Even with how far society has come with understanding mental health, it became clear to me that there is still a stigma about it.

I needed to take a break from writing this blog because I started to struggle again with my mental health. How can somebody be writing a self-help blog while he still needs help himself?

I should’ve noticed all the signs of my depression long before I did. I stopped caring about writing. I was bummed out I had gigs coming up. I was miserable at work all the time. I didn’t want to come home some days. I could only muster up the energy to doom-scroll on my phone. All signs pointed to depression.

The hardest part of admitting all of this is because I could just go back and read the things I wrote here with my own brain and I would have all the answers for what was fucking with me. Instead, I wallowed. It caused tension in my house and at my workplace.

So, I had to make a decision, and that decision was to go back to therapy. I found an amazing therapist here in town, and I am already starting to see progress.

I also have to give my fiancee Tori a lot of credit, because she encouraged me to write this article, and how my transparency about my struggles could help others.

Like I said, there is still a stigma about mental health, especially men’s mental health, so I felt a little embarrassed to write this article. However, the only way we end these stigmas is to bring more awareness, so here we go.

NOTE: This is an extremely personal story, and may not be for everybody. Trigger warnings for suicidal ideation.

HOW MY DEPRESSION BEGAN

I am really lucky, because I had an incredible childhood. My parents were truly in love with each other. My Dad worked his ass off to build us a beautiful home. I got to play hockey and baseball, and take guitar and voice lessons. I was very close with my baby sister, and I got to hang out with my cousins quite often.

My Dad wasn’t around a lot, and I kind of grew to resent him for it. I like to say that if a month had 30 days in it, my Dad worked 31 of them. He missed my first goal, my first strikeout, my first singing competition etc. When he wasn’t, I was lucky enough to have a father figure in his place; my Grandpa Jim. Grandpa Jim was my mother’s step-dad, but he raised her since she was a toddler.

Mom took care of the house and us kids, and while she was mostly a content happy person, there was the odd crack in her behaviour. I remember seeing her breaking down crying and when I went to comfort her she exclaimed something along the lines of “I don’t know son, I’m miserable and I don’t know why.”

Grandpa Jim took me to all of my hockey practices, and would come over to watch the first two periods of a ton of Edmonton Oiler games. He would go to bed before the 3rd period. Sometimes I’d call him the next morning to falsify how the 3rd period went to bug him. Hockey was our thing. We got to take him to his first ever NHL experience when he was in his late 60’s. We took a picture together by the statue of Gretzky and he had a funny run-in with Oilers reporter Gene Principe.

Grandpa passed away when I was 13 from Bone Cancer. He fought off Lung Cancer at 72, went into remission, only for it to eventually spread and he went downhill pretty fast. Last words he every said to me was “Goodbye son.” It was a hard time, but before he died my Dad asked me to strong for my Mother, so I didn’t cry. I didn’t even cry at his funeral. It’s insane to me how much of an impact he had on me, because I still remember him vividly. My son is named after him.

Dealing with the loss of grandparents is something most of us will have to do, and even though dealing with any familial loss is hard, it didn’t really create depression in me. I quit playing hockey after he passed, but nothing else really changed.

High school was fun. I made a lot of new friends and because I was introduced to drinking at a young age, I could hold my liquor pretty well by the time I was in 10th grade. I got my driver’s license and with it, I got the freedom to go anywhere I wanted when I wanted. I had a part time job and only one small truck payment to make every month.

Then my parents got my sister and I to sit down and we were informed that our mother had found a lump on her breast. Even after hearing that, I believed it wouldn’t be anything serious and moved on. A few weeks later, we found out that she was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. Stage 4. Basically a death sentence, but we weren’t told the Stage 4 part.

Over the next three years, we watched as my Mom went from this vibrant beautiful woman to a frail faith-healing hopeful woman. I could see her deteriorating, but I didn’t want to believe my eyes. I coped with alcohol and partying. I started smoking cigarettes and chewing Skoal. At a time when I should’ve started thinking about what I was going to do after I graduated, I was avoiding everything. I even moved out of my parents house just to get away. I wanted to simultaneously spend as much time with her as I could, all the while never being able to watch her suffer.

Eventually I had to move back home when I was faced with the financial reality of how hard it is to make a living in a big city and no solid income.

I didn’t have any ambition. I had nothing left. I drank booze, smoked cigarettes, ate junk food, and just wasted time. I got a DUI two weeks before my mother passed away. One last disappointment for her to witness before she died.

The day she died was my worst nightmare, but also a point of relief. I knew it was coming but I thought if I didn’t face the reality it would just go away.

After she passed away, I just stayed in a fog for over a year. I didn’t want to go anywhere or do anything. I lost my license for a year and couldn’t get myself to work, so I stayed unemployed the whole time. I gained almost 100 pounds.

I only went to family events when I was forced to, because I was ashamed of what I looked like and how I had nothing to show for my entire life. My every day was waking up hungover, playing video games and drinking more and more until Grandma brought supper over. I’d eat, help with the dishes, then retreat back to my room to watch porn and then drink some more until I passed out.

Eventually, I stepped on scale and was horrified to see 271 on the digital scale. It helped that there was a mirror in the same bathroom and the look of my naked body was enough to kickstart some kind of fire inside of me.

The next day, I started running. It was the only thing I could have control of. The first time I didn’t even make it down my driveway. The day after, I made the end of the driveway. The day after, I did it twice. Every day I made a little progress here and there.

I got a job hauling drywall and moved in with my cousin and his friends. Eventually the physical job and the activities my roommates and I would do every day led to my weight changing drastically. I lost almost 90 pounds in a matter of six months.

I finally looked better, so I had some confidence in myself. I was finally living on my own, and I had a lot of fun. But my life still wasn’t going anywhere. So I made the decision that I wanted to go back to school to upgrade my high school grades so I could go to college for Journalism. Now I had a plan for my future, but there was something else I was missing; finding love.

I’ve never really been open about this, but I struggled immensely with sex and love at points in my life. I had absolutely no confidence in talking to girls and I was living with guys who were having a lot of success in getting laid. Hell, I shared a wall with the most successful guy in our group.

The amount of fumbles I had with women during that period of my life makes me shudder. I just never believed I was good enough so I didn’t even try. Then on nights when I would finally muster up the courage to talk to a girl and she turned me down, I would lose all my confidence for the next couple of weeks. I was an incel before the term incel was a thing.

I eventually moved to Calgary with my cousin and his (now wife) girlfriend, figuring a new start in a new city would be good for me. I made some new friends, but I still had no success with women. It was a hard time, because all I wanted was what my cousin and his girlfriend had. Being a third wheel gets pretty old pretty quickly.

I was finally really starting to thrive in all other aspects of my life at that time. I was doing well in school, and Calgary is a beautiful city to live in. I liked riding the C-Train, and biking alongside the Bow River, and hitting up the outdoor rinks in the winter. The one day, I got the biggest shock of my entire life.

My sister called me at 7 in the morning while I was on the train to school. She complained that he back was hurting and she was having trouble breathing. Instead of being concerned and having compassion, I was annoyed at her for bothering me when I was 7 hours away. I told her to call Dad or our Uncle who was next door, because there’s nothing I could do.

I went on with my day. Texted her to see how she was doing to no response. I guess I didn’t think anything horrible could really happen. Sure, she was diabetic, but she was only 19 years old. She’ll be fine.

My cousin and I were high as fuck playing video games when my Dad called. We were in the middle of the game so I just ignored it. I’ll call him back later. He called again. I even made a remark like “Dad, just hold the fuck on.” Then it happened. Then, my cousins phone started ringing.

Now I don’t know if there’s supernatural forces at play, but in that very moment, I knew. It was like the outside world faded away to darkness and my heartbeat was all I could hear. Like my world was about to be shaken. I answered to hear my Dad through tears saying “Cassie’s Dead.”

I didn’t believe shock to be a real condition until that moment. I screamed “What am I supposed to do now?” My cousin hugged me, and I don’t think I said another word. Him and his girlfriend drove me from Calgary to Red Deer where we met up with my Uncle and Aunt who lived in Edmonton who drove me the rest of the way home. I couldn’t talk.

When we got there, I hugged my Dad, and was embraced by so many amazing family members, but all I wanted was to get the pain to stop. I wanted to be numb. So I went to the bar.

Losing her the way we did was the most pain I had ever felt. What if I would’ve just come home? What if I realized she was in a ketoacidosis state? What if I called an ambulance for her?

When it was finally time for me to go back home, I was a different person. Nothing else had meaning. My grades fell. My ambition wavered. My behaviour was unacceptable. I became reckless.

I sometimes attended class, but I would prefer to be at the campus bar drinking. I stopped doing actual school work and just half-ass fabricated articles so I could pass the course. I went out to bars hoping I’d piss somebody off and they would kick my teeth in.

By the time I graduated, I had pretty much burned every bridge possible. I always had a great work ethic when I cared about anything, but I didn’t care enough about my career choice I had just went to school for. My cousin was at his wit’s end with me and he said I was not welcome to continue living with him.

The final few months I spent in Calgary was just the same day over and over again. I had a paid internship with the Strathmore Standard in Strathmore, a quick 35 minute drive from the big city. I would do my work assignments, then I’d submit them and go out and party. Sometimes I would have to drive to the office and submit some of my work there, but then I would just end up next door drinking and watching hockey games. I’d sleep til noon and do it all over again.

I was pouring horrible food into my system, swiping like a mad man on Tinder, and the only liquids I would consume were alcohol and caffeine.

I was finally forced to move back home and back in with my Dad while I figured out my next move. I figured I’d just party until I died. Why would it matter if I did anything else? I didn’t have a girlfriend. I didn’t have a job. I had told the big boss at the local paper to fuck himself, so I didn’t have a career. I figured I was just a burden…

CHECK OUT PART TWO OF THIS ARTICLE NEXT WEDNESDAY!