PART 5: CRASH & BURN – JESUS – STILL ALIVE & WELL

     Before it got to that I was still holding down my job... things were getting worse not better. Here's some of the things that were going on:

     I began chain smoking nonstop on the job (smoking was not permitted in the plant).

     When we needed a new tech, I thought, I don't know how to higher a qualified tech. I don't know anything about these things or what qualifies a tech. My solution... I began reading tech notes and trying to repair line failures myself.

     I know. This makes no sense. Remember I was not suffering with Acute Logic Disorder. I was bipolar. This condition doesn't always lend itself to stable thinking.

     I actually succeeded in fixing about half the line failures. The other half began piling up and that fact along with the absence of a new tech was apparent to my boss. He wound up having one of the engineers higher a tech. My butt was saved for the time being. The new tech worked under my authority.

     I also started having less control of my temper. On one occasion I slammed a bin full of parts and sent them flying everywhere when I was out on the floor with the production lines. I cussed and carried on and stomped out of the building.

     Then there was the Friday that I was short a electric screw driver for one of my lines. I found it at my bosses other company. On the weekend I came back with wood and chicken wire and built a rickety sort of equipment cage to lock up all the tools from my bosses access. It was pretty sorry and could not have secured anything.

     In the front building where the other company was housed were some people working overtime. They apparently saw me bringing in all the wood and wire and called my boss. He showed up and asked what on earth I was doing. Well, I had to tell him something. I told him, “I'm locking up all the tools so you can't take them.”

     He proceeded to walk me around both factories pointing at everything and saying, “See that. I own it. It's mine. You see everything in here? I own it.”

     He didn't make me tear down the cage but I never stored a tool in it.

     On Monday morning my workers were peeking in the office and snickering. News travels fast. If they had Facebook then they would have said SMH (shake my head).

     The cage was undoubtedly a manic presentation. One thing that would happen with my mania is that it would invariably arrive at a point where I could no longer believe in the sense of what I was doing and/or thinking. I would then crash and burn and enter a deep depression.

     Then there was a period where I began talking to the people at corporate and trying to convince them that they didn't need the local owner, my boss, anymore. The shop could function autonomously under me. I won't even go into all the reasons why that would never work. Suffice it to say I'm sure anyone who heard it knew the whole idea was absolutely ridiculous. I'm also sure it must have gotten back to my boss. He had a lot more connections at corporate that I ever dreamed of having. He never said anything to me about it.

     More and more I began to stay in the office. I'd get the line up and running in the morning and then stay in my office unless someone sought me out for something. I'd then hide in the office again and only come out for lunch or problems.

     I became more and more dysfunctional until I was barely getting the barest essentials done. It was about this time that my boss sent another “co-manager” back to work with me. I think it was known from the start that he was going to replace me.

Interestingly, sometimes people will go along with crazy ideas because you believe in those wild ideas. My boss was clearing a field for another business he wanted to set up. He offered people the opportunity to dig some trees to plant at home before he brought in the bull dossers.

     I became obsessed with having trees. Somewhere in mind I determined I needed at least 100 trees. I don't know why that figure. But people helped me dig all those trees ranging from a couple of feet to 6 and eight feet. Palms and pines. I think my final count was 102. I brought them home and piled them in several big piles. I couldn't even get them all into the ground. More than half I'm sure were already dead before the even saw dirt again. In the end I had one survivor. I have a cabbage palm that continues to prosper. I'm not sure but I think when I pass it it snickers under its breath, “What an idiot!”

     My co-manager was also a friend and was aware that I was bipolar. He began suggesting that I should look into disability. I didn't understand it. I didn't get that what I had was a disability. After a little while as co-managers I was called to my boss's office and I was fired. When he fired me he suggested that I look into disability. I had worked there over 10 years.

     After that I tried somethings. I worked for a friend briefly. I sold jobs for her print shop and began learning to use software to set up printed materials. The first month I sold for them they where in the black for the first time. After that I could barely make myself walk through the door of a business and talk to anyone.

     My former employer would throw me a bone here and there. I supplied his labels which I ordered from a specialty printer. I set up the artwork. The labels were very high profit and it would net me a few hundred bucks here and there.

     Long story short, we crumbled financially and I eventually wound up on disability. Before it was done, my complete diagnosis included Bipolar Disorder, Dysthymia, and Social Phobia. I think the social phobia is a product of a lot of life experiences but possibly brought to a head as a byproduct of being bipolar. After a while you begin to not have a clue as to what's normal.

     Social Phobia. I'm not even sure what all the clinical implications are but this is what I experience: I become unduly fearful of entering into social situations to the point of consciously or subconsciously avoiding them. I can be in a conversation and become fearful that I'm not doing it right. I begin to stammer and not be able to think of words. I may ever begin to perspire and tremble and my voice may weaken and crack. I'm especially thwarted by how to disengage from a conversation. I feel less than everyone around me. I feel like a child even with people younger than me. I'm terrified that everything I do is inadequate. I'm more comfortable doing things alone because I think other people will know I'm not doing it the right way. I never know how I'm supposed to act in any given situation. I may sometimes overcompensate trying to figure out how I'm supposed to act. I believe I just make people uncomfortable.

     So are you wondering where the testimony is in all this?

     The truth is I still suffer with bipolar disorder. This may be my thorn in the flesh in the same way the apostle Paul had a thorn in the flesh. While I would relish a little mania sometimes that seems mostly gone but I still can go into crippling depression, sometimes with a trigger sometimes for no reason at all. It's not unlike someone with migraines or some other chronic disorder. Instead of horrible head aches I have horrible melancholy.

     You can't shake it off and you don't just get over it or ignore it. You survive through it. You fear the possibility that you may become a sad statistic and by an exercise of will assure yourself that you won't.

     One small part of my testimony is that I can say with reasonable confidence that I will never commit suicide. Because by the grace of God I've come through a thousand depressions and survived. I can't imagine telling God that I thought that was a reasonable solution. I can't imagine trying to explain why I thought it was okay to put my family though that.

     Also through and even because of being bipolar I've had the opportunity meet scores of people suffering from many psychiatric disorders. I've had the opportunity to peer counsel them, share the love of Christ and pray with them. Empowered by God I've helped many people in spite of myself.

     A therapist at Shand's once asked me, “How do you feel when you see others do better?” The implication was that I might resent it because I still struggled so hard.

     My answer was, “I'm glad if I was of help.” And I was sincere. What better therapy than to set aside your own troubles and help a friend gain ground.

     When Dr. Moore died his widow met with me and told me, “Jerry would want you to continue this work.” While he was alive he had entrusted me to facilitate a bipolar group. This also testifies of God grace. In Dr. Moore's own literature he recommends against giving bipolars responsibility for groups. Yet to me he gave that assignment and his mantle came to me.

     I believe I operated under a special anointing for this for a number of years. At it's pinnacle we had more than 20 regular attenders. Sometimes people with backgrounds in mental health came to these groups with their own issues and where surprised by how much they benefited.

     Over the years scores of people passed through my group.

     Probably the greatest story of this whole period was the woman who had come for years dealing with fears and depression. She was arguably bipolar. She struggled with fear of going to work to the point it had stranglehold on her among other things. While she was coming to group she was diagnosed with stage 3 beast cancer. We were able to support her and pray for her through the whole ordeal. Sometimes God would give me a word for her and I was able to tell her she would be alright in the end. She is now many years into remission and working a regular job. I have not seen her in years but hear through the grapevine.

     But as all things have a season so did this and I knew for a long time the season was waning. Once she was in complete remission the time had come to resign the group. The whole group pretty much dissolved after that.

     Despite all the all diagnosis’s I completed an associates degree going back to school after 40 and having been a high school drop out. Though I had the social phobia thing I took public speaking and aced it. I graduated with honors.

     I have led praise and worship I've even preached a couple times (it was a very small congregation). I currently participate in the praise team in a large church where I play in front of hundreds of people weekly.

     My college studies taught me how to do a certain amount of internet design. This combined with my musical talents has enabled me to create and share music over the internet that testifies of God. Thousands of people have been to my personal website and other sites that I use to play my songs.

     I challenge myself to introduce myself to new people at church even though I feel panicky that I won't know what to say next or how to effectively disengage.

     Through all the challenges my family did without a lot of wants but we were never without food, shelter and medical.

     I have been married 30 plus years. The divorce rate for bipolars is astronomically larger than the general population. This not only testifies of God's grace but also of my wife's strength and long suffering. It speaks of God's kindness to put me with the right woman despite the mess I was coming from. I don't know that I would have made it without her.

     I have a paid off home and 2 cars one of which is paid off. My children have been raised and are in their own homes.

     If this doesn't sound like much to you remember that it was once considered a big enough goal for me just to get out of bed and shower.

     Beyond all this God has graced me to remain a believer. Though landslides, backslides and more I have never stopped believing in Jesus from that evening in Joys living room. I may not have excelled at life but I have persevered. Anything that is good about me is the pure grace of Jesus Christ.

     I'm not going to close with the words of a great prophet but with God's permission the words of blues man Johnny Winter, “I'm still alive and well.”