The Things I Hate About Myself

Chapter One : I am not depressed

"I am not depressed".

"I am not the type of person who gets depressed".

"I am fine, I just feel down sometimes".

These are the type of sentences I have found myself saying increasingly over the past 8 months.
Four days ago, I said something I never thought I would say.

"I am not fine. This is more than feeling down. I am depressed. I need help." 

The initial feeling was not one of relief but shame.
I have never felt so pathetic and un-manly.
Men are not supposed to be this weak. I am not supposed to cry. I am not supposed to complain about how hard I am finding things to my 30 weeks pregnant girlfriend. After all she is the one going through hell right now, Not me. Right?

I would like to break this chapter up with a cheerful list of things I hate about myself; this should give you a better understanding of my mental state. Then we can move onto cheerier subjects, maybe, a deeper dive into my fears like the one of death or my Nosophobia (The fear of developing disease). You know, the lighter things.

So here goes. My list of things I hate about myself –
•I am selfish.
•I am overweight.
•When I sit down my nipple touches my belly button.
•I find it hard to listen to other people.
•I have an addictive personality.
•I fail at the essential things in life, like being a grown up.
•I am 34 with no savings or a car.
•I am about to be a father and I am drowning in debt and terrible money habits.
•I am the most awkward person in any room.
•I have a large skull.
•I have a receding hairline.
•I am a 4.
•My feet smell like somebody just opened a bag of Tangy Cheese Doritos no matter what I do.
•I let everyone down.
•I am a terrible person.
•I am a hermit.
•I cannot stop eating.
•I am slowly losing my teeth.
•I rarely finish things I start.
•I am wallowing in self-pity.
•I believed I could be something special.
•I self-destruct.
•I can not snap out of it.
•I am too opinionated.
•My body has a similar shape to a loaf of bread that i have sat on with my chubby bready body.

25 is a good round number so I will just scratch the surface and leave it there. Also, because it is a multiple of 5 it works well for the bonus fact I have just remembered.

Roll up, roll up, What do we have behind door number 26?

•I have obsessive compulsive disorder.

(The crowd go wild!)
What a lovely bonus! The gift that keeps giving. Straight from my dysfunctional brain to colour my day with thoughts like;

whatever number I leave the volume on the TV on is the actual age I will die at. Honestly, it gets better... If the volume I leave the TV on is lower than my age, my girlfriend will die at that number/age, if the volume is lower than her age, then my unborn child will die, and if it is below 5, my cats will snuff it early.

*Additional note on my cats, I am pretty sure they hate me and all I do is feed them and change their cat litter, but hey-ho.

One thing I can say about OCD though is I have had it since being 6 years old and it is still going strong so in effect it is the most consistent thing in my life.

Anyway, let's get back on track, if in fact there is a track to get on.
I am depressed, we have established that.
I think when it started to deteriorate was last year when my partner and I experienced a miss-carriage. I would not say this was the reason why I am depressed, but I remember never feeling sadness quite like it.
If I were to explain the feeling it was like coming down off the biggest high and slowly realizing you had lost your biggest dream and may never get it back.
Realizing you and your partner will never actually recover and the thought of what could have been will always haunt you. It is a barren, empty pain that unless you have experienced it you will never understand.
I know some people have many miscarriages and are not as lucky to conceive again straight away like we did, but it does not take anything away from our pain.
A pain that as a man there is a stigma about. A stigma that says it does not affect you as much as the woman, because so many men are shit bags. Carrying the fetus in your heart is not as important as carrying it in the Uterus and so on.
I could not find any support group for males going through miscarriage, no books, articles or blogs.
All I found were a bunch of bland patronizing comments from acquaintances like, "well it just wasn't meant for this world", "it will happen for you one day"  and the absolute worst; "all things happen for a reason."
Yes, that is right - casual acquaintance who's opinions on the subject mean nothing to me - you are right! The only reason is this, life has a way of breaking your heart over and over again.

So yes, as I touched on there, we conceived again... Great news right?        Well yes, if you take aside the pressures of self-doubt and inadequacy that make you compare yourself to the instamums and instadads of 2020. The vegan, no added sugar, yoga spouting, own brand T-Shirt wearing, skin care routine perfectionists that cure a baby's teething problems with a piece of Amethyst or by casting leeks onto an altar.
The type that say things like "parenthood is so easy it is such a joy, me and the twins Topaz and Tiger Lilly are in a great routine. We just kind of see into each others souls and if we EVER have any negative thoughts we write them down and bury them in our cabbage patch under a full moon. Water them with rose water and they just grow into 100 thousand more followers." You know the type, tossers, absolute twats.

How can I teach my child to eat healthy when I eat a large Cadbury's Marvelous Creations almost every day?

How can a failure teach success?

How can I teach positive thinking (something I believed in for many years) when I believe deep down (on my bad days) it is just a coping mechanism?

I touched on my fear of death and my fear of disease, something that I am haunted by every day. Some nights I believe I am going to die so much that after a panic attack I actually find peace in my mortality, accept my fate and fall quietly asleep into death only to be awoke the next day my the irritating sound of my girlfriends iPhone rattling against her half empty glass of Vimto.
Beat you again grim reaper.... AH, palpitations. Well played. 

Anyway, there is only so much cheeriness chapter one can take so let us move on, shall we? 

I just hope you were not wanting a happy ending. I am sorry, I do not have time. I need to go to the toilet for the 14th time today. You know, to attend to my imminent diabetes.