The Hidden Burden of Pretending You Have Your Shit Together.
Someone's got to be OK. Right?
One of the main things that prevented me from grieving was my strongly held belief that I was the one who needed to have my shit together. As I reflect on it, I don’t think I really know what that meant other that I couldn’t afford to fall apart.
Come to think of it, I didn’t really know what “falling apart” meant other than not being able to do the things that only I could do.
I think this belief was important to my self-identity…the person I told myself I was. Or at least the person I told myself I was supposed to be.
I was a leader who was climbing the corporate ladder like a fucking rocket ship. I had been picked for promotion faster than my peers. I got transferred to the big, fancy corporate office. I actually remember telling my boss who promoted me, “My future is so bright I need to wear shades.” That sure sounds corny now.
I made more money than most of my friends and neighbours. I know this because I used to tell them how much I made and I loved their reaction. It made me feel superior and validated and reinforced that I was special.
I traveled around the world with an expense account and worked hard and played hard. Which is really a euphemism for getting totally shit-faced on business trips and work parties and then trying to make up for it by doing good work. That expense account? It bought a lot of fucking booze.
I had my life planned out. I had a house with a pool. I had a beautiful wife with a great career. I had two beautiful daughters. I had some nice cars. The plan? Keep getting promoted. Buy bigger houses. Buy better cars. Retire rich.
The point though is that I believed to my core that I was the one who had the power to make all that happen. And nothing was going to stop me. Until, in a story as old as humanity, I got stopped like the COVID vaccine stops the transmission of COVID…oh wait. Let’s try this instead… I got stopped like a guy running face first into a brick wall.
After a lifetime of breathing down her neck, Cindy’s demons finally consumed her. Before I knew it, everything was fucked. And when I say fucked, I mean FUCKED. She was fucked. Our marriage was fucked. Our bank account was fucked. Our future was fucked. And I was pretty much fucked too.
I could not reconcile the idea of me being fucked with the identify I had worked so hard cultivate. I went from being the captain of my destiny to being one of those people you see an Oprah and say to yourself, “That could never happen to me.” On top of that, letting other people finding out how fucked I was would just be adding insult to injury. I couldn’t let that happen.
However, I would willingly tell anyone who would listen how fucked up Cindy was. My parents, my friends, my coworkers, the poor bastards standing around me in line at the grocery store who had the misfortune to ask me, “How are you doing?” That was all I needed to start talking about how fucked up my wife was.
To be fair to myself, talking about it was a pressure release valve for me. It also helped me ground myself in reality because I felt like I was going crazy a lot of the time.
What I wouldn’t do is let people in on how much I was struggling. I was drinking way too fucking much. I started smoking at 35. Who in God’s name starts smoking at 35? I was taking sleeping pills and anti-anxiety medication and washing it down with whiskey. And that wasn’t all. I won’t bore you with all the details. Let’s just say.. fucked.
But I didn’t say anything to anyone about that part of my life. As I sitting here thinking about it, a few reasons come to mind.
If I didn’t have it together, who would? I had kids to raise, a wife to try to keep alive and bills to pay. I also had a life and plans to get back on track.
I had a lot of emotional and mental energy invested in this image of myself as a guy who could handle anything. Even the totally unhandlable.
And lastly, and I think this is the most important, it felt good to be told how well I was doing. To be admired.
Let me explain the last point as I imagine it applies to a lot of us supporting a loved one who is in the fight of their lives. In a situation where there was a lot of fear, anger, confusion and uncertainty, it felt damn good when people would say things like:
”I don’t know how you do it Jason. If I was in your situation it would break me.”
”She’s so lucky to have a husband like you. I wish my husband was more like you.”
”If I have a son, I hope he grows up and turns out just like you.”
I did a lot of things during that time that I was proud of. And a lot of things I wasn’t.
So I knew when people said those things to me, they didn’t know the whole picture. But I didn’t care. Well, I probably did care, but hearing them say it was a bit of light in ocean of darkness. I needed every bit of light I could get. I was drawn to it like a moth with a drinking problem is drawn to a flame.
Then Cindy gassed herself in her car. In some ways, everything changed and in others, nothing changed.
As time passed, I still felt like I needed to have my shit together. As I said in the last post, I had a new family to build. I had money to make and shit to do. And it still felt damn good to me when I would tell people my story and they’d say the same things people said to me when Cindy was still alive.
I didn’t even realize the burden I was placing on myself. I could feel the weight, but the source was unseeable to me.
I was drinking pretty much every day. I was hiding it by going out for stealth beers by myself at lunch. Or stopping on the way home for a quick pint or two. I was doing the same thing with smoking. And pot. And porn.
And I hated myself for it. My behaviour was conflicting with my self-image of “Have His Shit Together Man”, so I did what lots of addicts do. Instead of confronting the pain, I rationalized my behaviour every which way from Sunday to make it ok.
One of the reasons I didn’t confront the pain, is because I didn’t think I was in pain. Or, maybe I knew and couldn’t or wouldn’t admit it Because people who have their shit together deal with pain quickly and then move on. Kind of like ripping a bandaid off.
All the while, cracks were forming. This kind of facade can only hold up for so long and I was doing a heroic job of keeping it going. I needed to. I was so terrified of the alternative and what it meant that I had to keep the illusion alive at all costs.
Of course, in the end, the dam broke. I’ll talk more about that in a future post.
Here’s the thing. It was never about having my shit together in the first place.
It was about recognizing what was in my control and what wasn’t and trying to my best at the things that were in my control.
It was about giving myself some goddamned grace when I didn’t do a great job at the things that were in my control.
It was about admitting that I was facing something that no one can be prepared for.
It was about understanding that losing the life you had planned and the person you had planned it with is fucking painful beyond imagination.
It was about admitting I needed help to sort it all out. And that the help was often right in front of my face.
And finally it was about learning that being more open and honest is one of the most important ways to heal my own pain and help others heal theirs at the same time.
Look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself if the stories you’re telling yourself about yourself will help you heal. It might be one of the hardest questions you’ve ever had to ask yourself. And one of the most worthwhile.
I guess the message is this. If you’ve lost someone you love deeply, it hurts. And you need to heal. And to do that, you need to grieve. It’s not optional. Your journey will be your own, but it’s a journey you must take. You owe it to yourself, to the people who love you and to the memory of the person you’ve lost.
For the men reading this, falling apart is not the real danger. The real danger is allowing your fear of falling apart to rob you of the life you are capable of living. You lost someone you love and pain is the evidence of that love. Pretending the pain doesn’t exist means lying to yourself about how much you’ve lost. And, ironically that hurts just as much.