Approaching the Precipice

As mentioned elsewhere, nervous breakdowns don't just happen. Rather, a breakdown is the culmination of a variety of factors including stressors, environmental background, and perhaps genetic predispositions, that conspire to push a person over the edge. Everyone has their breaking point. Add enough stress to any mix, shake well, and the result can be an emotional tsunami that will certainly ruin your day.

In my case, the breakdown was the culmination of three, and perhaps four, large stressors that literally knocked me down. I'll quickly list them here, but will then explore each of these in separate posts.

1. Marital separation
2. My daughter's wedding 
3. An apartment fire
4. Psychiatric evaluation that almost killed me

The Lead Up

Those that suffer a nervous breakdown very rarely share their experience and for good reason, I suspect. First, they are often embarrassed by the entire event. After all, who wants to tell anyone that they have experienced something that many do not understand (least of all, themselves), that is socially unacceptable, and that has often paralyzed them with fear? Second, sharing such an event often stirs memories including what can include emotionally violent flashbacks that can lay them low for days or weeks. Why would anyone in his or her right mind want to re-experience some of the darkest days of their existence? 

In most cases, nervous breakdown sufferers choose to avoid talking in detail about it. At least that's what I did (except for broad brushstrokes that I would occasionally share with friends and family looking for an explanation, and of course more detailed discussions with my therapist). But by not sharing, by not vocalizing the pain, sorrow, and horror, those experiencing a nervous breakdown are often unable to make sense of what happened to them. By wanting the past to simply 'go away' and disappear, sufferers are unable to validate the events to themselves.

Too, and by not sharing, people suffering from this debilitating experience can not learn from each other. We cannot gain hope, or strength, or experience by identifying with symptoms, causes, or cures. And though we can read many professionally-created reports, I firmly believe that by sharing the reality of this horror, we can help each other - which, of course, is one of the objectives of this blog.

For this reason - this lack of sharing - I can only help you, the reader, understand by talking about my own experience. In my case, I now know that my breakdown was the result of a series of events, often taking place over years, which led me toward the precipice of insanity.

In addition to my ancestry of emotional instability and how I was raised (see other posts), I was also plagued by a number of stressors. First, I had immigrated to a 'foreign' country. I was not born in Ireland. Instead I moved here many years ago. Immigrants experience a wide range of ongoing stress as they attempt to fit in to a new environment, deal with practical issues such as getting a job, make new friends, and otherwise adjust. The experience is often a complete shift in benchmarks and what a person grew up with. The process of fitting in, adjusting to, and accepting, a new country can be fraught with difficulties. The stress of immigration was therefore added to the daily stresses that I - like anyone - experienced: how to make money, how to raise children, how to save so we could survive. 

Second, I ended up starting a business. Through hard work and many, many hours, the business was successful for many years. But success extracts its own price. Like many business people, I was torn between the hours that I had to spend in business and the hours that I wanted to spend with my family. Constant stress often left me preoccupied, and with little energy, at the end of a long day, to share with my children. Which, in turn, resulted in feelings within me of guilt and resentment. I worked hard for well over 20 years. But while the business flourished, I had ignored my own needs and those of my family. Looking back, I know that my mental, physical, and spiritual health began to suffer.

During this period, the relationship with my wife began to fall apart. In many ways, I was to blame. I have to be very careful now in allocating blame to anything. For a long time, I accepted all of the blame - an unhealthy tendency that induces more stress through guilt and shame. Now I realize that it makes no difference who was at fault - or not. Relationships end. But endings can be traumatic.

Which is what happened when I finally called it quits. We talked one day. I told her I was leaving. We argued. She kicked me out. Suddenly, I was on the outside of my family looking in. I had isolated myself from the wife I had lived with for almost 30 years; from the home that I had paid off and had worked so hard for; from my three grown children who did not understand what had happened. 

Marriage breakdown is stressful. Depending on the situation, it can be highly traumatic. Certainly, it was for me. I was consumed with negative emotions about myself. I had failed. I was a horrible father and husband. I was an idiot and a fool. I was...I was...I was...  I went to bed beating myself up. I got up beating myself up. I had moved to a small town close to the family home in order to be close to them. But perhaps I was too close. My wife and one of my children phoned persistently. The language was destructive. What they said about me only reinforced my own feelings of self-shame. 

Looking back, I now know that I was getting very close to the edge. Physically, I was a mess. My hands shook. I was having trouble sleeping. I hardly ate. I was drinking too much. I was having difficulties focusing on specific tasks. Even washing the car now seemed to take forever. I was forgetful. Rather than share with people I tended to isolate myself. I rarely exercised. Emotionally, it was a nightmare. In fact I was having nightmares. In some ways, I had turned into two different people: the fellow that still tried to greet people with a smile and who did his best to always be there for friends and family, and the internal monster that was intent on devouring anything that was good about me because the Monster believed that I was simply no good anymore. In other words, and as I said in the very first Post to this blog, "I am a bad man."

In that period, I now know that absolute fear began to master my life. I was afraid of answering the door. I was afraid of picking up the phone. I was afraid of driving to work. I was so very, very afraid. And what I didn't realize but do now, was that I had become traumatized by that excess of fear as well as other negative emotions about myself. 

I was staring into the precipice but didn't realize how far I might fall. Soon, I would find out.