As I near my final days at my company, I am constantly reminded of the good… and the bad… memories that I’ve had while working there.
Today, one memory in particular really caught my emotions by surprise. This is a recollection that I think I buried and hid from my immediate collection of memories, and after thinking about it, I am wondering if it was a subconscious coping method to hide it from myself.
Here I am again, about to share a negative memory with the world from my time working there. I’m not trying to ‘whistle-blow’, not trying to point fingers, or get anyone in trouble; as I’ve said elsewhere in this blog, I have found writing therapeutic for myself. I write because it helps me, and that’s what matters. If you wish to read on, that is your choice, and your choice alone.
So, here you are, reading on. Here we are, I guess, metaphorically together coasting along these lines of text on the inter-web-space looking for the story I need to tell. But i don’t know where to start. I feel like it has a long background and I don’t know how much I need to tell you to share the whole thing… or if I can get away with just the ‘punchline.’
I alluded to something in my last post that I didn’t quite detail, so here, let’s start there. Fear. In the last two to two-and-a-half years I have been struggling with mild (at times) to moderate (at other times) to extremely severe (at a few times) Anxiety and Anxiety’s friend, Depression. If you’re unsure how they’re acquaintances, read up on how each one of them are caused at a chemical level.
Anyways, 2.5 years. *record riiiiiiiiiiip* SKKKKKRRRRTTTTTTTTTTT that puts us back at what? … October 2016. Phew! Holy guacamole, Batman!
Now, where I work, Anxiety and Depression (no, I know, they don’t need to be capitalized, but I may just continue for the sake of this post since I have become so intimate with them) are shunned upon. This is absolutely NOT uncommon in the workplace. Mental illnesses are all too often a taboo topic. In fact, where I work, if you deal with these at even a minimal level, don’t even joke about it. That is the essence of the mentality that seems to linger in my current workplace.
In the spring of 2018 I approached HR about supporting a Mental Health Awareness month. At one point I suggested as one of the events that me, myself, be a guest speaker to talk about my personal experiences and struggles with mental illnesses. I wanted to bring a personal-aspect to them, one that others in our workplace could see. Someone they could put a face and a name to. Someone they could approach for help, that way if they felt HR or their manager was too scary, I could potentially be a good neutral party or a good example of how I got help using company resources. I could be a good example of how I discussed my problems with my management, with my HR, and even used the Employee Assistance Program (EAP). But guess what? I was told… ‘that probably wasn’t a good idea.’ And that I should ‘probably keep my name and face away from the issue, for my own career’s sake.’
This post is going to be long, go get something to drink. Water. Seltzer. Something. Don’t forget to blink.
If you ask anyone in management, or anyone in Human Resources (HR), they will deny that this is the case. They want to be as supportive as possible. And I would say, besides that incident, everyone was as supportive as I’d expect… for my company. However, as with anything, we could always be better.
However, when it comes time to filling out your forms for a Security Clearance… you’ll question yourself. You’ll wonder if this impacts your ability to attain one. As you answer the hundreds of questions related to your address history, education history, felony history, misdemeanor history, foreign affairs history, and health history… the topic of mental health is slipped right in there. Section 21 – Psychological and Emotional Health. Right in between the topics of Foreign Activities, Business, and Travel (Section 20, which has many subsections), and your Police Record (Section 22).
Tell me how that, right there, doesn’t imply a negative connotation about mental health already?
Sure, that’s the U.S. Security Clearance form, however, the culture at our company is essentially dictated by the government ourself. In our company, the saying is something along the lines of… ‘How would you expect another country to let us operate a nuclear reactor in their port of call if we can’t even follow our own rules and procedures in our own country?’ Which then lends us to the excuse of over-following every rule, and every procedure that ever existed. While I, and everyone else, understands the point of the saying… someone very famous, and someone very important to the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program once said something that is all too often overlooked where I work.
All men are by nature conservative but conservatism in the military profession is a source of danger to the country. One must be ready to change his line sharply and suddenly, with no concern for the prejudices and memories of what was yesterday. To rest upon formula is a slumber that, prolonged, m e a n s d e a t h.
– Hyman G. Rickover, U.S. Navy Admiral. U.S. Naval Postgraduate School Address, 1954.
I’ve presented (a very small) case of how the culture where I work treats mental illnesses, such as Anxiety and Depression, in a very taboo way.
The summer of 2017 I was on a temporary work assignment for two months in a different city. This was almost a year into the start of my depression, and for me, one of the deepest parts of it. The summer of 2017, while I didn’t see it at the time, was one of the darkest times of my life. There were one or two days I contemplated suicide. And now I’ve made it public.
Upon returning home, I had hopes that my depression would subside.
It did not.
I returned to my normal job, to find that my work had been side-tabled by everyone. Also, it was time for me to start a new job and finish up this one. Also I was starting more graduate studies. Also, ‘this was all expected of me, so don’t complain, I did this to myself.’
Anxiety. My anxiety was back. When I wasn’t in a dark hole, I was fighting this anxiety I couldn’t control. I couldn’t bring myself to a normal state. I couldn’t figure out how to manage my work that always seemed to be out of my control. The reviewers of my analysis couldn’t ever seem to finish their reviews until I was too busy with my other work. Once I found myself busy with my new project, I had to drop everything to get my analysis back to my reviewers so they could find their own free time to review my corrections again. On top of learning an entirely new branch of engineering, while trying to issue an almost 600 page document from my last job, I was also enrolled in a graduate level course that was held at work. Therefore, i was basically multitasking all three things at one time. There was no leaving work to go to school. It was school on one screen, work on the other. ALT-TAB. ALT-TAB. ALT-TAB. Get to work at 8am. Leave work at 9pm. Monday. Through. Friday. Did I mention Saturdays and Sundays were usually 4-6 hours a day too? By now it was November.
Reminder, I did this to myself. So don’t complain. Reminder, previous Leadership Development Engineers went through this, so don’t complain. Reminder, you knew this was coming, so shrug it off, kid.
Hey – did I mention that at this point I was still in denial I had developed a dependency on alcohol? This started around… April or May 2017 I would guess. The significant, detrimental part came around December 2017 though.
There were days (November still) that I would drive home and look at the river freezing and wonder what it would feel like to be in that water. In that frozen ice, in the dark. Wonder how long it would take people to find my car. ‘Surely, that must feel nice, to be that numb?’
‘Nah. Not tonight,’ I would think. Tonight a glass of wine or gin will suffice. Plus my cutie-kitty needs my cuddles. Pacha.
I’ll tell you who saved my life. Pacha. Pacha saved my life. Day. After Day.
Alcoholism. Depression. Anxiety.
In 365 calendar days, maybe, probably even less. Probably half that time, I suffered the loss of four pets. Four. The realization that ‘the love of my life,’ my best friend, was never going to marry me and i should stop asking, stop waiting, stop hoping. The last four years, were in fact, a waste. In fact, he might not even be ‘in love with me’ and might just ‘love me’ and might not even know it himself. He mentally wasn’t there yet. Four pets. One of them, my best friend – my sister. One of them, essentially a ‘child’ to me.
How could I ever communicate this sadness to anyone? The only one person who might understand some of it didn’t even love me. The closest friends I had were gone, they were all his friends now and barely talked me. I still consider them my closest friends I’ve hung out with them less than a handful of times since then. My struggles at work, my anxiety and depression, those were on me. They were my fault.
I did have two other close friends. One day, I told them what was going on. Well, at least part of it. I needed someone else to carry some of my burden. And they did. For you two, I am forever grateful. I have not forgotten that. Thank you.
However, the reason I told them was because I did actually approach my manager first. I didn’t know where to go. I really needed help at work dealing with delegating the work and negotiating between my two other managers.
One particular day my manager found me at my desk, where at the time i was in the start of one my panic/anxiety attacks. I was questioning if my career there was the right fit for me (guess we know how that turned out). I was frustrated and saddened with myself and my inability to seemingly get the 600-page analysis issued even though it felt like the issues kept lying with the reviewers. I was having a difficult time balancing my time between the course, my new job, and issuing that analysis. I was really in need of guidance and motivation and was really at an emotional low (if you couldn’t tell already).
However, what my manager said to me has really stuck with me now that I remember it, and is what I think I purposefully forgot. I was told that ‘I should consider lowering my expectations of myself because maybe I have them set too high,’ as he thought that this is where my anxiety was coming from. There was never a question of whether I wanted to do the work, or could do the work. It was a question of ‘how could I get others to support the work I needed them to do’ – that was what I was struggling with. I was unable to manage my time appropriately because I couldn’t figure that part of the puzzle out.
Instead, I took a blow to my ego and was told to lower the expectations of myself instead of being taught time management. Or how to handle crucial conversations. Or taught meditation practices. Or how to prioritize my work.
I was told my expectations of myself were too high, and that, once again, this situation was my fault.
How does this develop a leader? How does this nurture me into achieving excellence? Just for this experience, and because I am quite the fan of irony, let me throw one more at you.
Happiness comes from the full use of one’s power to achieve excellence.
– Hyman G. Rickover, U.S. Navy Admiral. Thoughts on Man’s Purpose in Life, 1974.
Two and a half years of anxiety, depression and alcoholism. How do I know I’m out of it? I don’t. I’m not. Honestly, I don’t think anyone ever escapes these. These are life-long struggles. But I know I struggle now, and now I’m not afraid to talk about them. I don’t have the fear of them affecting my career. I know I have the control that I didn’t before.
Spoiler alert and ironically, a story for another time: Strep – a bacterial infection that almost killed me, I would say in fact maybe even saved me.
So while I absolutely love and adore the work I did there, my ability to not freely speak about my passions really added to my suffering. Like I sasid near the beginning of this post, writing helps me. In fact, speaking at conferences or with others has helped me too.
I am SO PROUD. SO SO SO PROUD of my work, and everyone else’s work that they do there. It’s amazing. It’s bad-ass. And, if I do say so myself, I think I was pretty darn good at it. But until there’s a more open culture there, where there isn’t a faux-pas associated with speaking about the things I’m passionate about (diversity & mental health, to name a few)… you won’t find me back on site, for my own mental health.
Lying to Myself 