I opened a piece of mail today from the Indiana Family & Social Services Administration (FSSA). I get a lot of mail from them. I’ve been receiving SNAP benefits for the last year, and then because of my low income from last year, I ended up qualifying for Medicaid. So I see a lot of mail with the FSSA stamp on it and wasn’t expecting anything particularly earth-shattering this time.
What I got what a notice stating that my circumstances had changed resulting in a change to my Indiana health benefits. Ok, I thought, This is mildly interesting. And then interesting turned to ironically amusing. You see, they were notifying me that I was now eligible for state plan benefits because — get this — I have been determined to be medically frail. They follow that statement with a list of conditions that help define what medical frailty looks like. The first possible condition?
Disabling mental disorder.
I’m not sure, but I think I actually laughed out loud. The key to a good joke is in delivering a punchline no one expects. This? This I did not expect. I didn’t even remotely see it coming.
You see, three years ago, immediately after I was hospitalized for severe depression and suicidal ideation — when I spent six or seven months trying to cope with the fact that the bottom had just dropped out of my whole world, when I was facing the worst anxiety and panic attacks I’d ever dealt with in my life, attacks that were so severe I could barely walk between rooms without gasping for breath, while shaking uncontrollably, while sweating bullets, while feeling cold chills wrack my body, and while experiencing all my nerve endings light up like an electric bolt — during all that, I applied not once, but twice for temporary disability benefits until I could get my mental state stabilized and become a functional human being again.
I was denied both times.
I chose not to appeal it further. And so for three years, I fought through bouts of depression and despair, but mostly through anxiety and panic, that no one but me could see. I battled daily, hourly, minute-by-excruciating-minute, and breath by breath to find myself again. I clawed for every inch of progress I could gain, and many were the days when I thought I wouldn’t make it. I nearly gave up on many occasions. But little by little, I gained ground. I even managed to hold down a part-time job for a little while, though even that was a test of my limits.
Then last year happened. I lost control. I spent a week in jail. I got slapped — justly — with a misdemeanor and probation.
And those things lit a fire under me that helped me burn through the rest of 2018 like it was tissue paper. Don’t get me wrong. It still wasn’t easy. It was still work. It was still scary as hell. But that one life lesson taught me more than anything else before, and I was determined to never slide back into that dark place.
I started a business. I got my own apartment. I changed both psychiatrists and therapists — and received better treatment with both. I made new friends. I began to find myself again and learn more about myself and realize who I was. For the first time in years, I began to respect myself and be happy with who I was becoming. In short, I found my feet, my strength. I grew, learned, developed.
And that growth has carried over into this year, hard as 2019 has already been on me in some crucial ways. So for this to show up in my mailbox, so unexpectedly and, quite frankly, so damn late to the ballgame, I’m left with only one thing to do.
Laugh.
After all, it’s hilarious that after the game has essentially already been won, at least for this night, a new batter steps up to the plate and drives one home. I have to admit — it’s a pretty sight, a powerful hit, a clean drive that easily clears the fences. But it’s far, far too late. The game is already done. The crowd has all gone home. The players have left the dugouts. Even the grounds and stadium crews have left. The lights have been shut off. There’s no one here but me, admiring the field in the dark, breathing in the scents of the battle that took place earlier and anticipating those of the fights soon to come again. That guy down at home plate that just smacked one out of the park? I’m happy for him. He did something significant. But it doesn’t matter, certainly not to anyone that’s not him.
Meanwhile, I stand above in the bleachers, a ghost of a smile playing across my lips right before I turn and walk away. Would that you had been here sooner, I think to myself, but perhaps I’m glad you weren’t. If you had been, I might not have learned so much or grown so strong. No. No, I think you better stay there, fella. Play your little game. I don’t need you.
Apparently, I never did.
