Unpacking Trauma

I don’t think I was depressed as a child. At least I don’t think I thought as a child I was depressed. But looking back through the brilliant prism of decades of experience I suppose I was. What I considered myself to be back then was a terrific liar. I created a wonderful and colorful background for myself that hid how lonely and sad I was. I can say for certain that I held that veil of secrecy above me from about the age of five until roughly twenty minutes ago.

I don’t recall what I was like before I was five. I assume I was happy. My family was very happy. We were stable, caring and supportive. My siblings were abusive; it’s true, but in a way siblings are supposed to be abusive. I can honestly say that I was not traumatized by my childhood or my upbringing.

Or maybe not…

Two days before Thanksgiving in 1978 my father asked me if I wanted to return football equipment with him after dinner. He was a little league football coach in addition to doing whatever his job was. As far as I was concerned he was an epic human being that lived a life that was so illustrious and bizarre that it simply could not be contained by a mere job description.

He used to play hockey for the St. Louis Blues but couldn’t ice skate. He was so good that the team allowed him roller skates. He played for a while but was fired because the puck kept going between the wheels of his skates.

He was a cowboy soldier. I have no idea what a cowboy soldier did but I knew it was awesome.

He was once an Admiral in the Bolivian Navy.

He was bayoneted in the chest in the Korean War. That’s why he had that nasty scar on his chest.

I would never have the chance to figure out the absurdity of the hockey story or find out that there is no such thing as a cowboy soldier. I didn’t know that Bolivia was a landlocked country that didn’t have a navy (though it does now…still landlocked though). I wouldn’t find out for another fifteen years that, while my dad had been in the Korean War that scar on his chest was from scrambling over a barbed wire fence running away from the Chicago police for stealing bottles for deposit so he could go see a movie. Admittedly I think that story is actually cooler than the bayonetting story.

I went on believe these stories for years because shortly after we left with a car full of football equipment my dad pulled the car over and asked me to roll down the windows to let the freezing cold in. He was unbuttoning his coat and his shirt, exposing the white undershirt he always wore—as all men of his generation wore.

A colleague of my father’s was following us with more equipment. He came to the window, talked to my dad for a few seconds. Without even realizing what was going on I was suddenly in the backseat, my father was slumping against the inside of the passenger door and his friend driving our Impala station wagon, speeding through traffic.

For the next hour, or more I honestly don’t know, I was alone in a hospital waiting room with my dad’s friend. These were the days before cell phones and my mother wasn’t home. I spent the time being given money by people to get sodas out of the soda machine and I distinctly remember having to pee.

A nurse came and shuffled me into exam room #6 where my father was stripped of his shirt, pale, sweating and hooked to machines I didn’t understand.

He wanted to make sure his little boy was okay.

That was the last time I saw my father alive. Turns out old cowboy soldiers die too.

I lived every child’s nightmare. I was alone with a parent when they had a fatal heart attack.

This moment informed everything that happened in my life after that. I can trace my anxiety back to then. I can trace a wide-variety of my fears back to that day—one of which would come true seventeen years later when my mother died.

Was I sad? Of course. How deeply had it affected me? Well that Easter I drew coffins on the Easter eggs, which terrified my mother. She was reassured that it was normal. I was just processing grief that was difficult for me to express.

Oh how the children endure.

I never considered it a trauma. The swirling sadnesses that followed me for years I never registered as depressions and no one knew I had those feelings because I swallowed them all. Me. A kid from an Irish family that has no fear expressing every emotion. A family that openly cries and comforts one another. I was going through an anxious, depressed hell and I never told anyone. I didn’t tell my friends, family, girlfriends…no one really knew about any of it until I started dating the woman who is now my wife.

I was never suicidal, though I tried several times to strangle myself. Note: It doesn’t work. Of course, you know that. I didn’t. I’ve never abused (or done, actually) any drugs. I never drank too much. Let’s face it; I just don’t have the dedication or perseverance to be any sort of –holic.

I didn’t see a therapist until I was thirty six. How’s that for taking care of yourself? Just push it down until no one can see it. No one needs to know…So I learned to act. I learned to be a happy person. Hell, I was outright go-lucky. Outside of me I was just a sweet, funny, loveable guy. Inside I was a torrent of self-hatred and worthless feelings.

Still…I can’t consider it trauma. I’ve talked to people who have endured horrible trauma. Truly horrific traumas. They have trauma. I had an unfortunate turn of events. Parents are supposed to die. So mine died young. That’s not trauma. That’s learning that the Universe is a dark, cold and uncaring place as part of kindergarten.

It’s not trauma if I say it’s not trauma, right?

So here I am. I’m much older than I should be at this point in my life. I lie my way through most relationships. (“I’m fine! Don’t worry! It’s not like I’m going to the party because I’m terrified to enter a social situation.”)

Here I am trying not to lie anymore about being depressed, about having ferocious anxiety, about how my brain is constantly telling me I’m terrible. I’ve decided I’m going to be open about it. Thus far I’ve smartly removed several people from my life who just making things worse. I’ve cut out people who simply refuse to believe I’m depressed. I should just cheer up, right?

So how am I doing? Well…I’m out of bed and enjoying the sun today. I lie a little less every day. Want some fudge?