My New Friend

There are some days I love living in the ghetto. I'm glad I'm not raising a family in my apartment complex, but living where I live isn't a bad way to save money when we only have about a year left before graduation.

I was feeding the dumpster kitties last night, lingering a little longer than usual. I was checking out the battle wounds of one of my toms, (hopefully not another story, right now I'm keeping a close eye on him) who looked like he'd got into it with either another cat or a raccoon. He is especially skittish so I was keeping my distance waiting for him to turn at an angle to give me a better look at his neck. I was standing closer to the parking lot than the woods behind the dumpster so I didn't feel especially threatened when a guy riding by on a bicycle stopped to talk. He was college aged or older, wearing hip hop clothes with long dreads. His bike was small, more of a stunt bike and he was steering it with one hand and drinking from a 16 oz. can of Natural Ice held in his other hand.

I was worried he was going to hit on me. Not that I am vain enough to think everyone wants to hit on me, but when deciding whether a twenty-something guy is going to take interest in me or a bunch of cats, I would have to guess me. I would have guessed wrong. He introduced himself as Curtis and asked if the cats were mine since he has seen me back there before. I told him they weren't mine, but that I cared for them and kept them safe. We then got into a discussion about the difference between feral cats and "house" cats. It took quite a bit of explaining before he understood that I did this for little reward. No, I don't get to pick them up and love on them. I could tell where this conversation was headed so I told him they were mostly spayed and neutered. He seemed shocked that someone would pay good money to fix cats and then let them go again. A lot of people have trouble with that one.

"So you just feed these cats, get them spayed and let them go without being able to pet them or pick them up?"

"Well, yeah. But I don't really think of it that way."

"Man, that's what's up!"

I took this as a compliment. He then proceeded to tell me about a kitten he found in the parking lot closer to the next complex and that it was pretty friendly. I was still trying to get a good read on this guy.

"So did you do anything?"

"Yeah. I kept him." He said this as if this were a perfectly normal occurrence. Which it is- in my world. "He's my buddy."

I suddenly had an image of Curtis and a cat sitting in his apartment, watching TV and drinking Natty Ice. Maybe even smoking some dope. Hey, it was one less cat on the street, and I'll take it. I decided Curtis was an alright guy.

My Monster Part 2

If anything was going to be a catalyst for my monster to come back it was losing one of my best friends. After the instinct just to get through the few days following Randy’s death wore away, I became increasingly worried about going into another depression. Sure I was still on medication, but the types and dosages were already being decreased and my stability was better than ever. Over the years, I’ve learned one of the worst curses of clinical depression. Constantly asking yourself, is this reaction normal? When it comes to something as terrifying as watching a friend die, I don’t think there are normal or abnormal reactions. There are as many ways of handling it as there are people in the world. But nevertheless, an internal line needed to be drawn as to when my recovery was starting to look abnormal.

I took two approaches to dealing with this without my depression getting the best of me. One was to look at all the progress I had made and the prospect of six years of recovery down the drain was as overwhelming as my grief. As a grad student with deadlines looming and my entire career on the line, I realized letting myself get pulled under by the current lapping at my heels literally wasn’t an option. I decided I had better fight this thing or I’d let myself and Dean down as well.

Randy had his own monsters which were ironically under control when he was diagnosed with leukemia. We talked about depression and mental illness a lot and both took solace in the fact that a disproportionate amount of intelligent tend to suffer from this disease. He knew better than anyone what it was like to struggle with this. The second approach I took to making sure I didn’t spiral after he died was knowing that it would upset him if I did. He wouldn’t have wanted that for me and I like to think he would be proud of the strength and perseverance I found within myself to convince myself that yes, this reaction is normal.

So why am I suddenly telling you all this? There are a few reasons. The biggest reason is that I am finally free of prescription medication though I still take dietary supplements, get plenty of mental and physical exercise, and constantly assess my environment to help regulate my moods. I’ve noticed a lot of changes since I weaned myself off of my medication, the biggest one being this sense of being alive that I haven’t felt in a very long time. If the deepest part of my depression was a coma, the medication was still a general grogginess. Today, I am awake. The moods are there, the highs and the lows. I didn’t realize I had given up the highs to get rid of the lows and it’s good to have them back. I know I needed to take them six years ago when I started but I know even more now that I don’t and that is the best feeling.

I’m not really writing this to increase awareness about depression. As a society we are advanced enough to know that it is out there and that there is help. We are aware that psychotherapy and medication in some combination will get it under control. People will disagree as to the causes, the catalysts, the treatments, nature versus nurture and so on and so forth. What I don’t think we as a society are advanced enough to know is that it’s not something to be ashamed of. If you have this disease, it isn’t your fault. You aren’t an alien from another planet. People have high cholesterol, high blood sugar, lactose intolerance, etc etc and they are not looked down upon for being unable to regulate these human functions. Nor should we look be looked down upon for being unable to control moods and emotions. It is all apart of the collective human condition.

My Monster Part 1

The first time it happened I was thirteen. The second time, I was twenty. But in between those times I always felt it lurking, just beneath the surface. That is why I don’t think that things happening are the cause of it, only the catalysts. It is my monster. My disease. My depression. And I still live with it everyday.

The time it happened as a twenty-year-old in a relatively new but serious relationship, I was diagnosed with clinical depression and anxiety. A number of things pointed to the fact that I needed to see a doctor. I didn’t remember when it had started, but I had a constant knot in my stomach. Everything made me nervous. Every situation. I distinctly remember one day sitting at work feeling nervous about my job- but I was the only one scheduled to work in the lab that day. I had absolutely no rational reason to be nervous about being there. I would pick fights with Dean. I would cry, throw temper tantrums, spend days in bed with my door shut just sleeping. Hoping that when I woke up I would feel differently. Like a tummy ache or a fever I thought sleep could heal me. I still believe in the rejuvenating power of sleep but looking back on it I needed much more.

The catalyst that time was the death of Chelsea, my childhood cat. I took it really hard and Dean tried his best to console me. He was still two years away from fully understanding what special role animals can play in a person’s life. After a few days, everyone else thought I should be over it. Embarrassed that I wasn’t over it, I pretended to be. And while hiding my feelings, I spiraled into a depression so deep I was rendered almost completely dysfunctional. I couldn’t concentrate at work or school. My grades those semesters were a big part of why I ended up in Florida. They were one of the only schools to give me chance and I don’t think either my department or I have regretted it since. But like I said, I don’t think Chelsea’s death caused my depression. It just gave my monster a chance to get its foot back in the door.

All this happened while my romantic relationship with Dean was less than a year old. You see, we had been friends for almost two years when we started dating. He knew that the sobbing, snotting, screaming mess of a girl wasn’t the Natalie he knew. He stuck by me even though he was young and could have moved on and found someone easier to deal with. He had much more confidence in me than I had in myself. When the world seemed to be too much for me, he would whisk me out of it to a small town or a resort for a getaway weekend. Those are still some of my best memories.

Finally I got help, started taking medications and going to therapy again regularly. I learned to recognize my moods, their catalysts (and thus what to steer clear of), and how to deal with them. I learned to supplement my chemical treatment with changes in behavior. My doctor and I discovered through my long course of recovery that besides social factors, I was affected by my environment and suffered from substantial seasonal affected disorder as well. And so it seemed that Florida wanted more than to offer me a shot at grad school. It wanted to wrap me in its sunshine and take care of me.

In large part, Florida did take care of me. The department I joined was tiny but growing and happy to accept someone from a Big Ten school. Many of the people were friendlier than I could have imagined. And when our first winter rolled around, Dean and I were filled with the excitement and giddiness associated with something too good to be true. Only it wasn’t. The constant sunshine, the beaches, the gulf and the foliage did wonders for my mental health. We know it can’t be forever, Florida isn’t known for its opportunities in materials science. And we don’t want to raise kids quite so far away from their grandparents. It isn’t fair to anyone. But by the time we make our way to an (inevitably) cooler climate I will know much more about taking care of myself than the scared, tentative girl I was when we moved down here almost five years ago.

Teeny Tiny Update

The new equipment has stopped hissing. Thank God because it took everything I had to come in today knowing that I may very well have to endure eight more hours of it. I've been rewarded for my perseverance.

I think I may have finally gotten a good haircut! Awhile back (18 months maybe) I stopped driving to St. Pete to see my favorite stylist Allie. It was way too far to drive and then after a couple of botched attempts I felt too foolish to crawl back to her admitting I'd seen someone else. I finally decided to stop guessing about what might be good places to go and put the money into going to an official Aveda salon. In Minneapolis I lived within walking distance of an Aveda institute and evidently took for granted just how hard it is to find someone who knows how to cut hair. Especially curly, unruly hair like mine. It wasn't too much more than what I'd been spending for the crap shoots before so it was worth it in my book. My new stylist's name is Sarah and she really scared me at first. She wore stripper shoes and had a tattoo on her ankle of a pair of scissors with blood dripping from them. But she pretty much rocked. I was skeptical because she was so fast but my hair looks great today.

The icing on the cake was this email I got from the "foster mom" I wrote about yesterday:

My dark, handsome buddy is doing fine. He loves to have his head, neck, chin and in general entire body scratched and the pleasure is mine. The vet was right, he eats like a horse! Good sign of course and I'm NOT complaining! He gets wet and dry food 3 times a day along with his water and seems quite content. This morning he started eating his wet food while I was putting in his dry food so he's obviously not intimidated by me. He did hiss once when I first opened the cage but that was it. Poor guy has had rough go of it! My week/weekend is open if you guys would like to come by and visit him. You know you're always welcome.

I know what we'll be doing this weekend...

Drivel

So, readers, I am jinxed and I blame you. After you all called me a writer I have nothing to say. It's all in my head and the pressure is paralyzing me. Actually I do have some things I want to discuss but I am quite busy with life in the real world. I will do my best, but this may increasingly become the case as I get ready to go on my summer internship.

Speaking of internship, the papers are signed (which includes a handsome wage I wasn't expecting), and my flight is booked. I'll be arriving in Minneapolis on May 12th, spending the first Mother's Day in five years with my mom, and reporting to a real grown-up type job on May 14th. I'm nervous for the normal things: Will they like me? Will I do a good job? Will my boss be nice? Or yell at me the first time I inevitably screw up? As my friend says, if you weren't nervous, you'd still be in your comfort zone which means you're not growing. Very wise.

In other news, our lab just got a new piece of equipment that is causing such stress and chaos as to further excite me to get the hell out of here in 3 1/2 weeks. I am considering faking something like mono just to avoid the tension this stupid thing is causing everyone. But I'm a better labmate than that. There has been lots of yelling, pointing and spilled liquid Nitrogen. There has also been a lot of brainstorming and McGyver-style antics like rigging a transfer line out of rubber hosing, PVC piping, some O-rings and a metal rod.

On the kitty front, Dean's black kitty is doing remarkably well. We ended up not housing him as we felt we just didn't have the experience to care for such a serious injury and on a feral cat nonetheless. One of the people that run the sanctuary he will eventually end up in volunteered to him into her home and is fostering him until he is well enough to be on his own in the enclosure. We were originally going to have him discharged from the hospital about a week and a half ago since they do charge a boarding fee and we thought we could save some money by moving him sooner rather than later. After the "foster-mom" volunteered to take him, she highly recommended leaving him in the hospital until he could heal a little more. After expressing to her that we want to do everything in our power to help this cat but that unfortunately we weren't a walking blank check, we decided upon a financial arrangement. She let Dean and I name our maximum price we would be willing to pay and the sanctuary would pick up the rest. He was discharged yesterday and after settling the bill the sanctuary is paying in excess of $200. We'll be making some periodic donations or even volunteering for an afternoon when we find ourselves in times of plenty. We (and the kitty!) are so lucky people like that exist.

That's all I got. The new equipment is hissing and giving me a raging headache. I'm outta here in an hour to get a haircut. We'll see if I can do this again tomorrow, or if I come down with a rare tropical disease in the meantime.