What Am I Waiting For?

For the past couple of hours, I've been watching Stephen Fry in a documentary he made, many moons ago, called 'The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive'. It's a harrowing, yet somehow strangely enjoyable documentary about the lives of people who suffer from Bipolar Disorder, or Manic Depression as some may call it. I've seen it many, many times but I use it as a tool of realisation. A tool of perspectiveness and context, a way of seeding out my own feelings when I'm not quite sure what is going on inside my own head. I may act like I know exactly what's happening to me, and my knowledge of what is going on has increased ten-fold in the past few years, but sometimes I bloody well wish it would just go away. Please just leave me be, and let me have a chance of the success that I feel lies deep within.

For that is the problem. I have stages where I feel like I can do anything. I become inspired, intelligent, galvanized into doing something that changes the world, and even on occasions begin planning into a huge project that, at the time, will undoubtedly be a huge success. For a couple of days, I spend hours upon hours preparing to change my life, putting preliminary plans in place that will propel me to new heights, but almost as soon as that feeling has hit, I am suddenly paralysed by another, completely different realisation. Who am I to think that I can change the world? Someone who swings from energetic, happy and a little bit mad to a man who can hardly get out of bed in the morning and almost dreads a full day in an office. How can I put hours and hours of effort, every day, to make this work, when sleep is all of a sudden a more benefiting option? It must be quite an incredible sight for anyone who witnesses such a change, but inside my own brain, it is a vicious cycle that occurs once every couple of weeks.

I shall give you such an example into one of the crazy, crazy weeks I experienced, way back in March of this year. I have not told a single person about this event, as it is quite ridiculous to get your head around. For any person of a "normal" disposition, you'd do well to appreciate the madness of what you're about to read.

It had been quite a tumultuous time. I was struggling to get to grips with a new job, I had been banned from refereeing from the top dogs at the FA, and I remember feeling utter blackness for periods longer than I was used to. For the last couple of years I suppose, I've always wanted to tell people of what I was going through. How all this feels, what I do to try and combat the darkness. Maybe I can help some friends and acquaintances move a step further to try and manage what they're feeling, but I wanted to go further than that. I wanted to help people I don't know avoid what I was feeling. For, as I said last week, I wouldn't wish depression on my worst enemy. The invisibility of it, the feeling of utter uselessness that surrounds you when captured by its worst traits. I wanted to help anyone and everyone that feels similar to the way I do.

After a couple of weeks of going to work, simply looking forward to getting home and going straight to bed to escape from the demands of life, I experienced a huge influx of positivity. All of a sudden, almost with the literal blink of an eye, I had gone from a stage of complete anguish to mountaneous inspiration and creativity. Quite a scary change of feelings, I'm sure you'd agree, but a welcome change in light of the darkness I had been feeling before. I've had mad ideas in the past. This blog for starters, was a mad idea, way back when I used to spend evenings crying into my duvet. I felt I had to start telling people what was happening, and it was a huge hurdle I jumped, and a successful one I suppose. But in feelings of inspiration, and simple happiness, I am always looking to jump more hurdles. Hurdles that I simply cannot even run towards when I'm feeling down, or even "okay".

I'm waffling. Let's get to it.

On the evening of 19th March, I e-mailed many TV production companies, pitching an idea of a documentary. A documentary based around the stigma of depression including bipolar and S.A.D and I really, really believed I was the right person to carry out such an audacious project. I know. During times where I'm stable or feeling a bit shit, I wonder how on Earth I could do such a thing. Who would listen to a nobody from nowhere? But I genuinely believed I could do it. This was only fuelled by the fact that I woke up the next day to a reply from almost every single company I e-mailed. Over 20 e-mails all from different personnel working in TV. It was staggering. Although most of them simply said that they couldn't accept unsolicited ideas, there were 5 e-mails that were extremely positive. 2 of them offered an interview to explore the idea further, another 2 companies were currently working with other TV channels, (BBC Three being a prime example), on projects and wanted to get to know me further so they could potentially explore future avenues and one even offered the opportunity to go up to Manchester the very next week to start planning into a possible documentary at a future stage. All of a sudden, I thought this may be it. Could I ride out the initial stages of absolute terror and get it started? I felt that if I could start the project, I would be able to complete it.

But I couldn't. I ended up making excuses to these people, telling them I was looking elsewhere or that I was delaying the idea and I've never gone back to it. I lost my nerve. I lost the inspiration that began the idea in the first place and I went back to living the humdrum lifestyle. I was scared of what people would think, scared that people would assume I was simply looking for fame or fortune. I was also daunted of the work that would have to be done. What would happen on the days where I couldn't even get out of bed? Ok, I feel good now, but what if a major part of the process was scuppered simply because I felt bad? How many people would I let down if this happened? Would I have been able to tell my story to others bearing in mind I can hardly tell my parents? So many questions with a simple answer. Who knows. It would have been difficult, but I know, very deep down, that I have it in me to do such a thing. I am a fighter, I will speak out if I feel an injustice has occurred, but the hurricane of emotions I feel, drifting from week to week, is just too difficult to control sometimes. So much so, that I cannot really be stable for large periods of time. I cannot rely on myself to be sustainably useful. And even if I do find myself to be in a situation where I'm ok, and have been for a while, I never want to act on a mission that risks being taken back to the black, merely content with being... content. I have no idea if you understand what that feels like. I want to make a difference, but I just don't know how I can do it without losing my nerve. Or my mind.

It's a mad story. One that I haven't told a single soul, but that is just one occasion, probably the craziest, where I feel I could have made a big difference. A big difference that I want to make, but just can't. I've began writing books, only to delete them citing "absolute nonsense" as a reason. I want to be someone, but in the grand scheme of things, I am no one. So why would anyone listen to someone who is nothing? I have no experience in the creative world, no credible qualifications that say otherwise, and I hear so many stories of failure that one cannot help but think that it won't work out for me either. And I don't have the bottle to risk it.

Work tomorrow. A glorious 8 and a half hours of it, and I'm not looking forward to it. Sat in an office chair all day isn't my idea of a career, and I know I can do better. I just don't know how to do it.