The Sharp Metamorphisis

Preface

I've discussed the day in detail in my blog before and I've talked to some of my friends frankly about it but I've never really said in a large forum that I have survived a suicide attempt.  It's been almost 2 years but it has been fresh lately due to my involvement in the opera "Madama Butterfly."

The Butterfly

I've relived that day in a fresh way many times as I've watched, from the wings, the third act.

I often tell Derek Myler, who sings the role of Sharpless, that his character is my favorite.  Part of it is because he performs it with a sweetness and a sincerity.  A good portion of why it's my favorite character is in the final scene.  Chio Chio San blindfolds Sorrow and he holds his American flag while she proceeds to commit Hari Kari.  Pinkerton and Sharpless enter and while Pinkerton wails and watches helpless while Chio Chio San's life drains from her, Sharpless runs to Sorrow and holds him and shields him from the horros that a child should never witness.

Like Butterfly, I too chose to end my life.  I chose to do it at home.  I posted my reasons on a status message and locked myself away to shield my family, much like the blindfold that Chio Chio San wraps over Sorrow's eyes and head.

I described a moment of clarity after I had taken the pills, and prepared to take some sleeping pills as well so that I could just fall asleep, in my earlier post on this moment.  It didn't come from myself but I never told of what I saw.

I saw my wife unlocking the bedroom door and finding me,  I saw my children now unprotected from the sight as my wife would have cried out and they would surely have come to her aid.  I saw that the blindfold I had put between me and them was a lie.

After my ordeal and my fight for my life.  I became protective.  I worried about my children and how what I had done would affect them.  I tried to shield them from it.  When someone does something like that at home inevitably DCFS and the police will make a wellness visit.  I was grateful to have them come but fearful of the effect of reliving the moment on my children.  When they came I asked if we could do most of the interview outside in the shade of the maple tree while my children were inside.  I welcomed them to talk to my children and even look at my home after if that was necessary but I wanted to protect them from what I had done as much as possible.  They were so gracious and it was mostly me they needed to see and make sure that I was getting the help I needed.  Many people are angry with or afraid of the authorities but I was grateful for their kindness and compassion and talking with them was part of my healing process.

I had to dye my hair for the opera and I see a different person in the mirror since then.  I change even more as I apply the stage make-up that completes my transformation for the opera.  It reminds me that I was once Butterfly and have changed.  Part of me is now Sharpless.  Holding on to my family and trying to shield them from my depression and anxiety.

So when I cry at the end, it is for the joy that I have in avoiding the scene I watch on stage.

I have become something else since then.

If you haven't read my account of the day you can find it in the blog contents under consequences, or this link:

http://timmair.blogspot.com/2013/08/this-one-worries-me-to-post-but-part-of.html

It's a process

This was my Facebook status but I thought it went well on my blog as well.

I'm not feeling very intelligent today. I feel awkward and not successful. I feel drained. I also feel a little sick. My brain is not my friend sometimes. My limbic system and amygdala are overworked when I force myself to do things that are good for me but cause anxiety. They respond by trying to slow me down. That's what seems to bring on the depression. My mind wants me to stop and think about what it is that causes the stress and how to fix it. But the logic centers know that I have been actually doing something good so my subconscious mind deduces that it must be me that is the problem.

Usually that makes me feel like I should lash out at myself and warn the rest of the world away from me too but today I'm trying to reason it out. Use the over analyzing that comes with depressed mindset (that's actually one of the natural functions of depressed mindsets in everyone just some people have a greater tendency to use it as their go to problem solving mode and I believe we actually become addicted to it) but use this mindset to fix it. By trying to use specific language to describe what is happening. Instead of lashing out at myself, I am making an effort to analyze what I have control over and what is out of my hands.

I don't always remember to do things this way but today I did. And thought that I would do it in a public way so maybe someone else could see that they are not alone if they are struggling. Our world needs us to remove the stigmas about mental illness so that dialogs can happen and more people can be helped. I'm still drained but there's hope too. I need rest but my mind is less foggy.

Indian Summer

It seems so warm for November

And the days still felt so long.

We'd have the sun it seemed forever

But the snow still fell and proved me wrong.

And I regret not taking time

To spend together in the sun

To run and walk, your hand mine

Before our time was all but done.

Indian summer is a tricky kind of friend

She holds your hand so tight and sure

But sooner or later warmer weather has to end.

Indian Summer can't endure.

Hear the bugler sound.

Hear the bugler sound.
Feet standing firm on the ground.
The sound  of the their hearts ringing loud.
Stout hearts are strong 'cause their proud. 

They never claimed to be brave
They rarely see the ones that they save.  
The red rose it covers the ground   
One heartbeat barely a sound.  

Hear the bugler sound.   
White lilies cover the ground.             
The sound of gunfire rings loud.
The heads of the people are bowed.
 
Father take this one in your breast.
This one has passed the test.
Stoutly this one held their ground
While cannon fire raged all around.

Fire voices

There's a fire.
It burns bright both day and night.
There's a wind.
It stirs the fire and makes it glow.       
There's the cold.
That makes you yearn to reach the fire.
There's your feet.
Bruised, bloody and swollen from trying to make it.
There's the mind.
Telling you that you can never be warm.
There's the voices.
They call you to join them at the fire.
There's your hearbeat.
The cadence that keeps you moving to the music of the voices, to escape the cold and to reach the fire.  To warm your soul.

Perspective - Today vs 2 months vs 2 years Battery life better or worse?

I'm not going to church this morning.  It would be great.  It's the primary program after all.  The children will all sing and get up to repeat the lines that their teacher whispers in their ears.  So adorable. But with it brings lots of people.

I have learned that I'm still good at being social and I can even maintain a social  extroverted side for long periods of time but it severely drains my battery.  I have to recharge.  I began to feel this morning as if I had gone backwards because it's been so hard lately to go to church.  I got so good after first starting my medication at going at least for Sacrament that not being there now is making me feel like I've made no progress.

Then I look at where I've been for the last two years.

Surely this is where I started if I look at just today.  2 years ago being around people began to stress me more and more.  Church was always so full and then you file into a class room to sit even closer with others without the benefit of your wife and kids as a buffer it gets worse.  It's hard to concentrate long enough to feel the spirit when your mind tells you that you should be running and that you're having a heart attack at the same time.

After going through that more and more for many months I sought help and treatment and things got better.  By this time last year I was doing reasonably better.  Though I had moments (like when Tina lost her job) that it was hard to be around people I still could usually make it to at least part of church and talk to people about it.

I was conditioning my social batteries to accept a bigger and bigger charge so to speak.  Then this Summer came and it started to get a little harder to sit in church again.  I was able to do things like practice piano in a room during gospel doctrine and that usually gave me a little recharge to make it through the rest but I could tell it was getting worse.  In the past 2 months it has gotten almost as hard for me as it was 2 years ago up until right before I sought treatment.  Have I really undone everything?

Sitting here I realize that I haven't gone backwards.  Certainly I'm doing more now than ever.

This past Summer I started working on campus.  That was draining but as a custodian I didn't HAVE to socialize a lot.  I could work through it.  But in August school started and I was also singing with the dedicatory choir for the Ogden Temple.  Suddenly I'm socializing 8 or 9 hours a day 6 days a week with only a Saturday to recharge.  My better conditioned social battery has been running on maximum and draining all the way each week.  My battery still charges rather slowly so I don't always have a full charge to make it.

It was hardest right after the dedication.  I was recognized.  Lots of people would come to me and say how great the choir was.  Not realizing how hard that is for me to handle.  It's even more difficult for me because I have a weird philosophy about singing in church.  It should be acknowledged but more in the way you do a prayer.  It's not a performance.  it's a participation in the ceremony that is a church meeting.  The choir in the dedication more so.  You can disagree with me if you want that's ok.  It's just how I feel.  I would rather someone come up and say "Good Talk"  or "Good Testimony" than acknowledge my singing or my prayer.  I'm not saying others are wrong but simply trying to get it out how difficult it is for me to field praise in those situations.  It is like your phone working over time to find a signal when there is none or very little to be had.  The battery drains faster and faster and it begins to overheat at times.  Not to mention that socializing in general is much like running your phone or tablet with the screen on nearly all the time.  My screen is my face and body and voice as I attempt to be the extrovert I feel is required when I'm around people.

I realize that I haven't gone backward.  I'm still getting better and I'm learning more and more ways to not only better condition my social battery but also to turn off programs when they're not needed so that I can conserve energy, turn off the screen at times.  Put it on airplane mode at times.

I get better everyday.  Don't give up on me but if you reach out to me and I back away, it's not about you.  I'm just trying to save my battery for a long period of time without recharge.

Humble Confidence, a rebuttal to my own post "On my shelf I have a few trophies."

Dr. Thomas Harris made the following wise observation on insecurity and confidence: “Most people never fulfill their human promise and potential because they remain perpetually helpless children overwhelmed by a sense of inferiority. The feeling of being okay does not imply that the person has risen above all his faults and emotional problems. It merely implies that he refuses to be paralyzed by them.”

I began my post with this quote.  I recall a time when I believed in my own abilities.   Some people who knew me called it ego.  Some cockiness.  Some overconfidence.   Some just thought that I knew what I could do.  I knew I had limitations.   I worked hard to overcome the ones I could see and to recognize new ones as soon as I was mature enough to do so.

Still the words "Ego" and "Cocky" began to stick with me.  I began to wonder if it was true.  My desire to be better at the things I could do well forced me to look at my faults so I began more and more to focus on them.  I believed that if I focused on my weaknesses at all times that I could rid myself of the ego and the cockiness.

Don't get me wrong,  I don't want you to think that I blame others for this.  My choice to interpret their words in this fashion was my own.

Instead of saying "Thank You" when someone gave me a compliment I began to describe why I did not deserve it.  If it was about music or performance I would offer suggestions for how I could have done better.   I didn't even realize how ill mannered I had become.

Now as I say these things many of you, especially those of you who perform or are artists probably do the same things.   Some are good at saying "Thank You" and save the self criticism for later.  Some are just like me.  Some of you are good about accepting praise and are genuine about it despite knowing you could do better.   

Recognizing weaknesses,  that's a good quality.  See it, fix it if you can and move on.  Recognizing your own accomplishments, I contend, is also good.  See it, figure out how to repeat it, figure out when to repeat it and move on.  

What about awards? Trophies?  Reminders of past success, is it moving on to keep those?  Only you can answer that truthfully but I would argue that you can keep memories, reminders, tokens of these things and still remain humble.  If you take them out and polish them everyday and try to bring them up in every conversation, maybe they aren’t so good for you.  But it can never be a bad thing to pull them out and remember how it made you feel to accomplish something.  Remember how hard you worked and even how much you learned and improved since.

“On My Shelf I Have a Few Trophies” is the name of a blog post I made over a year ago.  In it I described my ordeal with not feeling good enough.  About looking at past accomplishments with shame, thinking that otherwise it was egotistical to think of them any other way.  We are warned against pride often.  Pride cometh before the fall….there is no such thing as righteous pride…(I paraphrase on those, I think, and at this moment I’m too lazy too look them up to give proper credit)

Recognizing what you’ve done and what you are capable of is not pride.  Dwelling on it, holding it over someone else, building yourself up with it while thinking of others as beneath you, that is pride.  And I am arguing here and now that dwelling on your weaknesses and ignoring your good works is also pride.

If someone asks you if you can do something and you can, you say “Yes.”  If they tell you good job you respond with sincere gratitude.  

You can be Humble and Confident.

I wasn’t completely lazy I did look up one other quote.  It was said by a man I that looked up to and thought of as having a quiet dignity and humble demeanor. so I will close with that quote:

“I believe in myself. I do not mean to say this with egotism. But I believe in my capacity and in your capacity to do good, to make some contribution to the society of which we are a part, [and] to grow and develop. … I believe in the principle that I can make a difference in this world, be it ever so small.”

“President Hinckley Shares Ten Beliefs with Chamber,” Church News, Jan. 31, 1998, 4