Diagnostics

So for about the last month or so, I've been battling it out with my beloved car, trying to figure out why it is the "Check Engine" light decided to kick on and why, after repeated visits to the mechanic, why it still insists on remaining lit on my dashboard, even though I've spent hundreds of dollars to correct the very problem it has.

It's frustrating, because until this point, my little Honda has run like an absolute champ. She's dependable, efficient and being the first car I've ever bought and owned myself, I've kept her well-maintained at the appointed intervals.

And yet, she's still got a problem and I guess what frustrates me the most is that not only do I not know what it is, but I can't seem to accurately fix it either.

It's a similar situation to what has been going on in my head for the last few years.

When I had my psych evaluation done two years ago, the diagnosis that came back was that I have severe to extreme manic depression, PTSD, and issues with attachment and trust in other people. That's what I was told by doctors who I'd like to think know what they were talking about, even if I didn't like what they had to say.

But when I explained that to the people around me, as is in keeping with the all-too-real stigma surrounding mental health issues, the majority of the feedback I got was either to ignore that diagnosis altogether or to be shunned on some level because I chose to believe the information I'd been given.

I hoped my support system would grow once I came clean and told my family and those I cared about that yes, I am dealing with some pretty heavy duty stuff. Instead, it actually shrank, and as a result, I have little to no interest in talking to anyone about what I'm still trying to do out of fear that it might end up taking the last few friends I have left.

"Why can't you just be happy?" my mother exclaimed in our last conversation. "I don't want to be dragged down anymore," said a former friend.

I was watching a documentary on the writer Ian Fleming the other day and his stepdaughter explained how for all he was able to do in his life, he actually created James Bond as a way to overcome his own inner turmoil and insecurities.

"Real melancholia comes from within," she said. "Ian could be deeply melancholic on a lovely day."

My issues, whatever they actually are, did not just come about out of the blue. It's the summation of all the disappointment, regret, guilt, fear, and yes, even pain, spread out over decades. They are tied to memories that I can't seem to forget and people whom I've loved with ever fiber of my being and then lost.

It's not as simple a case of just "being happy" and that fixes the problem. The amount of good things I have is grossly disproportionate to the bad. That's not the fault of one person either, including myself. But when those things are so deeply rooted in who you are as a person, trying to pry them out of you is neither easy or painless.

As people, we like to oversimplify the solutions to complex problems, even when we know such methods don't work. We swallow tons of antidepressants and try our best to just ignore the required heavy lifting.

I was given a diagnosis, and even now there are days when I don't want to believe it either. I've been lucky enough in this life to not be told I have cancer, but I've talked to enough people who have to know they didn't want to believe it either. Getting told what's wrong isn't an incredibly bad thing. When I went in, I wanted to know because I'd never had an answer for why I am who I am.

Now I know. I may not like it. But I know and I can do something about it.

I just can't fix it alone.