Steven Michael Kudelko

I posted this on my LiveJournal, but also wanted to repost it here.  Not that I have the illusion that I’m a celebrity or have a following or anything, but there was a time when quite a few people would read my posts and I always looked forward to any feedback or advice they would reply with.  I’m cross-posting this to LiveJournal and Tumblr in order to get exposure to as many of those former readers as possible, since many have stopped following me on LiveJournal after I stopped writing for over a year, and after LiveJournal became a ghost town.  I haven’t made up my mind on whether I’ll use LiveJournal as a place for my serious writing and use Tumblr to just re-post things lacking substance (which seems to be the only thing it’s used for anymore), or if I’ll fully commit to using Tumblr for everything.  In the meantime, I’d mean the world to me if anyone reads this and gives me their feedback.

This post is a copy of something I was asked to write by my psychologist for a therapy session.  His goal, as well as mine, is to get me to start writing again as a therapeutic output in order to release a lot of the feelings that have been crippling me and keeping me from getting back out into the world again.  Knowing a lot more about my psychological condition, and realizing that bi-polar disorder left untreated, which so far has been the case since any psych treatment I’ve been receiving so far has been geared towards depression and suicidal tendancies, is more or less a roll of the dice when it comes to how I’ll feel or react and whether or not I’ll be social and outgoing or hide from the world, has led me to realize that I writing about what I’m going through, my feelings towards people and situation that I dearly miss, and my ambitions for the future and regrets of the past, is not what triggers the extremes in my behavior.  Bi-polar disorder can be very effectively treated with medication, and now that I’m going down a path that seems to be the correct one for the true nature of my condition, I can write like I used to without fear that a touchy subject will trigger my withdrawal from the world and complete isolation.  Anyway, without any more preamble, here is my first attempt at writing in a very, very long time:

One of my favorite posts I ever wrote in my LiveJournal was the entry about my dog being in heat and comparing it to my situation with Kayla. It’s one of my favorite because it illustrates how i compare every situation around me to what i’m going through emotionally, and how i’m plagued by worry and fear to a point where it almost cripples and suffocates me. the thought of loving someone or something so much, and having the fundamental belief that the ultimate purpose of one’s life is to be directly involved, influence, impact, and change, for the better, the lives of the people you love, the isolation and ignorance that is an inevitable part of someone else moving on, drifting apart, losing whatever feeling attracted them to you in the first place, is compounded by my racing, obsessive, and constant thoughts over and over into what I believe to be a massive failure of my ability to fulfill the duties that a friendship or relationship entails. This feeling of having let-down people who, free from the weight of these emotionally crippling criticisms that fill my every idle thought, can with exponential quickness move on with their lives, experience new things, meet new people and fall in love again until the memory of our friendship, or relationship, or experiences together, are long forgotten, because of my failure to be memorable, or attractive, or brilliant, or simply put, “good enough,” and my inability to victoriously distinguish myself from the competition, hurts me in ways that even the most painful wound or injury never could.

I have always believed that the true measure of a person was the company they keep. To be, not just loved and appreciated and praised, but of value and purpose, has always been my goal. I endured the most lonely years of my youth with the strength I gained from the belief that one day I would find a companion who would not only share this belief but that it would be the quality she would find most attractive, and would set me apart from th competition, and having, in the most primal sense, found my mate, I would have achieved all that life required of me, and my ultimate goal would be to nurture that love, continually reaffirm that I was the right choice with my words, deeds, actions, behavior. I believed that if I was given the opportunity to love someone unconditionally, along with their reciprocation, that was all I would need to be finally and forever truly happy.

Using that unit of measurement, I have failed miserably. Not only was I proven wrong, having won the fight, gotten the girl, and finding no relief from paranoia, fear, and anxiety, but if I were to instead measure my life’s success using the more traditional methods such as level of education, how far I’ve progressed along my career path, how much money I make and have, how many material things I possess, and how many girls I fuck on a regular basis, I have, once again, failed miserably. I had a pretty good run for a while. Though my earlier school years were filled with loneliness and isolation, the combination of being the only child in my entire grade to be deemed “gifted” and having undiagnosed ADHD stumping teachers and administrators who decided being in classes with older kids and “independent learning” scenarios by myself, some kind of magic happened when I hit my eighth grade year and I skyrocketed to a position of popularity and power, being chosen by the school administrators to take command of the district’s computer network in addition to fulfilling the duties required of me as a student, and while the underlying sadness and dream of finding my one and only would creep up on me when my head hit the pillow at night, I was generally happy and fulfilled.

I followed up high school with a half-assed enrollment at university 3 hours away from home that lasted only a semester. While I could justify coming home by claiming the classes didn’t interest me, and that my inability to focus and follow direction made classroom learning not suited to me, the true reason for my detachment from the college experience and the quick rush to give up was that I was home sick. I missed the high school world where I had things to do, people to love and that loved me in return, and the reputation I had earned as a creative, taskmaster who found success in all my endeavors.

It was after these years that I finally found the love I thought would solve all my problems. I had found a soul mate. I jumped in head first and devoted my every second to nurturing and tending to that relationship. And while it was perfect for the majority of the time we’d spent together, her enrollment in college and full commitment to the college experience which included exposures to ideology that I believed was the exact opposite of the beliefs and values our relationship was founded on, was a major factor that tore us apart.

Following this breakup, I was devastated. I had fought ferociously in the war for her heart and soul, and had naively never even entertained the idea that I’d be defeated. When it became clear that I had lost, I, like so many leaders of revolutions so self-absorbed with the view that only they could save the people, I launched a scorched earth policy and immediately started to self-destruct. When it was clear (or so I thought) that I had finally hit rock bottom and still had no effective outlet for the tidal waves of feelings that pounded the shores of my brain, I decided to finally seek help.

When I went to my medical doctor with the intent to seek an anti-depressant, I was already a full-blown drug addict regularly abusing opiates. Being an addict and a “pill-popper,”, I knew of no other solution than to continue to take an oxy, or a few vicodin, or whatever else I had or could get, and self-medicating was really a day by day behavior. My thoughts were too concerned with how I was going to get my fix that day, or the next day. There was no long-term strategy. I didn’t have a timeline that, if followed, would eventually reduce my intake and dependency or end with treatment or rehab. That same lack of a long-term vision was what drove me right into the arms of an anti-depressant. I already took pills every day. Of course I could handle one more. What would it hurt? It would get me out of this rut that I was in and I could be happy again and get back to my normal life, sans soul-mate. I never realized the nightmare this would lead to. Sitting in my car parked in front of the doctor’s office, baking in the heat of the springtime sun, I would have never been able to picture myself in the place that I am in now. Had I been able to, it would have frightened me more than any horror movie, ghost encounter, or run-in with a revolutionary street gang armed with AK-47s.

My experience with doctors and seeking medication to treat my depression and other psychological ailments can be compared to LBJ’s experience with the Vietnam War. The country, and himself as the President, were in a predicament but were not yet involved in a full-scale war. He never really wanted to go to war. He wanted a quick fix and to get out as soon as he could. But, with the misleading advice of his generals, the increasing brutality and relentless attacks from the Viet Cong, he let others convince him that agreeing to their proposition, going to battle, would bring victory in a short amount of time, at the expense of a brief period of minor sacrifice. But with every new request from the Department of Defense, LBJ’s commitment to war grew and grew until two years later, he looked back and wondered “how the hell did we get here?”

I feel the same way. I can’t blame the doctors, because I ultimately was the one who had the final say. They could promote the latest miracle drug and write the prescription, but I was the only one who could make myself tip my head back and swallow. But reflecting on everything that has happened and where I am now at since that first doctor’s visit, I can’t believe the reflection I see in the mirror and I can’t help but think “how the hell did I get here?”

This all is a crucial component of my thoughts on the diagnosis of bi-polar disorder, which was the topic on which I was to write. I look at the arguments I have with my family, and the reactions I have to the simplest irritations, and the way I’m now perceived by the people in my life who have stuck around since the good days when I was happy and full of life, and I wonder when I became so fucking mean. I always had so much patience and compassion. Now, when my mother comes home from the grocery and I find that she’s purchased every type of lunch meat that I don’t eat and not a single type that I do eat, I flip the fuck out and launch into a speech claiming she intends to inconvenience me or punish me with starvation while jumping around the kitchen and making gestures that would make Adolf Hitler appear as cool and collected as Barack Obama. I never acted like this before. And I know that this reaction is not only unfounded, but incredibly inappropriate. I realize this while I’m screaming, yet I can’t stop myself. This kind of behavior repeats itself over and over, and each time I end up apologizing, and claiming that I didn’t mean what I said, I know my actions were wrong, and explaining, but not blaming, my bi-polar disorder. I have the best of intentions, and my apologies are sincere, but I can only apologize so many times and claim that with therapy and medication I will eventually get better, before everyone just assumes it’s bullshit, and that I’m just a disrespectful, ignorant asshole and I always will be.

I realize that this has occurred for some time, and that I have always had episodes and outbursts like this long before I ever became depressed and sought treatment and even knew what bi-polar disorder was. What I didn’t realize, until I made a effort to really pay attention, was how severe this behavior has gotten. I’m terrorizing my friends and family when I don’t have any more friends or family to lose.