Whitey, Noise: On #BlackMass and our own bully

Lovey and I ran away from home on Saturday night. The nice neighbor couchsat while our littles slept sweet melatonin-infused dreams. We went to go see "Black Mass," which is the opposite of a sweet melatonin-infused dream, but which might be core curriculum for anyone who's ever lived in Boston. Even if you have no investment in the stories of Boston boys-turned-gangsters from around the way, Johnny Depp's performance is eerily good. I pretty much agree with everything Ty Burr wrote about the film, as I generally think he gets it so right. A major focus of Burr's review which was especially sensitive to the families of Whitey's murder victims is on the villainous portrayal of Whitey Bulger. His character in the film is not intended to be liked. He is to be feared, foiled with his statesman brother, aligned with his boyhood friend who became his FBI liaison.

The villain that is James Whitey Bulger, whether rotting in prison in real life or portrayed on a silver screen, is sometimes easier for me to confront than the enemy that lives with me. It is easier for me to vilify someone whom I will never meet and expect fair punishment for the crimes committed than the enemy I live with everyday. The voice of the enemy that whispers often enough to me, You are so far from the mark, girl. You haven't come close to your potential. No wonder you are unloved and uninvited. I have heard the lies that gangster spits long enough to recognize a bully. But because I've lived with this bully so long, I sometimes assume its permanence. When I skip my medication for a couple of days, the voice becomes louder to the point of deafening. When I stop recognizing the bully for what it is, I slide into some kind of Stockholm Syndrome, as if the lies are a defense for me, an excuse for self-loathing. It's been some years since suicide ideation was a part of my daily life and I'm grateful. But it doesn't mean the villain isn't lurking, stashing its venom behind the corners of my mind that I prefer not to visit.

A few months ago, I started working on some strength-training goals. Nothing too crazy, just a plan that an online trainer works out for me that is easy for me to follow. It's amazing what a difference having something spelled out like a recipe will do for one's fortitude. If I know what to do, what order to do it in, how to lift it and lunge it, and how many times, I can follow along and go hard with it. I still mostly look the same but I'm stronger and I realize that when I'm stronger, I'm less susceptible to listen to the lying liar. I'm sorry, I just lifted my kids' combined bodyweight, so that verse doesn't ring true, anymore. I don't talk much about the enemy that performs on the stage of my mind wearing the costume of generalized anxiety/depression.  When I do, I find that I'm not so alone, though. "You're too fly for that noise," my friend Trish once told me. And she's right. We all are--too fly to believe that the enemy that whispers lies about who we are and how we were made for eternity should be put away for a life sentence.

Remembering Chuck

Ten years ago, I was a Resident Director in a freshman building. I was a second semester senior, working on my thesis, tickled to be living in a residence hall with mostly first-year students. They kept the quintessential college experience alive for me: the late nights, the cram sessions, the homesickness, the smells of chicken wings and stale beer. I was months away from graduation and the excitement was palpable. I couldn't wait to earn that rightful sheepskin, spend the summer traveling, and then move to Boston to be with my boyfriend and live a fabulously urbane grown-up life!

But I had to get through the winter first. The winter in Northwest Pennsylvania is seemingly interminable and gray and bitter and prompted me to buy a sunlamp that I used constantly.

That winter of 2002 was especially heavy. My sunlamp was always on.

***

Chuck lived in a fraternity house off-campus. We knew of each other as we had many people in common and were both active in the Poli Sci department. Two of his fraternity brothers Jerry and Jeff were on staff with me in the freshman dorm.

My college boyfriend was one of Chuck's RAs. We would see him around campus and Chuck always had a quick smile and a witty aside for us. He was brilliant, an Adonis. He would have become a remarkable lawyer, offering a voice to the marginalized with his splendid writing and speaking abilities.

Chuck did not survive the winter. On February 11, 2002, he took his own life. Jerry and Jeff came to my room and we sat, angry and begging for the hands of time to reverse. Our boss Josh stood and listened and made us all feel heard.

Ten years have passed and the pain and the ache and the loss is still acute. I trace back over the court case that ensued following Chuck's death. I examine the evidence like an archaeologist trying to piece together clues of how the structure of a promising young man's life, once in tact, tumbled and became buried. I think of his family and wonder how they have processed the pain. I think about the paralysis I would feel for the rest of my days if the same happened to one of my children.

***

I was not a close friend of Chuck's but my life was irreversibly changed by his death.

As someone who has suffered from major depression, I do not hesitate to advocate for others who suffer similarly. If I am having a hard time in mental health land, I will not send you a postcard, "All's sunny and well--wish you were here!" If you ask, I will tell you the medications I have taken and continue to take. I will tell you the dosage. I can share my experiences with months-long insomnia when I was a sophomore in college that were punctuated by several weekends in which I spent hours holding my mother captive to my tears. I have had racing thoughts and wondered if the pain I had been feeling for a year would ever EVER fade. I celebrate the fact that the people around me implemented man-on-man defense at certain times and implemented a serious time-out on the court. For all these reasons, I refuse to perpetuate the stigma associated with mental illnesses and the therapies that treat them.

I now teach college students, and by virtue of being an employee of a church, I consider myself a part of a ministry. I see many young people at their best and brightest. I see some at their most disaffected, their most despondent, on the worst days of their lives.

I pray with them and I pray for them. When my students are not in class, I fret and I pester them. I make a nuisance of myself and I do not apologize. I refer students to the counseling center and if they don't make contact I do it again.

I married that college boyfriend, a mental health therapist. We both share singular ministries that involve direct service to people.

I do not believe that anyone is beyond help, that any person is beyond redemption. I believe our world is a widespread construction zone but I do not believe that God is powerless to save us from it. He often places people in our path to help save us from ourselves and our own demons. I wish so much that Chuck and countless others could have been in a place to receive this help. I know this is not always possible, but I pray that our world would continue to increase its value and awareness for the importance of sound mental health.

I will try mightily to do my part in making this so. Of course, I am only one person. But so, too, was Chuck.

SAD

During the months of October/November and again in the soul suck that is January/February, I get a lot of questions about Seasonal Affective Disorder. I don't know why I have never written anything comprehensive about my experience with SAD. (How sad, really!). So here I sit in front of my sun lamp with an FAQ list just for you, or anyone who gives a toot.

So, how were you, like, diagnosed with SAD? I saw a psychologist during my senior year of high school when a lot of ish was going down for me. I continued to meet with this therapist on breaks in college. On one such break, she said that she had noticed a pattern of when I would slip into a depression. She noted it was always around the time that the days got shorter, and then it would seem to lift around the time that daylight savings ended. Yeah, was a super sleuth. She suggested that I get a sun lamp and just see what happens. She herself used one in the winter whenever she got home from work to motivate her to do her notes.

So I bought one on the intranets for $200. This was 1999 when I was a sophomore in college. I had a single room so I could sit in front of the lamp whenever I wanted. I didn't really know what I was doing but I noticed almost immediately that sitting in front of the lamp every day for 15-30 minutes right as the sun was setting helped me to feel more energized and positive. I noticed that I was more focused after light treatments, and that I didn't eat three solid meals of ice cream and cereal. Woohoo! Where did you buy your sun lamp?

I purchased it from The Sun Box Co. in Gaithersburg MD. It is about 14" and sits on my desk. The model that I use is what they call the Sunlight Jr. I have never had to replace the bulbs--they have lasted ten eleven years!

How did you learn how to use it?

I had the opportunity to participate in a study through Brigham & Women's Hospital when I was in Boston. When I moved to Boston, I struggled the most with SAD since I had always lived on the other side of Eastern Standard Time Zone. Boston is obviously at the far end of the time zone, so the sun was setting in the winter as early as 3:30 p.m. Chances were often good for me that I would not even see the sun, working in a vacuum of an office building. So I joined this study hoping that I could learn something. The lead psychiatrist on the study said that I should attempt to sit in front of the sunlamp every morning and every afternoon for 30 minutes, with the lamp 6-8" away from my face. I think there are benefits to just sitting in front of the lamp for even a smaller window of time, but this was the "prescription" and I would not dispute it.

What about meds?

I'm obviously not a prescriber, but I have experienced many winters when I was unmedicated and plenty of winters where I was taking an anti-depressant. Relative to the sun lamp, I would say that it is still worth it to use light treatments to help treat winter depression. It's cancer free sunshine. Or you could just move to Bali.