and the like. Conversations about people with mental health issues included terms like “bat-shit crazy” and “psychotic” in ways that indicated derision and a derogatory tone. Mental health issues were a shameful thing, best dealt with quietly, in the darkness, and out of sight. Nobody admitted they were on pills to cope. Ever.

For years, I cast off any suggestion that I had depression, or needed therapy, or any help at all. I denounced all mental health meds as just “crutches for the weak” (again, ableist as fuck) and denied myself the care I clearly needed because of the stigma around not being normal.

That stopped, fully, last year, when I started down a path towards my own mental health improvement. My anxiety and depression had gotten so bad that it was affecting how I interacted with the people I love. I was sleeping maybe 4-5 hours a night, my insides were always in a knot, and my drinking had grown exponentially. I needed to come to terms with my old ways of thinking, and admit that I needed help.

Thankfully, I had (and still have) a wonderful support network around me to lean on when shit hits the fan. Dad’s not as strong as he’d like to be, but then again, the definition of “strength” is malleable. I’m learning a lot about the bullshit I carried around for years. I’m working through it. Part of that journey meant coming to terms with my needs at work. I finally applied for an intermittent medical leave, a protected right under the federal Family Medical Leave Act, which will help me both keep my job, and work even harder on my mental health needs and growth.

Today, I finally took advantage of this protection for the first time.

I woke up feeling overwhelmed and exhausted, and as I looked at my scheduled day – 12 hours at the handle of my train – and felt myself already mentally crushing under the weight of that. I made a choice. Today is a self-care day. I have been running hard for a few days straight now, and I’ve hit a wall. Mentally and physically. I lost track of myself yesterday, forgot my meds, and started to grind my own self down.

This decision runs smack against everything I’ve ever been taught about work and reliability and all of that. I still struggle with these old ways of thinking, still refer to myself as “broken” when that’s not fully accurate. Perhaps, today, as I recover and pull myself together again, I will ruminate on the way I talk about my own mental health and wellbeing.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , , , , ,

Dad’s State of Mind

Things started getting really tricky for me back towards the end of the first year of the Pandemic We All Hate (COVID-19). I’d managed to open up my heart, and love in a way that’s true to who I am, but because of lockdowns and such, forming a stronger bond with those who were far away became next to impossible. I found myself constrained and contained, much like the rest of the world, and stuck in an inside-space, with all of the inside-thoughts that come with that.

Things at work had also taken a turn. No longer were my transit vehicles full of commuters and people just getting around the metro area for one reason or another. Suddenly, it was empty vehicles, or vehicles that became rolling shelters for those without homes, and just as suddenly, I was in a place of damage mitigation and social support for those in need. None of which, I might add, I was trained to handle. I was raw-dogging my way through things, just like everyone else was.

Two COVID infections myself, one short-term relationship with a fellow who decided he preferred a monogamous match rather than being part of a polyamorous situation, and myself left with a broken heart in a broken world, 2021 was shaping up to be one of the most challenging years of my life to date.

Amazingly, though, in that year, I met David the DJ, and Dylan, both of whom quickly became solid supporters of me and my mental health. Both of them had begun the journey of getting a handle on their own mind matters, and it was while learning from them that I began to take steps for myself. Panic attacks at work, along with a severe lack of sleep, and running into anxiety walls while working out all had me back on my heels, worried about what was going on in my head. It was, in fact, a lack of boners, that sent me to the doctors. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’d been missing sex a LOT and suddenly, the machinery that I’ve been depending on for all of my post-pubescent years just wasn’t operational. It was a real problem, for sure.

Since starting therapy, and going down my own mental health wellness path, I’ve been making some pretty decent progress. I’ve recognized where loads of my old trauma responses come from. I’ve begun the process of sifting and sorting and healing from old wounds I wasn’t even aware I was carrying. I’ve started to really make new mental connections to the concepts of love and desire and want and validity. Truly, over the last eight months, I’ve made some real growth.

But, as was the case today, there are still moments of opportunity for me. Today was a challenge of a day.

I’ve fallen in with two beautiful men as of late. One, Cody, lives in Tucson and I met him over my trip to see Above & Beyond at the Gorge Amphitheater a little over a month ago. He and I formed a strange and beautiful bond that’s persisting and thriving, in ways I was not expecting. Then, there’s another David, a young man I met online who was living in Philadelphia, who has recently moved to Salt Lake City, and who, for some reason I have as of yet to fully ascertain, has opened up his heart and world to me. Both of these wonderful connections have so much potential for Joy and Goodness and all the things that relationships can include. It’s a damn Good Thing, and I’m super-duper lucky.

Except that I don’t feel worthy of it. Not fully. Like, I don’t know if I deserve their affections and attentions. Today, as I asked myself “are you worthy” while at the gym, my mind went into chaos-mode, and a panic attack unlike I’d ever felt before, really reared up. I called out of work, knowing full well I’d be unsafe to operate a vehicle in this state of mind, and then made a bee-line, with the dog, to the forest for a respite.

I quieted myself next to the Clackamas River, while Steinbeck kept watch. I let him swim and take a deep drink of the cold mountain water, and as we drove, he leaned in on me more than once, as though to check on me, and tell me I’m worthy of his love. We passed a lone cyclist, who was riding towards the forest, who just reached high and gave us an excited wave, which I returned in kind. He also saw me as worthy, it would seem. I got home, turned back on my connectivity to the world by taking my phone out of Do Not Disturb mode, and caught a message from young David, and DJ David, and Cody, all of whom were checking in on me. All of whom, it would appear, see me as worthy.

I had a vulnerable moment in a video chat with young David, and told him of my struggles. His response has been one of love and gratitude for my allowing him to see this side of me. A text message chain with Cody brought similar results.

Today, I learned that I am worthy of the love I’ve been shown. It was coming at me from all directions, though not from my own inside-self.

I need to continue the work on building up my own sense of self-worth, and not need to rely on external topping off of such things as much. That, for me, is the state of play in my mind these days. I know there’s much more work to do.

by Thom Categories: TasteTags: , , , , , , , ,

Locked Down, Again

I started to feel off on Saturday. Scratchy throat, headache, and a dry cough that no amount of cough drops could soothe. I wasn’t stuffed up, and my allergy meds and nasal spray weren’t really doing any heavy lifting, so I figured I’d rule out something I’d thought I’d been vaccinated and immunized against for a while now – COVID-19.

Turns out, that’s exactly what I’ve managed to contract. Again. For the third time.

Sunday, my positive test result took the wind out of my sails. I called off work, let them know that I was poz, and sat in kind of a blank-stare stupor for most of the day. How was this possible? I mean, I know how it’s possible. This virus is very, VERY happy to mutate, and since my last infection, and last dose of vaccine, I’ve lost count of how many variants have been discovered and labeled and started their march across humanity. I don’t know which strain I have now, and it doesn’t matter, but the symptoms are vaguely familiar, though not as sharp/steep as the previous rounds I’ve had with this coronavirus.

This is a forced time out. This is the universe telling me “chill, bro” and catch your breath (as best as you can, the virus has my chest all kinds of tight). So, that’s what I’ve been doing. No, that’s actually not quite true.

I’m not a “chill, bro” kind of person.

In fact, what I have been doing is working on the things I have been kicking down the road for a while now out of a lack of time and focus strength. I’ve started to put into place the pieces I need to launch my coaching career, and so far, with only a few minor hiccups, things seem to be rolling on.

I have a site up – kind of quick-and-dirty and subject to refinement – that both markets my coaching skills and links to software that I will be using to engage with my clients. Right now, I have three beta-testers who are getting twelve weeks of nutrition coaching for free in exchange for their feedback on elements and the process along the way. I will be coaching them for sure, but part of our check-ins will also be to get feedback on the process, software, information, and how well my coaching aligns with the curriculum they’ve got for themselves.

I’ve gotten some intake surveys from the people who’ve started, and immediately, I am finding myself focusing in on both the areas I’m spotting that have the most need for my help, and setting expectations for myself, and for my clients, about what areas I want to really hone in on for them.

I’m really, really excited for this! It is tapping all the way into my Healer/Teacher/Guide self, and I feel like I can make a MASSIVE impact on the people who engage with me, if I trust my instincts and listen with my heart and mind aligned.

I feel really, really in alignment. For the first time in a long time.

This journey is just getting started, and I’m excited for it. I can already sense some massive doors just starting to peek open for me, and it’ll be up to me to both check what’s behind them, remain vigilant for opportunities that align with who and what I am, and to remain in this state of utter gratitude for this opportunity to change how I engage with the world around me.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , , , ,

Daddy Goes Deeper

For over twenty years, I’ve been on the run.

I came out of the closet into a maelstrom of gay identity and chaos, making choices along the way that were detrimental to my very existence. I went against my instincts time and time again because, at the end of it all, whatever came my way made me feel valid, made me feel like my life had purpose, that I was wanted and desired, on any level, among society. My roots in a family, full of rage and resentment, have left a wiring diagram in my brain that has, for years, needed to be reworked, realigned, rebuilt. It was too much for me then, but never got better as time passed. Trauma doesn’t know what Space and Time are.

I finally started therapy for this, far too long along this path of fog and darkness, because my age and stage of life was finally exhausted from carrying around that baggage. You can only make the same mistakes for so long, before something has to give.

The privilege of therapy, and access to mental health resources overall, is a thing I recognize. It is a human right that all should have access to. Nobody should have to bear the weight of the world on their own, using google and social media to both diagnose and treat the ways their mind works.

So, here’s to figuring things out so that Dad is a stronger, better, wiser man going forward. It’s far-past time to get right with the world around me so I can be better for you all.

by Thom Categories: TouchTags: , , 1 Comment