The Crash:
A couple of months passed by and the winter holidays approached. A few days before Thanksgiving I started losing sleep at a rapid rate; this eventually evolved into full blown insomnia. Coupled with the sleeplessness my entire body started to shake and there was nothing I could do about it. I had never felt this way before, I wasn’t sure what I should do. I felt frantic all of the time and I started to become nervous about everything. I started to have uncontrollable thoughts of bad things happening to me and my family. I was so afraid that I was going to lose my job or maybe even die.
After several days of being coached over the phone by my mom and a couple of trips to the hospital, I decided to fly my mom out to Vegas to stay with us to see if she could help me in any way. A day or two after her arrival the symptoms had reached a point where I wasn’t even sure if I could deal with them or not. Suicide was NEVER an option, so I just laid around wondering what to do. I felt lost and disconnected from everything and everyone I knew. I felt like a bad husband, a bad father, and a bad friend; something had to be done.
Realizing that I wasn’t just going to get better on my own, I sought out the mental health clinic on base. After talking with a psychiatrist, I self-admitted myself into Spring Mountain Treatment Facility. If you can avoid it, I would highly recommend never admitting yourself into a mental health ward. This was probably one of the worst experiences of my life. A big portion of that was most likely due to the way that I felt, but I still feel like it wasn’t a helpful environment. I’m not going to go into the details of my visit, just know that it was bad enough to make me want to feel better just to avoid ever being in that place in the future.
I spent nearly a month in Spring Mountain. I wasn’t even close to being better, but my 1st Sergeant pulled me; I didn’t want to be there anymore. I got out just in time for Christmas and to see my family. My dad and brothers were able to drive down from NorCal to visit and my mom was still at the house helping my wife and daughter. It was so nice spending the holidays with family. I even got to go skidding for free on Christmas day thanks to U-Drift. I was already back out and having fun, but I still had such a long way to go.
Well the holidays ended and my family had to go back home. As any person that has severe anxiety would, I started to worry and have panic attacks. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to recover without my family close, but they had to leave and live their own lives. It was hard but I managed to pick myself up and get my shit together and get back to work. I had no idea what the future had in store for me, but you can’t just give up that easily.
At this point in time my car was the last thing on my mind. I spent nearly a year seeing different doctors and struggling through each day. Every day I was making progression, which was the most I could ask for at that time.
In August 2012 we decided to get a dog. Her name is Bella. She was found in a box in an abandoned home with her two brothers. A good pet can be one of the best forms of mental health
October 2012 rolled around and we celebrated my daughter’s 3rd birthday. It’s the days like this that make you feel good about life.
In November my wife wanted to take my daughter and go visit her family for a few months back in Japan. We arranged for the flight and they were off. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do by myself, but I was hoping not to lose it again mentally and just have fun.
I ended up spending some time with my family back home in Cali for the holidays and it was great. It gave me a new desire to start working on the car again when I went back home. So I headed back home and got to work.