Hanging On By Your Fingernails

Yesterday a comedian named Brody Stevens committed suicide by hanging, like Robin Williams did five years ago on August 11, 2014. But unlike Robin, I’d never heard of him. Mind you, that’s no reflection on Brody. (He was 42.)

Hanging yourself seems to be more prevalent with men. I could never do that. I could also never shoot myself. Not only because I don’t like guns, but because I’d be afraid to screw it up and survive in some vegetative or paralyzed state. I’d also never slit my wrists. Slow, painful, and messy. And forget about driving my car into a tree or lake.

Women usually take their lives with pills mixed with booze. You simply go to sleep and never wake up — if you’re lucky. I haven’t been lucky. I’ve never succeeded with that method. My body always rejects the poison. I vomit and live to see another miserable day. At this point, I’ve given up on attempting suicide because it’s given up on me, like so many other things — and people — in my life.

Today I didn’t get out of bed until 5pm, after going to bed at 1am. I simply didn’t see a reason to get up. If it weren’t for Kona bugging me to feed her, I’d still be in my dark bedroom under a warm comforter listening to the rain hit the window. Brody was lucky. He had a career. He was making money doing what he loves. He had fans and friends. But obviously that wasn’t enough, because depression doesn’t discriminate based on fame, success, or wealth. Depression is an equal opportunity mental illness.

After I fed Kona, I decided to make an egg sandwich with sun-dried tomatoes and shredded cheese on toasted sourdough. As I was gathering ingredients, I noticed I still had a few slices of pre-cooked bacon in the back of the fridge, vestiges from my meat-eating days. In fact, it was the last “meat” in the house other than dog food and dog treats. I decided to eat the bacon to cheer me up because, you know, well… bacon. But it didn’t make me feel better. You know it’s bad when even bacon won’t cheer you up.

As news of Brody’s suicide spread across social media, I saw a lot of people tweeting: Reach out. Talk to someone. Let people know. Don’t suffer in silence. Obviously those people don’t have depression or mental illness, or they wouldn’t say that. Talking to a stranger for 20 minutes on some hotline doesn’t help. At least, it doesn’t help me. Twenty minutes later you’re back to being alone with no one who gives a shit about you. And let’s be real, those people on hotlines don’t really care about you. They’re not going to come walk your dog when you have too much pain, fatigue, or sadness to get out of your pajamas. They’re not going to do your laundry or clean your house, or pay your bills, or go to a movie with you, or even sit next to you on the couch and watch a TV show. No, they’re temporary fixtures in your life, as fleeting as that satisfying fart you had two seconds ago. Sure, it felt good to release that gas, but now what? What will entertain you two minutes from now? Do you sit and wait for the next fart?

When you’re chronically depressed, as I’ve been since childhood, there’s no fix. Not even Wellbutrin is an elixir. It doesn’t make me happy. It just gets me out of the “emotional basement” so I’m not suicidal. My “high” is a normal person’s normal.

I have no joie de vivre. People tell me to go volunteer to feel better. That doesn’t make me feel better. That depresses me more as I see how many of us are suffering. And then I want to fix everyone. Help everyone. And always to my own detriment.

On top of depression, my body has been falling apart over the last 15 years. If I listed all my conditions, you’d think I was a hypochondriac. But it’s all documented in medical charts, confirmed with xrays, MRIs, and lab work. Not imagined. A few include fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and multi-level degenerative disc disease. I also have C-PTSD (Complex PTSD) having been raised by a malignant narcissist and severely bullied my entire childhood. Add depression to the cocktail and you can see why just getting out of bed is a major feat.

Those of us who are creative seem to suffer from depression more than others. The trope of the tortured artist is based on centuries of empirical examples. Perhaps it’s because we’re so fucking sensitive and emotional, open vessels who experience feelings more deeply and profoundly than most. Or perhaps it’s because we’re narcissists. As Bette Midler would say, “But enough about me. What do you think about me?”

So many people in the entertainment industry self-medicate with drugs and alcohol because they think it either masks or manages their depression. Sadly, it does neither. Drugs and alcohol are addictions I’ve never had. I’ve never even tried cocaine and am not remotely curious about it. I value my brain cells. I also don’t drink to excess because I value my liver. Does this mean that I value my life? Not really. But the alternative does scare the shit out of me. The nothingness. The ceasing to exist. What if there really is nothing?

Yes, I know — if there’s nothing, we won’t know the difference. And certainly if you think back over history, there were millions of people whose names we’ll never know. Catherine, a farmer’s wife. Jonah, a blacksmith. Their lives were mere blips on the timeline of all things great and small.

I’m a Gnostic Atheist who is clearly having an existential meltdown. Go ahead, wrap your head around that one. I’ll wait.

My decision to not attempt suicide again is not because I have hope. I have no hope. It’s not because I believe that if I just “hang in there” — gallows humor pun in poor taste intended (too soon?) — my time will come and I’ll finally sell something I’ve written. I’ve given up on that pipe dream. After 26 years in Los Angeles, I learned that talent comprises only 5% of Hollywood; the other 95% got there through nepotism and contacts. I’ve always said that to make it in Hollywood, it’s who you know, who you blow, or whom you do blow with. Obviously I don’t know the right people. And also obviously, I’ve given head to the wrong guys. As to blow, it’s something I would never do.

That leaves me with reaching out to some suicide hotline where someone who doesn’t know me will pretend to care about me for 20 minutes to talk me off a proverbial ledge so I can continue suffering with extreme physical pain, extreme fatigue, and extreme depression. The trifecta of friendship killers.

In the meantime, I continue hanging on by my short fingernails, waiting for someone to catch me when I fall.