I am in one motherfucker of a mood. I am angry. I am depressed. I basically want to curl up and sleep while radiating waves of anger and venom. I feel trapped and when I feel trapped I devolve into a cantankerous mass of seething emotion lacking in all coping skills beyond that of a cornered feral cat. I don’t want to be touched or talked to because any interaction only intensifies my feelings and highlights my complete inability to deal with life; to deal with being me. Additionally, I know that as the emotional manager of my family, if I’m losing my sanity and ability to self regulate emotions, I’ll be less than helpful when someone else presents themselves to me with their own platter of issues. If I knew how to process or deal with my own shit when I feel this way then I wouldn’t feel this way.

Most people get a whole childhood to learn coping mechanisms and to understand that emotions are simply emotions. They come and go like the tide. We name them. We breathe. We allow them space. We breathe. We process and proceed accordingly. We live. This is what Mr. Rogers taught a generation of children. This is what I’m teaching my children. Unfortunately, I’m still learning it myself and in the mean time, the unhealthy coping mechanisms that I ingested without question as a kid, like strychnine laced candy, take over every cell of my being when I’m at my most fragile. I feel like I’m trying to fight an emotional cancer. I can’t release this toxic build up inside of me and express what I’m experiencing and feeling internally because I learned that’s not acceptable.

These are the two passages I scribbled out in the morning hours before my sanity completely fractured last week. This is not hyperbole. I came as close to a psychotic break as I ever hope to experience. Spoiler alert, I’m totally ok now.

There’s a whole backstory associated with me and my shiny menagerie of mental illnesses. It’s practically a Victorian circus that would put P.T. Barnum to shame and over the course of writing here I’ll pull back the curtains to reveal each one with the appropriate flare and honesty they deserve. However, for the time being, suffice it to say, I’ve lived with anxiety for as long as I can remember, endured bouts of depression, experienced deep postpartum depression, and was diagnosed with ADHD as an adult. I have been on antianxiety medication since 2018 and ADHD meds since 2021 and have a solid team of support. Any changes of medication or therapies, unless otherwise noted, are always at the direction of a medical professional. These are all my own personal experiences and everyone’s mental health journeys are their own. I will continue my story of KiKi another day, but I think having an open and honest conversation about mental health is important. Plus, it’s my platform and I’ll do what I want.

So, without further ado, ladies and gentleman, boys and girls I present to you, my three hour mental breakdown, sponsored by my brain chemistry’s septic reaction to Concerta. . .

A few week’s ago I began taking the starting dose of a new ADHD medication. My initial thought was, “This medication is shit.” I was encouraged to, “give it a chance.” I felt tired and grumpy and audibly gave my review to Jared, “Man, I’m not a fan of this Concerta. ADHD yelp gives it a 2.5 star review. No es bueno.” I often give random reviews of things to my hubby so he can be in the loop with what’s going on with me. Granted, half of these reviews I say in my head or to one of our cats. Regardless of reality, I file these things away in my brain as being appropriately communicated. In my defense though, we’ve been married forever and he should be able to read my mind or the cats should be passing these messages along. Anyhow, I ignored the irritability and exhaustion lurking just beneath the surface as they are two standard side effects to being a mom some days.

A week later, wishful thinking prevailed over common sense and I stepped up my dose based on my prescriber’s directions. The day started off like most of my days. My alarm went off at 5:30 AM. I took my pills. I was out of bed by 6:00 AM and brewing my morning coffee. No one in my house gets up before 8:00 AM and I use those two hours to settle into my day. In those two hours I’m not emotionally or physically responsible for another living soul, which gives me the freedom to paint, write, read, send messages to my friends, or just doom scroll on my phone without worry of interruption or guilt. On this particular morning, I started off in the cozy grey chair in my office to drink my coffee. As I sat there, I began to feel a rising tide within me.

If you’ve ever taken a mind altering drug, like Ecstasy or even been given pain killers in a hospital, there’s a sensation that will hit. It’s the same sensation as the lap bar on a steep rollercoaster car being locked in: you know you’re going for a ride and it doesn’t matter how scared you are, you can’t get off until it’s over. As my ride began its assent, I could feel a rage building inside of me like I have never known in my life. Wishful thinking tried to convince me this was a familiar demon. I’ve wrestled more than a few and I’ve learned to calm them. I ran through my tried and true tools of exorcism like Constantine, but not nearly as cool: deep breathing, listening to music, writing, podcasts.

Nothing worked.

I have experience wrestling my demons. Between years of practice and years of healing, I’ve built a solid enough foundation of knowledge, therapy, and medication to give me a level playing field. I make my stand built on this solid ground, a winning playbook at the ready.

This was bigger.

Nothing slowed the ever growing fury’s rising tide. It began to churn into an all consuming storm of self loathing and hatred. I struggled to find some semblance of solid ground or even sand to grip with my toes. All I found was an encroaching darkness with unfamiliar and never ending depths. In the last moments before I was consumed, I made an appointment with my doctor, throwing up a distress flair in exchange for a time to hold onto, a lifeline ensuring I wouldn’t be lost to the darkness forever. And then I went under.

This wasn’t my demon.

The me that is me at my core, Jess, the best and worst parts of me along with everything in between, was pulled deep into this dark void. I was dragged under, only able to watch as some other force took control. This fathom of fury did everything in its power to dissolve my life. It began by attacking me from within, weaponizing my insecurities and wounds. Every insult to ever slice my skin, every rejection to scathe my heart found fresh blood, some after decades of starvation. I struggled to stay close to the surface. Shame filled scenes from my life, once hazy, now played on an endless loop of evidentiary support in remastered high definition. Echoes of mistakes and regrets reverberated with an invigored exaggeration. The descent quickened.

With each wound, scene, remembrance of pain felt or inflicted, I sank deeper. Lies wrapped themselves like tentacles around me, infecting my truths and light with their venom and darkness. “You’re human garbage not worth the pity or the trouble.” Scenes played. Words echoed. I sank. “You’re too damaged, beyond repair, and your presence is a burden on everyone. You’re an inconvenience.” Scenes played. Words echoed. “Your life is just one giant delusion attempting to prove you’re something you’re not, loved.” With each drop into the abyss, I saw various versions of myself. Ghosts of who I was the last time I felt this despair.

I have been here before. . .

The tentacles tightened and my mind raced. “I can’t stay here,” I repeated over in my mind. The tentacles twisted and more venom seeped into my cuts, “Then disappear. . .Let go. . . Give in. . .Take the leap.”

I may not have been here before, but I knew what this was. This sinking darkness, this fury, this pain shared the same splitting atoms as my demon of depression, before I learned how to unmask it. Before I learned how to soothe it and care for wounded kiddo it was hiding. I couldn’t stop this sinking, but I have survived similar. I couldn’t stop the ride, but I could control if I stayed in my seat, the lap bar securely in place.

Just stay.

It is a ride. It is not an eternity.

Just stay.

I was submerged, tangled in tentacles of pain and lies. They were tightening. As the slithering held fast, malicious magma boiled in my great abyss. An untenable pressure of noxious notions and toxic torment building toward some means of release. Eruption.

I was resolved to stay, holding fast to my safety bar. This is a ride. It is not an eternity. The fury had its own resolve. I could survive the ride, but that doesn’t mean I would want to survive the ride’s resulting fallout. If the fury couldn’t convince me to disappear it was going to manifest a toxic tsunami to wipe out everything in my life that meant something to me. Leave lasting scars, charred relationships, and an unrecognizable world of ash.

What followed is a story that isn’t mine alone to tell. That’s the thing about mental illness, at its best it’s contained within you, but at its worst, it spills over and drenches everyone around you. In short, a tsunami of venom crashed within my home. The kiddos were safe and shielded, unaware of the storm. I came back to the surface and by the time my lifeline called, my feet were on solid ground once more.

There is no excuse for what transpired that day. There is only a cause. A shadow version of myself would have compartmentalized this entire experience and tucked it away out of shame. It probably would have festered and continued to do harm, a withering tentacle transformed into a Hydra. Instead, I choose to pull back the curtains and put it on full display. No trick lighting to make it more interesting or captivating. No snake oil or holy water to sanitize. No filters to hide my humanity or flaws.

Mental health is a journey. It’s fucking messy. You do work to heal. You open old wounds to reset them. You acknowledge your unhealthy behaviors, own your shit, and try to be better. You strip yourself down, build yourself back up, and for every two steps forward there is a step backwards. You learn, fail, relearn, cry, rewatch favorite tv shows like West Wing, and laugh while you keep going or take a nap. It’s never a straight path. It’s not always easy, but it’s not always awful. Mental health is like life, it’s complex as fuck, but it’s also all material.