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Mac Musings

Change Can Be Good, Even When It's Hard

Dan Knight - 2003.11.21 - Tip Jar

Without change, we'd never know time was passing. And I've been dealing with a lot of change lately - mostly personal, but some site-related.

I'm coming face-to-face with a lot of issues that have haunted me my entire life. I first discovered I had ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) when our oldest son was diagnosed in second grade a dozen years ago. I read the books. "That sounds like me." And I lived with it. I saw my ability to juggle tasks, my tendency to bite off too much, my pattern of just barely finishing on time or never quite finishing at all as ways I harnessed ADD to my advantage.

Until the past months, I have never been medicated for it, and that was a mistake. I now have more focus, something I especially notice when driving. But more than that, I have better control of my impulses. And I'm hoping the medication will help with relationships strained in part by my ADD. That's where I most regret just living with my problems instead of facing them.

I've been suffering from depression, and in learning about that disorder, I find that I've been mildly depressed my entire life. That also impacts relationships. Combined with ADD, anger flare-ups can be a real problem, something I see in myself and my youngest son. There's a lot of underlying grayness when you're mildly depressed. The world isn't covered by black storm clouds, but neither is it sunshine and warmth. About the only positive thing that comes from mild depression is a very balanced outlook on the world - some things are good, some are bad.

I'm on medication for depression and ADD. It helps. If have more focus. I am less stressed, less grumpy, smile more, experience positive emotions at a new level. I wish I'd done it years ago, but I was able to get by and pass as just another geek.

That's a big part of my problem, denial. It's a learned behavior from the home I grew up in. It's how my parents coped with life and still seem to in many ways. It's a defense mechanism that's lets you blind yourself to what you see. Kinda scary when you think about it.

I spent four weeks preparing for my first therapy session. On the one hand we wanted to find the right meds. On the other, I never took a psych course in school because I was afraid people would see how messed up I was. Part of me was frightened.

But I spent four weeks putting together an autobiography for my therapist. This also helped me better see the structure and events of my life. I wrote openly and honestly about rejection, being victimized, and confusion along with the good stuff - the balance of the mildly depressed.

I was very ready for therapy. During the weeks prior to the first session, I'd started coming to grips with my wife's insistence on a separation while I work through my issues and we work on the marriage afterwards. I have mostly been a loner with very few friends and a limited number of acquaintances. A lot of people moved to the friends list as I needed to process and vent. I am building a support system and even reaching out to family members I rarely talk to.

After discussing my marriage and recent past in the first session, we got to family of origin stuff in the second. There's a lot there, but between the two sessions we turned over a lot of puzzle pieces. My therapist says we've got most of them turned over now. The next step is putting them together - where do I want to start?

I had no idea. I want to end emotionally healthy and in a healthy marriage, but what's the next step after identifying the pieces? I had taken the chaos of puzzle pieces strewn all over the place, put them on the table, and turned them over. Time to look for an edge piece?

My therapist did something very helpful then - he gave me a choice of two issues to deal with. Two issues it would really hurt to face, issues that brought anger and fear and frustration and pain. We went for the oldest, and when he mentioned the word abandonment, I broke down.

On the one hand, I'm an introvert and need a lot of time to myself. On the other, I can't make it alone. On the gripping hand, because of my ADD and mild depression, I'm not very good at relationships. The end result is few friends and very few close ones.

Add fear of abandonment to the mix, and you get a strange concoction indeed. You either hold people too tight - my response when my wife said we needed to separate - or you keep them at a distance so they can't abandon you. No wonder I went so deep into depression when faced with a separations - all I felt was rejected even though we both hoped it would be a short-term separation.

I have recognized how needy I am in some ways, how desperately dependent on a few people to keep my going. I was too needy to give my wife what she needed as I withdrew more into myself over the past several years. Now she's run out of energy to continue giving.

These are the kind of issues that fill my days and haunt my nights. I have insomnia, some nights a lot worse than others. Some days I can hardly focus on anything else. I'm reading a lot and learning a lot. I'm coming to peace with the idea of separation, of possibly living alone for a while as I get emotionally healthy. There's a lot of good coming out of all this, but it is draining.

That impacts Low End Mac. For the second time in a few months we've gone three days without any site updates. Since we'll be closed next week, I put a lot of effort into getting what we had ready last night for publication this morning. And I'm giving a lot of thought to moving to a three day (MWF) publishing schedule until I feel up to daily updates.

I'm also hoping to start learning the drupal publishing system, which is something like the slash code used at Slashdot. A couple guys from church know and use it (also Macs!), and two of my sons are proficient in PHP, so I'm hoping over the next week we can get drupal up and running. That should really simplify posting articles in the future.

For those wondering about site finances, we are making it. We're not getting rich, but we have a steady cash flow. We are in this for the long haul.

In the end, despite all the issues, I'm optimistic. My therapist applauds my courage in just facing the issues, not trying to hide them or deny their impact. My wife needs some time apart to find herself and recover, but she wants to work on the marriage when I'm healthy. I've learned that even a geek like myself can find supportive friends. I've experienced how medication can take away some of the gloom of depression and chaos of ADD.

Most of all I'm liking the person I'm becoming, someone freeing himself from the shackles of denial and squarely facing the other issues that warped my life, whether caused by my biology or my circumstances.

Healthy is a good place to be, the journey there means some pain, but the destination makes it all worthwhile. More at some point in the future, and thanks for all the support and concern yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Dan Knight has been using Macs since 1986, sold Macs for several years, supported them for many more years, and has been publishing Low End Mac since April 1997. If you find Dan's articles helpful, please consider making a donation to his tip jar.

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