Mental Health and My Special

Hi there. I wanted to do a post last month about mental health awareness because it had its own special month, and because it is something that I believe is valuable for all of us to be aware of and to pay attention to. I didn’t make that post though. I put it off and didn’t do it and couldn’t start it. I made a file called “MHAM” (Mental Health Awareness Month) that sat untouched until today. 

Today is another day that I’m having trouble getting started. So was yesterday. This is not uncommon for me, and is something that I have struggled with as long as I can really remember. Some days are easier than others, but some days are not easy at all. And that’s not even necessarily when I have anything to do. I’ve often attributed it to general fatigue, or the fatigue associated with my varicose veins, or the heat, or the cold, or my own self-pity, or being lazy, or something possibly resembling depression. And it probably has something to do with some of those things. Maybe.

Anyways, things like this started to make a bit more sense for me recently. 

After nearly a year of getting ready, and 13 years of standup, and doing more than half of the jobs associated with it, I produced a comedy show on my 13th standup anniversary in February, with the threefold intention of: putting on a show, making that show good, and recording that show. 

I feel confident in saying all of those things happened. On February 17th, we sold about 90 tickets to the show at Luckey’s, had to turn people away in fact, and we had an awesome two hour show with a lot of my actual favorite people in the world, both performing and attending. I did about 75 minutes of comedy. Wasn’t bad. If you were there, I hope you had a good time. It felt pretty special, even if I was exhausted for most of the day/weekend. Thanks for being a part of it. It was a lot of work, but I’m excited and proud that I’ll be putting it out next Tuesday. Why next Tuesday? Why not? 

Well, about a month after the anniversary show, I was in a pretty rough spot. I was feeling overwhelmed, like I was unable to do anything, like I was stuck, trapped, lost, and had no clear path forward. I never thought about hurting myself or anything, but it was pretty bad. I had what I thought was a nervous breakdown, or extreme burnout, or an anxiety attack, or something like that, and so I took the next day off work. We had just talked about taking care of our mental health at work, so I was doing what was best for me. 

The next day I got fired. Which came right after I told them I was struggling mentally. The brand new site director cited that I “wasn’t a fit”, and he assured me that “it wasn’t personal”, which is not how it feels when someone says they don’t want you to be a part of a community you value. It seemed like a mixture of budgetary reasons and my forthright nature as a human/employee. As I’ve said to others, I think I got fired because 1) I can’t lie, and 2) I won’t shut up. (Only semi-kidding.) But honestly I just don’t think most people know how to manage people who ask for what they need.

Of course it’s not that simple, but throughout my entire life I’ve been called high-maintenance, difficult, overly sensitive, and many other less savory things. So, when I’m let go for essentially just being myself, while doing my best, and asking for what I need, in a community where the people I was supporting actually wanted me there (the clients told me regularly), and I felt like I was contributing every day (even if it was hard work), it took its toll on me. 

Comedy is my passion, my love, what drives me more than just about anything. But I haven’t figured out how to make a living out of it. Not yet. I hope I will. I believe I’m good enough to. I know I am. But just because you can do a job, doesn’t mean you will get the opportunity to do that job. And with my 40th birthday is coming up fast, and I don’t know how the hell I’m gonna pay bills in 10 years if I keep living like this. It’s scary, it’s weird, and it makes me resent capitalism, and the structures and people that have kept it in place in a way that makes it so hard for so many people to just get by.  

Back to mental health. A month or so after I got fired, I reached out to my PCP, because I was on the verge of another break. I could feel it. My nervous system had been shot for months, and I didn’t know what to do about it. I tried working out, I tried sprinting as fast as I could, I tried talking to my mom, spending time with friends, spending time alone, cleaning, doing yard work, eating vegan, taking vitamin D, sleeping, drinking less, staying hydrated, feeding myself. Wasn’t working. Not really. 

Through the health care that I get for free because I currently make zero dollars (but the amount that you have to make in order to be eligible for this health care is so little that going over that line can screw you over as it relates to being able to find suitable health care and have any money at all for life), I was so fortunate to have found a doctor nearby that I like and that treats me respectfully, and that I was able to get in to see within a week, which is kind of unheard of. 

Anyways, doc was pretty immediately concerned when I told him how I was feeling and all the things that precipitated this, and he brought up the words anxiety, depression, and one that I hadn’t previously thought about for me: ADHD. 

And he not only brought in someone to record my responses, but a social worker immediately after we spoke. The team there seemed to be talking a lot about ADHD, which is something I had not wrangled with personally before. And, if we’re being honest, I didn’t know quite what it was. But the social worker was kind and open about her experience with ADHD, and my doctor seemed to think this was something that was a possibility. ADHD is a learning disability, and for a person who has always gotten good grades and been able to grasp many challenging concepts, this felt…odd. But it also made sense. 

Throughout all of this, I should say that I’d been speaking with a counselor. Still am. I changed counselors once in the middle of the pandemic (because of insurance/availability), but I’ve been speaking with a professional for a couple/few years now. And while I feel like that space is absolutely vital for my well-being, I was still just kind of hanging on. Just getting by. Just coping.

And so about a month after seeing my doctor, and after talking with multiple centers that were primarily focused on medication, I was more concerned with getting some sort of diagnosis rather than medication. The more we know about ourselves, the better we are able to support ourselves, is how I see it. But the thing I found, in doing my own research and talking with others, is that so many of the symptoms of depression/anxiety/ADHD come out looking the same or very similar, making a diagnosis incomplete or unclear or inaccurate, obfuscating root issues and confusing patients. 

The first time I met my mental health nurse practitioner, after having filled out the requisite forms and had an initial consultation, he seemed pretty confident that I had some type of depression. When I told him how I was feeling and what I had been experiencing (which is far more than even what I’m sharing here), that was his diagnosis. He told me that it’s treatable. I started crying when he said, with actual concern in his voice, “You don’t have to feel this way.”

But that bummed me out. ADHD, at least, seemed to have some sort of clarity, whereas depression was just like, the absence of anything. If you see a depression in a chair, it’s the place where a butt used to be, but now it’s just, like, a depression. Something cool used to be there, but now it’s empty. Shit.

But I didn’t want to jump into a diagnosis or anything further without talking to my counselor, doctor friends, other friends, family. This stuff runs in my family, and I was told that I got the “shit end of the mental health stick”, or something like that. Still, I needed to understand things better for myself. 

I talked with my counselor, and he had his own diagnosis, which he said he was required to make. He told me that he thought I had “adjustment disorder with depressed mood”. Well, that’s also something. My doctor friend said that I was an interesting case, because I have this melancholic side to me that is quite present, but I’m also active. I’m laughing. I’m doing stuff. I’m not just resting on my laurels. Maybe that’s all part of the issue.

After a few weeks of deliberation and consulting with the supports in my life, I met with my nurse practitioner again. I told him that I was weirdly disappointed that he thought I had depression, because ADHD seemed more treatable, I guess. Depression is treatable, too, he assured me. And he let me know that in filling out the ADHD form, I met the criteria for ADHD as well. Oh. Cool? 

One weird thing about ADHD is that its symptoms can come out as depression for a lot of people. If you are on top of your sleep, eating, and all that stuff, it can feel pretty manageable, actually. But if that stuff is out of whack, everything can feel overwhelming, even seemingly small or regular occurrences for other people can feel like too much to bear. This has often been my experience. And honestly, people in my life have not always been able to see my experience as valid, or I haven’t learned to express it in a way that is understandable, and so I’ve probably learned to keep things in even more than you might think. Partners have told me I don’t need to be so honest all the time. I bet a lot of my masking has come out onstage and in person as jokes. Or in Irish goodbyes. I’ve always said that lifting weights “keeps my head on straight”, and that may be more apt than even I knew all these years. 

When I told my NP about how confusing and challenging this whole thing had been for me, he said something that was also very helpful for me. He said it’s important to not get bogged down by a diagnosis. And that kind of clicked for me. 

I said, “Yeah. Okay. We’re not treating the diagnosis; we’re treating the person,” to which he replied, “That’s a very good way to put it.”

When I expressed concerns over being less of myself, he did his best to quell those worries. “The goal here is not to make you feel less like Rudy, but more like Rudy.” And that got me, too. It’s not that I don’t like who I am, not at all. I like myself. A lot. I like Rudy. And I think other people do, too. I just want to be able to see myself clearly through the fog that currently seems to be between me and the mirror in front of me. 

And so, after months of trying to figure out more about the state of my mind and body, I decided to move forward with medication in addition to the other lifestyle changes I’m making currently. But I don’t view meds as some kind of silver bullet. This isn’t some cure all where I’m going to wake up feeling magically better all of a sudden (especially not with this pollen all around).

In addition to medication, I’ve been making the following changes:

-improving my sleep hygiene, trying to be in bed at the same times 7 days a week if possible

-taking vitamins D and B12 daily

-taking regular time off from drink and smoke, maybe even cutting them out altogether for regular extended periods of time

-reduced the intensity of my workouts, as I have a tendency to go to failure far too many sets in a typical workout

-trying to be more social

-trying to go on a date or two

-continuing to go to mics regularly

-but also not feeling bad if I don’t feel like making it out

-journaling most days

-working on a project regularly

-building a schedule even without being at work

-using the pomodoro technique (timing activities so I don’t lose track of time)

-reading physical books

-spending intentional time outside

-feeling gratitude when I connect with my cats

-focusing on process

-breathing

And plenty more. These are just some of the things I’ve done over my life, but I can always be more intentional with how I fill my days, and how I fill my mind, my time. 

Being labeled as neurodivergent at almost age 40 is shocking. It feels like I lost so much time. It feels like there’s an alternate timeline where Rudy figured this stuff out like 15 years ago, and was able to work towards healthy ways to cope and to grow, instead of just coping. I have so much inside me. AlternaRudy knows this. And if we met at that point where universes collide, he’d probably look at me, give me a big hug and say, “Be patient. Keep working.” And then he’d zip back to his universe where he’s getting his toes sucked on a jetski. 

Whether I lean into these diagnoses or not, that’s not the important thing for me. The thing that this has been able to do, as I’ve learned more and more about ADHD, is shed some light on things that have been happening my whole life. Ways that I’ve been masking. Things about me that people have laughed at or made fun of were not just because I was a “too sensitive”, but potentially because I have a neurological condition that creates challenges with emotional regulation, executive function, time management, focus, restlessness, low frustration tolerance, task initiation, task completion, social anxiety, and so much more. Every time I find more symptoms that I have experienced and previously shrugged off as me being “difficult” or “high-maintenance” are in all likelihood much more complex than that.

I’m not saying there aren’t things I take responsibility for. It’s my life. I’ve made choices. I stand by my words and my choices, and am willing to accept responsibility or blame for the consequences my decisions and actions have or may lead to. I have a choice every day. I have a million choices every day - which is another thing that makes me so fatigued/is related to ADHD and burnout - and having a greater understanding of how to deal with the various challenges that are presented to a neuro-something person such as myself is the most appropriate way forward for me at this time. 

In the midst of all this, I haven’t just been sitting on my keister. I’ve been active. I’ve been doing stuff. I’ve been legitimately trying. 

I have been conducting a job search. I got three interviews from different departments in the span of a week at the UO, which was exciting because in the dozen or so applications I’d put in there over the years, I hadn’t heard a peep. It took about a month to get all of my rejection letters from these three interviews, but hey I got them. And I’m still trying. I’m continually looking for jobs and working on my place and the yard and the cats and my health and my life and it all feels like it never stops. 

AND!

I’m editing and putting out a comedy freaking special a week from today. It’s gonna be on youtube. Nobody asked me to do it. I have no agents knocking down my door. Bookings are still hard to come by. But this is something I’ve wanted to do for a while. Something that I’ve been working towards for 13 years, whether I knew it or not. All the ridiculous rides across Korea (where I started doing standup) to do weird ten minute sets for expats, or military, or confused Koreans. The trips to Singapore and Japan to perform for 15 people and sleep on a mat. All the hours spent poring over words and ideas and punchlines and books and essays and videos. All the trips I took across the world to see my favorite comedians, and to perform with some of them, and my best friends. All the time, money, and effort I put into putting on great comedy shows across the globe, whether something was already there or not. All of that goes into this special. And I don’t think I would change any of it. It’s who I am. Our stories are who we are.

I’m not putting it out because I think Netflix is about to come knocking, but if you watch my special (which I hope you will), it’s comedy. And it’s comedy that only I could have done. It’s my comedy. That’s it. And a few of my jokes and stories are about to have a little place to live for as long as Youtube exists (wasn’t youtube created on the seventh day?). If you watch it, you might think, “Oh, not for me.” But it might be for you. It’s going to be for somebody. And if that somebody is one kid who finds it 20 years from now on youtube, that’s more than enough. 

Anyways, I’m excited for some of my jokes to be out there. I’m excited for you to see it. 

Rudy Tyburczy - Lives! In Eugene, comes out June 13th on my youtube channel.

And if you need help, reach out to somebody. Start with a friend if you don’t have a doctor. Start with family. Start with whoever you feel comfortable with. Be honest with yourself, others. But do something. That’s what this whole thing has been about for me: taking an active role in my physical and mental well-being. Just like learning, nobody is going to do it for me. It’s my job to protect this meat vessel that gives so much and works so hard. I hope I can do it justice. I feel like I’m working towards that. I really hope this goes well. I want to do so much more than just cope.

Thanks for your support.