A story Ep 6/8 : How i got better
Chapter 6: A Catch-22. – How I got better.
Looking back: After returning from CT in 2004, I’d basically been waiting to start over again because I’d hit rock bottom then and lost all I thought I wanted ( career=money=defining-me-as-a-person-pleasing-my-peers/parents/culture/society) But my natural healing process was delayed by fake friends interventions and trying to save face.
So I only really started to heal when I let go of them and after I’d waited for them to leave Satan’s Dustbin which was mid 2005. So basically it took 2 ‘n a half years for me to get back to reasonable position of emotional and personal clarity to ‘float to the surface’ which was during 2005 and 2006 - my come-back year.
But now in 2007, I had a dilemma.
Gary had returned from overseas and some other fake friends from the old days were hanging around in Satan’s Dustbin again, the Beck song – Lost cause, was my anthem, “..there’s too many people you used to know.. they know your secrets and you know theirs, this town is crazy but nobody cares..”
There was a problem of fake friends from High School in this town, and I’d feared that if I go out in public, when they inevitably greeted me how hard it would be not to subjugate to the role of Sebastian because of the lie I was part of in High School. The ‘old boys’ were enablers to my ‘old me’ routine, just like alcoholics have enablers.
This was my fear scenario:
I go out (restaurant/bar/date) and meet a fake friend – now keep in mind I haven’t seen any of them for 2 years. And the conversation goes like this.
Fake Friend: Hey Rudboy41, how you doin’!? I haven’t seen you in ages dude, what are you doing now?
Me: Hey [fake friend] I’m [insert lie here] and I’m [insert lie here]. So what are you doing? (so I can compare/vary it to my lie usually based on salary.)
I can’t very well say, “Nothing.” –OR- “I’m salvaging my train wreck of a life” I’d look like a fool either way. I couldn’t help lying like I did in the past (which would make more things for me to be anxious about) or I get back into the Sebastian character not being able to say no to them. I’d come too far, just to regress back into the ‘old boys’ circle and end up like I did in my fallen days.
- Why?
Because that’s the only way I’ve related with ‘the old boys’ I’d be tempted to play a role because of their acceptance behavior. Like the parameters of the relationship was set in High School and they haven’t been redefined, how could I redefine them without getting the “What? Don’t kid us Rudboy41, you haven’t changed, changed my ass” from the peer group. Two scenarios loomed:
If I don’t go out, I stagnate at home in Satan’s Dustbin, I don’t get a job and move on with my life, just so as not to be seen around and keep the lie alive in the ‘old boys’ minds (that I’m somewhere else.)
BUT
If I do find a job and start working I’d probably see or meet them sooner or later, and then need to have courage to explain why I was in Satan’s Dustbin and how long I’d been here. Without using the Sebastian character to hide behind (then they would invite me to join the circle again) if I did that I would de-value myself, regress and end up starting from scratch again, just like the fallen days.
“A Catch-22”
If I stay at home I’m doomed, if I get a job then I eventually regress and I’m doomed as well.
In the meantime I couldn’t wait to see Dr. A and the group in Jo’burg again but neither my parents nor I had the money for therapy. Dr. A agreed to my plan for an intervention at her hospital in the near future, using my medical aid to pay for sessions, while that was being organized, she allowed me to be a part of the group sessions. I had some doubts that my medical aid would pay for the sessions outside of the intervention but I kept quiet about them.
At each of the sessions I was privileged to attend, I hung onto her every word, advice and techniques about mental self-defense and how to handle tricky situations and why people do what they do etc. It’s rare to meet people that truly love their job and have mastered it completely. Dr. A was both. I was so lucky to be allowed to attend.
Now in South Africa proper health care is not subsidized by Government, it’s all privatized, and that includes mental health. So everyone is on medical aid, basically health insurance. And mine was an option D type of insurance, hospital plan. Basically the company would only pay doctors I saw during time of hospitalization.
Dr. A and I worked out a plan, with the help of her local clinic’s resident psychiatrist, that I be admitted to the hospital for a week. Dr. A reorganized her schedule and group meeting to try and cram as many one-on-one and group sessions into the week that I was in hospital.
During that week, Dr. A was happy to become my mentor, we joked how she was Yoda and I was a Jedi. She taught me “Jedi mind tricks” how to listen to my thoughts and understand myself even better, giving me a CBT book to help teach me how to become my own therapist as well. Dr. A advised that I try and leave Satan’s Dustbin at any cost, she taught me how to deal with my enablers should I meet them. We ended off on the subject of me getting a job, she advised that I move to Johannesburg and try get into a career that was as close to my authentic skills/talents as possible.
One suggestion was internal sales clerk at a musical instrument store, since one of my authentic talents was music, I would be able to survive in that industry without having to resort to using my chameleon need-to-please ability. I could stay real and gain confidence by being real and working at the same time. She gave me a task for the day at our last session: Go and ask about a job at the nearest musical instrument store. She suggested one that she knew, which was quite far, too far to walk to. So I instead tried a closer one, and the guy was friendly and asked me to send him a C.V and he’d consider it.
A week later I returned to Satan’s Dustbin, and my next move was writing up a CV from scratch and sending it to that musical instrument store I’d visited in Jo’burg. I had a huge problem writing a CV – how would I account for the 21/2 years that I used to pick up the pieces of my broken life? For one it’s embarrassing to write about it and secondly I didn’t have any real jobs during that time. All I had was the video editing thing to write about, which was pretty sketchy.
I asked myself, “should I lie on my CV?” it goes against all that Dr. A and I talked about. So I basically added a fancy description of the curriculums used for my Engineering and Architecture credits that I achieved, I embellished some of the aspects of what I did while editing videos, saying that I was a freelance editor, made it acceptable that work was sporadic.
Making a CV let alone trying to sticky tape the mess of my past into something that would be of any value to read was very stressful and hard for me to do. It took over 2 months to draw my CV up but looking at it I realized that if I couldn’t find a job at a musical instrument store, Maybe I could also look into what type of video editing jobs are available in Jo’burg, even though Dr. A hadn’t suggested it. In the mean time I was really open to both.
There was a 3 day Audio/Visual convention taking place during June in Johannesburg, where all the big companies in South Africa’s media industry would be exhibiting, and it would be worthwhile going, there were also two group sessions with Dr. A. So I was looking forward to June.
“It has been said that something as small as the flutter of a butterfly’s wing can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world – Chaos Theory “
The day before I left for Jo’burg my father told me that the only video editing company in Satan’s Dustbin was looking for a new employee. Since I had my CV and copies of the wedding I’d edited, I figured why not apply, as a safety option. The boss was only interested in my video work, he was positive about me joining but asked how much I wanted to earn there. I gave a typical Jo’burg starting salary. And he said he would think about it and call me.
I drove up to Johannesburg in my car, to stay for a week with an old friend. And a few days before the convention started I went to visit the music store that Dr. A had first told me to check out, two months ago. It turned out there weren’t any vacancies, the last one was filled 2 months ago, I entertained the idea that Dr. A might be psychic but walking out the door I was proud of myself, It didn’t matter that I was rejected as the act of trying was empowering especially how I’d also completed Dr. A’s original task for me, albeit 2 months later. I had done it.
After I got back from the 1st day of the convention my mother phoned me telling me how she met the boss of the video editing company in Satan’s Dustbin at a flea market and asked him why I didn’t get the job. He’d told her I was the best applicant they’d had but I wanted too much money. The job was still open, I just had to go and see them the next week. I told her to say that I’d see them the following week (even though I wasn’t sure)
Now I had a big decision to make. Stay in Jo’burg and stick it out trying to find a job or go for the job waiting for me in Satan’s Dustbin. I thought hard about it but what swayed me to go back to Satan’s Dustbin were four big ideas (1) that I didn’t need to pay rent staying with parents, so I’d save more money than I would in Jo’burg, (2) I’d use the job in Satan’s Dustbin to gain money and job experience in the media industry, a strong CV filler, then move back to Jo’burg. (3) Dr. A had helped me gain enough confidence to handle anything plus I felt like could do anything. (4) I could fill in the gaps of the question, “So what do you do?” and I wouldn’t need to lie or avoid it anymore.
I sold out, but for a good cause, and I returned to Satan’s Dustbin where I started working for the video production company for the rest of the year and I couldn’t get to Jo’burg for sessions with Dr. A anymore, but hoped that what I’d learnt would be enough to get me through.
It turned out that my first boss was the most bombastic bastard I had ever met in my whole life, I had to use every technique in my mental defense arsenal to bear working there, I knew that if It hadn’t been for Dr. A’s therapy I wouldn’t know how to put out the fires at work. She was the only reason I was able to work in Satan’s Dustbin without losing my sanity at the same time.
“We all have to make tough decisions in life.”
It was near the end of 2007 and I sent a sincere email of thanks to Dr. A explaining how much she had changed my life and how I couldn’t have tolerated this job if it weren’t for her therapy.
She didn’t reply to that email, a few days passed and I could feel something was not right. I emailed her with one line, “Did you get paid?”– I got a reply the very next day.
It turns out Dr. A was a master at psychology but not so much with her admin work or health insurance policy. She was supposed to submit my bill to the medical aid within 3 months of my hospitalization, but she was 6 months late. The medical aid had rejected her claim. I.e. Dr. A was paid nothing for helping me. And she was bitter about it now.
Legally I had immunity because her application was too late. She hadn’t looked into my specific medical aids financial policy, because she had trusted me and put her faith in me through her compassion for my cause. There were no records of my attendance to any of the sessions outside of the hospitalization time frame. An extent of the faith Dr. A had in me.
Now I had a moral dilemma..
Looking back: After returning from CT in 2004, I’d basically been waiting to start over again because I’d hit rock bottom then and lost all I thought I wanted ( career=money=defining-me-as-a-person-pleasing-my-peers/parents/culture/society) But my natural healing process was delayed by fake friends interventions and trying to save face.
So I only really started to heal when I let go of them and after I’d waited for them to leave Satan’s Dustbin which was mid 2005. So basically it took 2 ‘n a half years for me to get back to reasonable position of emotional and personal clarity to ‘float to the surface’ which was during 2005 and 2006 - my come-back year.
But now in 2007, I had a dilemma.
Gary had returned from overseas and some other fake friends from the old days were hanging around in Satan’s Dustbin again, the Beck song – Lost cause, was my anthem, “..there’s too many people you used to know.. they know your secrets and you know theirs, this town is crazy but nobody cares..”
There was a problem of fake friends from High School in this town, and I’d feared that if I go out in public, when they inevitably greeted me how hard it would be not to subjugate to the role of Sebastian because of the lie I was part of in High School. The ‘old boys’ were enablers to my ‘old me’ routine, just like alcoholics have enablers.
This was my fear scenario:
I go out (restaurant/bar/date) and meet a fake friend – now keep in mind I haven’t seen any of them for 2 years. And the conversation goes like this.
Fake Friend: Hey Rudboy41, how you doin’!? I haven’t seen you in ages dude, what are you doing now?
Me: Hey [fake friend] I’m [insert lie here] and I’m [insert lie here]. So what are you doing? (so I can compare/vary it to my lie usually based on salary.)
I can’t very well say, “Nothing.” –OR- “I’m salvaging my train wreck of a life” I’d look like a fool either way. I couldn’t help lying like I did in the past (which would make more things for me to be anxious about) or I get back into the Sebastian character not being able to say no to them. I’d come too far, just to regress back into the ‘old boys’ circle and end up like I did in my fallen days.
- Why?
Because that’s the only way I’ve related with ‘the old boys’ I’d be tempted to play a role because of their acceptance behavior. Like the parameters of the relationship was set in High School and they haven’t been redefined, how could I redefine them without getting the “What? Don’t kid us Rudboy41, you haven’t changed, changed my ass” from the peer group. Two scenarios loomed:
If I don’t go out, I stagnate at home in Satan’s Dustbin, I don’t get a job and move on with my life, just so as not to be seen around and keep the lie alive in the ‘old boys’ minds (that I’m somewhere else.)
BUT
If I do find a job and start working I’d probably see or meet them sooner or later, and then need to have courage to explain why I was in Satan’s Dustbin and how long I’d been here. Without using the Sebastian character to hide behind (then they would invite me to join the circle again) if I did that I would de-value myself, regress and end up starting from scratch again, just like the fallen days.
“A Catch-22”
If I stay at home I’m doomed, if I get a job then I eventually regress and I’m doomed as well.
In the meantime I couldn’t wait to see Dr. A and the group in Jo’burg again but neither my parents nor I had the money for therapy. Dr. A agreed to my plan for an intervention at her hospital in the near future, using my medical aid to pay for sessions, while that was being organized, she allowed me to be a part of the group sessions. I had some doubts that my medical aid would pay for the sessions outside of the intervention but I kept quiet about them.
At each of the sessions I was privileged to attend, I hung onto her every word, advice and techniques about mental self-defense and how to handle tricky situations and why people do what they do etc. It’s rare to meet people that truly love their job and have mastered it completely. Dr. A was both. I was so lucky to be allowed to attend.
Now in South Africa proper health care is not subsidized by Government, it’s all privatized, and that includes mental health. So everyone is on medical aid, basically health insurance. And mine was an option D type of insurance, hospital plan. Basically the company would only pay doctors I saw during time of hospitalization.
Dr. A and I worked out a plan, with the help of her local clinic’s resident psychiatrist, that I be admitted to the hospital for a week. Dr. A reorganized her schedule and group meeting to try and cram as many one-on-one and group sessions into the week that I was in hospital.
During that week, Dr. A was happy to become my mentor, we joked how she was Yoda and I was a Jedi. She taught me “Jedi mind tricks” how to listen to my thoughts and understand myself even better, giving me a CBT book to help teach me how to become my own therapist as well. Dr. A advised that I try and leave Satan’s Dustbin at any cost, she taught me how to deal with my enablers should I meet them. We ended off on the subject of me getting a job, she advised that I move to Johannesburg and try get into a career that was as close to my authentic skills/talents as possible.
One suggestion was internal sales clerk at a musical instrument store, since one of my authentic talents was music, I would be able to survive in that industry without having to resort to using my chameleon need-to-please ability. I could stay real and gain confidence by being real and working at the same time. She gave me a task for the day at our last session: Go and ask about a job at the nearest musical instrument store. She suggested one that she knew, which was quite far, too far to walk to. So I instead tried a closer one, and the guy was friendly and asked me to send him a C.V and he’d consider it.
A week later I returned to Satan’s Dustbin, and my next move was writing up a CV from scratch and sending it to that musical instrument store I’d visited in Jo’burg. I had a huge problem writing a CV – how would I account for the 21/2 years that I used to pick up the pieces of my broken life? For one it’s embarrassing to write about it and secondly I didn’t have any real jobs during that time. All I had was the video editing thing to write about, which was pretty sketchy.
I asked myself, “should I lie on my CV?” it goes against all that Dr. A and I talked about. So I basically added a fancy description of the curriculums used for my Engineering and Architecture credits that I achieved, I embellished some of the aspects of what I did while editing videos, saying that I was a freelance editor, made it acceptable that work was sporadic.
Making a CV let alone trying to sticky tape the mess of my past into something that would be of any value to read was very stressful and hard for me to do. It took over 2 months to draw my CV up but looking at it I realized that if I couldn’t find a job at a musical instrument store, Maybe I could also look into what type of video editing jobs are available in Jo’burg, even though Dr. A hadn’t suggested it. In the mean time I was really open to both.
There was a 3 day Audio/Visual convention taking place during June in Johannesburg, where all the big companies in South Africa’s media industry would be exhibiting, and it would be worthwhile going, there were also two group sessions with Dr. A. So I was looking forward to June.
“It has been said that something as small as the flutter of a butterfly’s wing can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world – Chaos Theory “
The day before I left for Jo’burg my father told me that the only video editing company in Satan’s Dustbin was looking for a new employee. Since I had my CV and copies of the wedding I’d edited, I figured why not apply, as a safety option. The boss was only interested in my video work, he was positive about me joining but asked how much I wanted to earn there. I gave a typical Jo’burg starting salary. And he said he would think about it and call me.
I drove up to Johannesburg in my car, to stay for a week with an old friend. And a few days before the convention started I went to visit the music store that Dr. A had first told me to check out, two months ago. It turned out there weren’t any vacancies, the last one was filled 2 months ago, I entertained the idea that Dr. A might be psychic but walking out the door I was proud of myself, It didn’t matter that I was rejected as the act of trying was empowering especially how I’d also completed Dr. A’s original task for me, albeit 2 months later. I had done it.
After I got back from the 1st day of the convention my mother phoned me telling me how she met the boss of the video editing company in Satan’s Dustbin at a flea market and asked him why I didn’t get the job. He’d told her I was the best applicant they’d had but I wanted too much money. The job was still open, I just had to go and see them the next week. I told her to say that I’d see them the following week (even though I wasn’t sure)
Now I had a big decision to make. Stay in Jo’burg and stick it out trying to find a job or go for the job waiting for me in Satan’s Dustbin. I thought hard about it but what swayed me to go back to Satan’s Dustbin were four big ideas (1) that I didn’t need to pay rent staying with parents, so I’d save more money than I would in Jo’burg, (2) I’d use the job in Satan’s Dustbin to gain money and job experience in the media industry, a strong CV filler, then move back to Jo’burg. (3) Dr. A had helped me gain enough confidence to handle anything plus I felt like could do anything. (4) I could fill in the gaps of the question, “So what do you do?” and I wouldn’t need to lie or avoid it anymore.
I sold out, but for a good cause, and I returned to Satan’s Dustbin where I started working for the video production company for the rest of the year and I couldn’t get to Jo’burg for sessions with Dr. A anymore, but hoped that what I’d learnt would be enough to get me through.
It turned out that my first boss was the most bombastic bastard I had ever met in my whole life, I had to use every technique in my mental defense arsenal to bear working there, I knew that if It hadn’t been for Dr. A’s therapy I wouldn’t know how to put out the fires at work. She was the only reason I was able to work in Satan’s Dustbin without losing my sanity at the same time.
“We all have to make tough decisions in life.”
It was near the end of 2007 and I sent a sincere email of thanks to Dr. A explaining how much she had changed my life and how I couldn’t have tolerated this job if it weren’t for her therapy.
She didn’t reply to that email, a few days passed and I could feel something was not right. I emailed her with one line, “Did you get paid?”– I got a reply the very next day.
It turns out Dr. A was a master at psychology but not so much with her admin work or health insurance policy. She was supposed to submit my bill to the medical aid within 3 months of my hospitalization, but she was 6 months late. The medical aid had rejected her claim. I.e. Dr. A was paid nothing for helping me. And she was bitter about it now.
Legally I had immunity because her application was too late. She hadn’t looked into my specific medical aids financial policy, because she had trusted me and put her faith in me through her compassion for my cause. There were no records of my attendance to any of the sessions outside of the hospitalization time frame. An extent of the faith Dr. A had in me.
Now I had a moral dilemma..
41-45, M