So, as early as the first grade, I remember lying in bed in these melancholy states experiencing mild to extreme despondency. I had already developed erratic sleep patterns and would lie awake late or wake up in the middle of the night scared and wide awake. It was NOT okay to wake up anybody so I’d just lie there in my dark thoughts. During those years, I had my first desires of wanting to go to sleep and not wake up. They later became full-blown suicidal thoughts. I experienced self-loathing. I resented my father for his meanness. I resented my brothers and sisters for their constant teasing and harassment. I felt so unsafe and scared most of the time. I hated life. I developed a constant fantasy of this safe-box I could get into whenever I wanted. It was cozy and had whatever I wanted in it. It was climate-controlled—cool in the summer and warm in the winter. No mosquitos! It was fur-lined and it was completely safe. For goodness sakes, it locked from the inside! No one could get in. It was definitely metaphorical for what was happening inside my mind and heart.  I would fantasize all sorts of designs for it based on the current feelings of sadness, fear, and/or discomfort. This fantasy went on well into my adolescence.

After my mom died, I invented this person who was a super-human kind of guy. His name was Bill McKenzie. And, if you know me, don’t tease me about this as the very name is associated with pain still. He was everything I didn’t feel I was. I would become him on a moment’s notice. He was my escape when I needed one. He was a great teacher. He was a great athlete. He was a gymnast. He was independent. He was happy. Etcetera. He stayed with me in some subtle ways even into college. He was my safety valve and my strong, independent dream person. I would become him when I felt weak or wanted to feel good about myself.

Another parallel development was occurring with all of this—I was becoming emotionally detached from others and completely independent emotionally. I worked very hard to not depend on anybody. This built over the years until my sophomore year in college when I began to spend most of my time by myself. I was miserable on the inside that year. I couldn’t stand to depend on anybody for anything, physically or emotionally. I’d mostly made my own way through college, but that year I resisted taking money from my dad and that summer before my junior year, I moved into a two-bedroom apartment by myself. I lost any real belief in God.

So, I was completely alone and independent and free. And depressed.

Depression dogged me over the years. It wasn’t a constant companion but it was a regular visitor. Extreme fatigue often triggered it. Protracted feelings of frustration. Dealing with personal failure and shortcomings were also key triggers. In various ways relationship issues also factored in as triggers. I think I was on the cusp several times of some even more serious emotional downturns. (Although I was not “with” him, I know God was with me through this and saved me in spite of myself.) I discovered later in counseling that in adulthood, I gradually developed an “alter-other” person that I would become.  However, unlike Bill Mckenzie, this person was not powerful and independent but rather was pained and detached, and of course, depressed. I certainly was fairly unaware of what was happening at the time.

When I was five and six I had gone through this phase of putting my head in the toilet. I didn’t go so far as to put it in the water, but I’d put my head inside and let the cover rest on my it. I don't know how many times I did that or how long it went on, but I know it was multiple times over some period.  I’ve tried over the years to understand what I was getting out of that or what I was achieving. I think it’s fairly obvious what I felt I was like though. I tried desperately to gain favor with those around me, and except for my mom, I felt I was of little value to anybody. In my worst moments, I’d go lie on the couch and put my face in the crack and leave it there until somebody made me stop. In adolescence I began to get in bed and put the pillow over my head. When I had to breathe I would raise the pillow up just high enough to breath. When depression would strike, I’d get there just as quickly as possible. I withdrew and I hid. Of course, after I got married my poor wife didn’t know what she’d gotten into.

I first went for professional counseling when I was about 23. I was terrified, but I was also desperate. I had a ton of baggage. I was ashamed to have to and except for Tana, my wife to be, I did so secretly. When I moved to Texas in 1989, and was not serving in vocational ministry, I took the opportunity to find a counselor that worked for me and I proceeded to try to put my life in perspective. I saw her for over a year. A few years later I went through over a year of counseling with another counselor I’d found. I got myself better in a lot of areas. For the most part, I left my alter-ego behind and I began to think clearly about what was going on. I left some pretty destructive thoughts and behaviors behind. Yes, I still got depressed, but while I was emotionally ill, I didn’t have to be mentally ill too.

I eventually escaped depression for a few years in the late 90s but after my nephew’s protracted battle with cancer and subsequent death in January of 2000, depression swept over me again. Wade was born to my sister out of wedlock and he was so representative of our life. I became a surrogate father-figure to him and had remained so through the years. As best as I can understand, his pain and death brought back my feelings of utter helplessness. Wade often turned to me when he needed certain things and help.  The night he died, he asked me if I thought he was a candidate for a kidney transplant.  He was emaciated and at death's door.  I couldn't fix this one for him.  Several times when I went and sat with him and sort of held his frail body, he looked at me with these wild, pained eyes and shouted to me, “Uncle Ronnie, it hurts.” He was in bitter agony and he died in the middle of the night with his mom, our brother and me sitting by him on the bed. Words can’t describe the pain of such moments. His mom had depended on me a lot through the years as we had long had this bond of survival from the days back home. As badly as I felt, I could not even imagine what she was feeling. Inside, I felt I’d let him down as well as my poor sister. My psyche took a real beating, and the subsequent depression was deep and dark.

Most didn’t know about my depression though. I preferred to bleed in secret with a pillow over my head, at least figuratively, and literally when possible. Most didn’t know about the hours of counseling I went through trying to get my head on straight. After all, I was the one who was helping everyone else get better. Right? The guy that helped others was again regularly fighting for his own sanity.