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Others Who Fight the Stigma

This isn’t the only blog trying to poke the stigma of mental illness and addiction in the eye. Check these out:

Mood music for this post: “Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise” by The Avett Brothers:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E22HprMQN8M&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

I’ve been lucky to run across a couple other blogs this week where others are doing their part to break the stigma of OCD and binge eating. These finds make me happy because I’d hate to be the only one out here trying to fight the good fight. This is a stigma that’s hard to kill, after all.

So let me show you three blogs. Two are stigma-fighting blogs and the third actually glorifies all the stuff food addicts can’t touch.

I include the latter because the gals who write it always give me a chuckle, and laughter is an important tool of recovery, too.

EXPOSING OCD

What’s great about this blog is the level of detail the author gets into about every aspect of her OCD. While my blog casts a wide net on OCD, addiction and all the things that go with it, the author of “Exposing OCD” focuses like a laser beam on the compulsive behavior itself. it’s also chock full of information about the coping tools and organizations that have been a valuable resource for people like us.

The author says the following about herself:

I am a 40 something woman living in the Northeastern US, who took the average 17 years to find out I have OCD and even longer to actually find someone who knows how to treat it. I am sharing what has worked for me, as well as my current challenges with Exposure and Response Prevention Therapy. I hope you find this blog helpful!

I do find it helpful, and I thank you.

PEBBLES IN THE ROAD

This one focuses specifically on the challenges of compulsive overeating. The author takes a real diary approach in this one, while my blog — though the word “diary” is in the title — usually strays from the format.

Her writing is really about taking things one day at a time, focusing on each OA meeting, each day of abstinence from compulsive overeating and how she gets through things like traveling without losing her head. She stumbles, of course, and she doesn’t shy away from that. Here’s what she says about herself:

The is the journal of my road to recovery through Overeaters Anonymous. I have been an obsessive-compulsive personality for most of my 40 years. I had lived most of that time working to cure my disease. Through the years, I have practiced and changed almost all of my OCD behaviors to a livable standard, except compulsive binging. Food was my most powerful compulsion and when I hit bottom on May 13th, 2010, I finally I decided to join Overeaters Anonymous. Little did I know then that this was the answer I had been looking for all along. I have been abstinent from my compulsions since May 15th, 2010 and I have never felt so free.

KTEBCDOG’S BLOG

The ladies who write this one are friends of mine from the IT security industry: Christen Rice Gentile and Katie Boucher. Both work for Kaspersky Lab and Threat Post. Theirs is an unlikely blog to be included here.

I can’t eat a thing that they write about. They write about wanting to eat entire rooms full of kettle corn. They have more to say about beer than I ever thought possible.

But I’m at a stage of recovery where I can read about stuff I can’t have, be OK with it and even enjoy it. Besides, I’m a sucker for this comic direction they take.

Their colleague and my former boss, Dennis Fisher — an avid runner who can eat all this shit and stay thin — is quoted in the tagline as saying “serious food blogs suck out loud.”

Funny… I always felt that way about serious runner blogs. Except for this one. 😉

Go figure.

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These Piss Me Off (But Won’t Cut Me Down)

I’m a light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel/glass-is-more-than-half-full kind of guy. But sometimes I wake up in a bad mood and let my brain smolder over stupid things. This is one of those mornings.

To roll with the moment’s mood, below are a few of the things that piss me off. It’s useful to get angry sometimes — as long as we don’t let it break us.

Mood music for this post comes in two flavors:

“God’s Gonna Cut You Down” by Johnny Cash:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG7aS07dAN0&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

And “Broken, Beat and Scarred” by Metallica:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7eRiAnZt24&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Things that piss me off:

— Health insurers who label mental health care as a luxury instead of a necessity, cutting sufferers off from the things that can make them well again.

— The fact that final closure over the death of Sean Marley still alludes me.

— School districts that take kids who are different (special needs) and put them in a box that holds them back; dismissing them as stupid or trouble makers.

— My habit of picking up one addiction after I put down another.

— Fellow church-goers who think themselves more morally pure than everyone else and are quick to judge others, even though God wants us to be humble and forgiving.

— People who write off suicides as damned souls. True, suicide is a mortal sin. But those who do it are often so mentally ill that they’re not doing it in a moment of sanity or clarity. They have fallen to a disease.

— People who dismiss all addicts as idiots who either need sense knocked into them or need to be locked away. Sometimes they do. But addiction is a disease, not an attitude problem. I salute the priest who came clean about his own alcoholism and taught us all a lesson.

— My ongoing penchant for sinning right after I leave the confessional.

— People who pity me for the things I’ve been through. Your heart’s in the right place, but I’ve been through more joy in life than pain, so no pity is required.

— Letting myself go nuts over things I have no business trying to control.

Now for a few people/places/things that keep me grateful and prevent the other things from cutting me down:

— God

— People in my present

— People from my past

— Recovery

— Metal!

— My Revere roots

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Just a Little Patience

I recently stumbled upon this live version of GnR’s “Patience” and wanted to post it here because it’s always been an inspirational song to me.

Being an OCD-wired control freak with a knack for impatience and  endless attempts at recovery before I finally pulled it off, patience was a virtue I simply did not possess. It would be a stretch to say I’ve mastered it at this point in my life, but I at least appreciate it more than I used to.

I used to drop F-bombs to myself while driving every time I saw those bumper stickers that say things like “Easy Does It,” “One Day at a Time” and “Let Go and Let God.” Already seething in whatever traffic jam I happened to be sitting in at the time, those sayings would raise my anger level into orbit.

Years later, I understand those sayings and appreciate them in a way I never thought possible. My favorite is “Let Go and Let God,” just as the Serenity Prayer is one of my favorite prayers.

Anyway, I hope you get as much out of this song as I do:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjto02iDNZA&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

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My Personal Ground Zero

A walk past Ground Zero takes the author from the darkness to the light.

Mood music for this post: “The Engine Driver” by The Decemberists:

If ever there was a day when I could relapse my way into McDonald’s to down $40 bags of junk and wash it down with four glasses of wine, this was it.

My mood took a deep dive this afternoon. And the source was the last thing I would have expected.

In New York City to give a security presentation, I walked past the World Trade Center site on my way to the my destination nearby. Gone are the rows of lit candles and personal notes that used to line the sidewalks around this place. To the naked eye it’s just another construction site people pass by in a hurry on their way to wherever.

I was pissed off at first. It wasn’t the thought of what happened here. My emotion there is one of sadness.

No, this was anger. I was pissed that people seemed to be walking by without any thought of all the people who met their death here at the hands of terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001. It was almost as if the pictures of twisted metal, smoke and crushed bodies never existed.

I wasn’t here on that day. I was in the newsroom at The Eagle-Tribune and remember being scared to death. Not so much at the scene unfolding on the newsroom TV, but at the scene in the newsroom itself. Chaos was not unusual at The Eagle-Tribune, but this was a whole new level of madness. I can’t remember if my fear was that terrorists might fly a plane into the building we were in as their next act or if it was a fear of not being able to function amidst the chaos. It was probably some of each.

This was a huge story everywhere, but The Eagle-Tribune had a bigger stake in the coverage than most local dailies around the country because many of the victims on the planes that hit the towers were from the Merrimack Valley. There was someone from Methuen, Plaistow, N.H., Haverhill, Amesbury, Andover — all over our coverage area.

When the first World Trade Center tower collapsed on the TV screen mounted above Editor Steve Lambert’s office, he came out, stood on a desk and told everyone to collect themselves a minute, because this would be the most important story we ever covered.

Up to that point, it was. But I was so full of fear and anxiety that my ability to function was gone. I spent most of the next few days in the newsroom, but did nothing of importance. I was a shell. I stayed that way until I  left the paper in early 2004. In fact, I stayed that way for some time after that. I should note that the rest of the newsroom staff at the time did a hell of a job under very tough pressure that day. My friend Gretchen Putnam was still editor of features back then, but she and her staff helped gather the news with the same grit she would display later as metro editor.

The bigger point though is that I was in that newsroom, not in lower Manhattan. Many of the people walking by today were, and their scars are deeper.

As I started to process that fact, my mood shifted again.

I realized these people were doing something special. No matter where they were going or what they were thinking, they were moving — living — horrific memories be damned.

They were doing what we all should be doing, living each day to the full instead of cowering in fear in the corner.

Doing so honors the dead and says F-U to those who destroyed those towers and wish we would stay scared.

It reminded me of who I am and what I’ve been through. I didn’t run from the falling towers or get shot at in the mountains of Afghanistan or the streets of Baghdad. But the struggles with OCD and addiction burned scars into my insides all the same.

I was terrified when I was living my lowest lows. But somewhere along the way, I got better, healed and walked away. I exchanged my self hatred and fear for love of life I never thought possible.

It’s similar to what the survivors of Sept. 11 have gone through.

They reminded me of something important today, and while some sadness lingers, I am grateful.

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The Brenners Invade The White House

The author on returning from a journey that would have been impossible a few years ago.

It’s 5:30 a.m. and I’m running on less than four hours of sleep, so excuse any typos that follow…

I’m back in my “sunrise chair” the morning after returning from one hell of a road trip that included a private tour of the White House West Wing, a stay at buddy Alex Howard’s place and a stay with our wonderful Maryland relatives, Charron, Steve, Stevie and Maggie.

There’s a lot about the trip I’m still stunned about. I’m still in awe of the fact that I got to poke my head in the Oval Office and Cabinet Room and that I got a quick peek inside the Situation Room when a staffer was leaving the main room (the Situation Room is actually made up of several rooms).

I’m very thankful for Howard Schmidt for giving us the tour and for Alex for letting the whole family stay in his cramped but very cool townhouse on Capitol Hill.

I’m also thankful for the level of recovery I’ve achieved, because without it I never could have done the trip, especially with the whole family on an 8-hour drive down and a longer, 12-hour drive home Sunday (lots of traffic).
I’ll be honest and tell you I wasn’t perfect this trip. Friday morning we got a late start to the day and I found myself in an OCD-enhanced mood dive. It was a classic control freak out: I wanted to show Erin and the boys EVERYTHING. But with two small kids with shorter legs than their Dad, you can’t do that. And for a few hours Friday afternoon, as we walked from the Lincoln monument to the Museum of Natural History, I was in that brain-clouding mood I used to live with 24 hours a day.
But it was still a good day, and an even better night. Being in the West Wing of The White House, where every president of the last century has toiled away (some for the good, others for the not-so-good), was just magical for a history nerd like me. And I’m grateful my wife and children got to see it all.
It was a joy the next day to spend time with our Corthell cousins on the Maryland coast: Charron, Maggie, Steve and Stevie. Such a wonderful family. Charron took us to a maritime habitat that included time out on the water and inside a really cool lighthouse.
I especially enjoyed watching Maggie and Duncan bond during the boat ride.
So why wouldn’t this trip have been possible a few years ago? For starters, driving ANYWHERE outside the comfortable confines of the north-of-Boston area used to send me into panic. My fear and anxiety extended to a terror over getting lost. Even getting lost in Boston was cause for fear.
This trip, I did the whole drive down and back with none of that. I even enjoyed the journey.
I also wouldn’t have had the guts a few years ago to inquire about a White House tour. Too much work and I’d have to actually talk to someone with a big title. That would have been too intimidating.
I also would have been afraid to take the time off from work, since being a people pleaser was more important than living back then.
My 12-Step recovery program helped a lot. It kept me from wasting time and energy on binge eating and so I got to experience more from the journey. My Faith also helped, because I know now that the key to everything is to Let Go and Let God. I worked my tools, and everything was fine.
Not perfect. I feel like an idiot for taking that mood swing Friday afternoon. I also realize now more than ever that I’m addicted to computer screens. Erin decreed that we leave the laptops behind and I’m glad we did. But man was it hard to not run to a computer and upload those White House pics right after taking them. That’s something I still have to work on.
But then I knew I was still a work in progress. I always will be.
But I’m a grateful, lucky work in progress.
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Health Care Reform Won’t Bring You Sanity

The author sifts through the noise from left and right wingers over Health Care Reform and comes away with something both sides SHOULD agree on. But they probably won’t.

Mood music for this post: “Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise” by The Avett Brothers.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E22HprMQN8M&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

When President Obama signed Health Care Reform into law yesterday, some of my liberal friends  on Facebook hailed it as the Second Coming. My conservative friends cried treason.

One conservative co-worker posted from in front of the U.S. Capitol that he could still smell the stench pouring from the building.

If anyone out there is wondering what the law may or may not do for those suffering from mental illness and addiction, I have an opinion. But it has absolutely nothing to do with the fine print of the law.

All I’ll say about the law itself is that it’s not what either side thinks it is. It’ll probably do some good and cause unintended problems. That’s how it is with every law.

Is this the end of bad behavior from insurance companies?

To think so is to be naive.

Is this going to destroy everything families have spent their lives working for because of the cost, as one of my relatives suggested?

Probably not.

Those who know me will tell you I have a passion for history. It’s almost always the topic of whatever book I’m reading or documentary I’m watching. So you’d think I would have a lot to say about how this may compare to other watershed moments in legislative history and, in the end, what the consequences are for those suffering with the mental disorder I’ve lived with.

But I don’t. That’s because my own struggles have revealed a simple lesson:

Nothing the government does or does not do can help those who are out of their minds and slowly killing themselves with addictive behavior.

Government funding for more addiction treatment centers? All well and good, but if you’re locked in your crazy head you’re not going to go to one.

Making it illegal for insurers to deny coverage to someone with pre-existing conditions, including mental illness? Sounds great. But someone bent on self destruction isn’t going to be going to the doctor.  They’ll go to the emergency room when the chest pains and paranoia become too much or they’ve overdosed on something.

When it comes to this kind of affliction, I’m reminded of a line from the Avett Brother’s song “Head Full of Doubt/Life Full of Promise,” which I’ve embedded above —

When nothing is owed, deserved or expected

And you’re life doesn’t change by the man that’s elected

If your loved by someone you’re never rejected.

Decide what to be and go be it.

In the final analysis, government can’t help the sufferer. Only the sufferer can, once he or she hits bottom and decides they’ll  do anything to get well. When that feeling hits, there nothing a law can do to stop it.

Anyone who finds recovery does so because they are loved. Family, friends, fellow sufferers and ultimately God help them through the ups and downs. That support system and willingness of the sufferer to do what’s necessary is far more powerful than anything that will ever result from Health Care Reform.

Don’t get me wrong: There are a lot of medical conditions where treatment WILL be affected by this law.

But mental illness and addiction are different animals from something like heart disease or kidney failure. If you give me a brain scan my OCD isn’t like a growing tumor that’s plain to see. You’ll just see a typical-looking brain.

It’s more like a ghost that occasionally shows itself in a haunted house before vanishing from mortal eyes.

The government can’t go in and flush out the ghost with a warrant or a SWAT team.

My own mental disease was too embedded and personal for outsiders to touch.

Things only got better when I woke up one morning and decided to make a change.

It may sound outrageous to some of you. But it’s my truth.

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An OCD Diaries Primer

A collection of posts that form the back story of this blog.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:19n9s9SfnLtwPEODqk8KCT]

The Long History of OCD

An OCD Christmas. The first entry, where I give an overview of how I got to crazy and found my way to sane.

The Bad Pill Kept Me from the Good Pill. How the drug Prednisone brought me to the brink, and how Prozac was part of my salvation.

The Crazy-Ass Guy in the Newsroom. Think you have troubles at work? You should see what people who worked with me went through.

The Freak and the Redhead: A Love Story. About the wife who saved my life in many ways.

Snowpocalypse and the Fear of Loss. The author remembers a time when fear of loss would cripple his mental capacities, and explains how he got over it — mostly.

The Ego OCD Built. The author admits to having an ego that sometimes swells beyond acceptable levels and that OCD is fuel for the fire. Go ahead. Laugh at him.

Fear Factor. The author describes years of living in a cell built by fear, how he broke free and why there’s no turning back.

Prozac Winter. The author discovers that winter makes his depression worse and that there’s a purely scientific explanation — and solution.

Have Fun with Your Therapist. Mental-illness sufferers often avoid therapists because the stigma around these “shrinks” is as thick as that of the disease. The author is here to explain why you shouldn’t fear them.

The Engine. To really understand how mental illness happens, let’s compare the brain to a machine.

 

Rest Redefined. The author finds that he gets the most relaxation from the things he once feared the most.

Outing Myself. The author on why he chose to “out” himself despite what other people might think.

Why Being a People Pleaser is Dumb. The author used to try very hard to please everybody and was hurt badly in the process. Here’s how he broke free and kept his soul intact.

The Addiction and the Damage Done

The Most Uncool Addiction. In this installment, the author opens up about the binge-eating disorder he tried to hide for years — and how he managed to bring it under control.

Edge of a Relapse. The author comes dangerously close to a relapse, but lives to fight another day.

The 12 Steps of Christmas. The author reviews the 12 Steps of Recovery and takes a personal inventory.

How to Play Your Addictions Like a Piano. The author admits that when an obsessive-compulsive person puts down the addiction that’s most self-destructive, a few smaller addictions rise up to fill the void. But what happens when the money runs out?

Regulating Addictive Food: A Lesson in Futility. As an obsessive-compulsive binge eater, the author feels it’s only proper that he weigh in on the notion that regulating junk food might help. Here’s why the answer is probably not.

The Liar’s Disease. The author reveals an uncomfortable truth about addicts like himself: We tend to have trouble telling the truth.

Portable Recovery. Though addiction will follow the junkie anywhere in the world, the author has discovered that recovery is just as portable.

Revere (Experiences with Addiction, Depression and Loss During The Younger Years)

Bridge Rats and Schoolyard Bullies. The author reviews the imperfections of childhood relationships in search of all his OCD triggers. Along the way, old bullies become friends and he realizes he was pretty damn stupid back then.

Lost Brothers. How the death of an older brother shaped the Hell that arrived later.

Marley and Me. The author describes the second older brother whose death hit harder than that of the first.

The Third Brother. Remembering Peter Sugarman, another adopted brother who died too early — but not before teaching the author some important lessons about life.

Revere Revisited.

Lessons from Dad. The author has learned some surprising lessons from Dad on how to control one’s mental demons.

The Basement. A photo from the old days in Revere spark some vivid flashbacks.

Addicted to Feeling Good. To kick off Lent, the author reflects on some of his dumber quests to feel good.

The lasting Impact of Crohn’s Disease. The author has lived most of his life with Crohn’s Disease and has developed a few quirks as a result.

The Tire and the Footlocker. The author opens up an old footlocker under the stairs and finds himself back in that old Revere basement.

Child of  Metal

How Metal Saved Me. Why Heavy Metal music became a critical OCD coping tool.

Insanity to Recovery in 8 Songs or Less. The author shares some videos that together make a bitchin’ soundtrack for those who wrestle with mental illness and addiction. The first four cover the darkness. The next four cover the light.

Rockit Records Revisited. The author has mentioned Metal music as one of his most important coping tools for OCD and related disorders. Here’s a look at the year he got one of the best therapy sessions ever, simply by working in a cramped little record store.

Metal to Stick in Your Mental Microwave.

Man of God

The Better Angels of My Nature. Why I let Christ in my life.

The Rat in the Church Pew. The author has written much about his Faith as a key to overcoming mental illness. But as this post illustrates, he still has a long way to go in his spiritual development.

Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely. The author goes to Church and comes away with a strange feeling.

Running from Sin, Running With Scissors. The author writes an open letter to the RCIA Class of 2010 about Faith as a journey, not a destination. He warns that addiction, rage and other bad behavior won’t disappear the second water is dropped over their heads.

Forgiveness is a Bitch. Seeking and giving forgiveness is essential for someone in recovery. But it’s often seen as a green light for more abuse.

Pain in the Lent. The author gives a progress report on the Lenten sacrifices. It aint pretty.


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The Politics of OCD Management

The author finds an unlikely tool for OCD management in politics. Specifically, watching liberal and conservative friends fight over the subject.

This isn’t a post about the politics of having OCD and getting folks at home and work to accept it. It’s about enjoyment of the political debate as a tool for sanity.

Sound odd? Well, it is. But hear me out:

I have a lot of friends who are bleeding-heart liberals. I have just as many friends who might qualify as nut-job conservatives. The common thread between them is that they are wonderful, caring people who work hard and cherish their children’s future. Their beliefs are based on what they think is right, not on selfish impulses.

I get into heated discussions with them all the time. And it’s very, very good for me. I get to focus on issues bigger than my own petty concerns. When my political beliefs are challenged, it’s great exercise for the mind.

I’m getting a lot of this kind of exercise of late, because a heated campaign is under way to fill the seat of the late Edward Kennedy.

I live in the bluest of states, and yet the Republican candidate, Scott Brown, is surging in the polls. Chances are better than average that the Democrat, Mass. Attorney General Martha Coakley, is going to lose.

She’s run an unbelievably inept campaign and it would serve her right. In fact, I’ve been undecided on who to vote for because of her. I like Brown as a person, but think his record as a state senator is overblown. I also believe the Democrats deserve more time to make their agenda work, because the Republican agenda of the last decade didn’t work out so well. That doesn’t mean I wholeheartedly embrace the Democrat agenda. I am a pro-life Catholic, after all. But I embrace the old saying of Franklin Roosevelt that what we need is action and bold experimentation. If an idea fails admit it frankly and try another.

If the Democrats fail, I’ll try another by voting for the other guy in the next election. But I’m not there yet.

On the other hand, Coakley offends my Catholic sensibilities, and that includes her handling of the priest sexual abuse crisis. As a district attorney for Middlesex County, she didn’t go nearly far enough in going after the abuse.

Who will I vote for? I’m not saying, because I don’t have to. And I can still change my mind between now and tomorrow’s election.

I consider myself a centrist. I believe the checks and balances built into the U.S. Constitution were meant to keep our policies and laws on the middle road instead of the extremes to the left and right.

I like my leaders to be pragmatic and act on reason — not ideological fever.

I vote for Democrats and Republicans, based on who I see as the strongest leader for all seasons, not just the season when their political party has the House-Senate majority. I’m a history buff with a fondness for Teddy Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan as well as Franklin Roosevelt and Bill Clinton.

I have a saying: If you’re a liberal, conservatives can’t tell you anything. If you’re a conservative, liberals can’t tell you anything. If you’re a moderate, you can’t talk to either people. I think that when you delve too far to the left or the right, you’re on walking on the lunatic fringe.

So I tend to say things to get a political argument started between friends and family. Then I get out of the way and watch them go at it.

By listening to both sides, I get that mental exercise I crave.

Some of my best friends are right wingers. I love my father-in-law dearly, but find his brand of conservatism misguided. Some of my best friends are also liberal to the core and see Republican conspiracy everywhere. It’s fun to watch. My wife is far more liberal than I am at this point, though she’s one of the more sensible liberals :-).

The other thing I like to point out is that mental illness is a bipartisan thing. The pain strikes Democrats and Republicans. Faith is also bipartisan, though a lot of priests and ultra-conservatives will tell you otherwise.

So while we all have our disagreements, we are truly all in this together.

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6 Guys I Look To In Times of Trouble

This is the perfect time to write about why I’m such a history nut. I’m in a rotten mood because my office technology is on the blink, keeping me from getting things done.

People with OCD don’t just shrug off such things. We zero in on the problem like the proverbial laser beam, trying anything and everything to fix the problem until, exhausted and bewildered, we realize what we knew in the first place — that some things are beyond our control no matter how much we’d like to make it so.

Now that I’ve found my bearings and poured another cup of coffee, I’m ready to sit back and let the IT professionals do their thing.

What does all this have to do with history? Plenty.

Yesterday I wrote about all the pictures and statues of historical figures I have scattered across my desks at home and in the office. Today is about why these people are important to me.

Bottom line: The historical figures I revere all had to overcome disease, mental illness and personal tragedy through the course of their lives. I look up to them because they dealt with challenges greater than anything I will probably come across in my own lifetime. And they achieved what they achieved despite crippling personal setbacks.

I’ll stick with six examples, though there are many more:

Teddy Roosevelt was a sick kid who wasn’t expected to live a very long life. He had serious asthma and other ailments. His first wife died giving birth to his first child the same day his mother died in the same house. Yet he went on to fame as the Rough Rider and President of the United States. He wrote countless books throughout his life, went on a danger-filled journey to South America to map The River of Doubt after he was president and already in declining health.

FDR was a pampered child whose world view changed when he was crippled by polio in 1921. A lot of people would have given up right there, but he rebuilt his life, became a mentor to other polio victims and was the longest-serving president in history, dealing with war and economic calamity that could have broken the spirit of healthier leaders. Through it all, he carried on an outward cheeriness that put people at ease.

Abraham Lincoln has been covered at length in this blog. He suffered crippling depression his whole life and lost two of his four children, all in a time before anti-depressants were around.

JFK had plenty of flaws. But he achieved much for a guy who spent most of his life in bad health. He suffered searing back pain, intestinal ailments, frequent fever and he had to see two siblings die and another institutionalized before his own death.

Winston Churchill held his nation together and led it to victory over the Nazis despite a lifetime of suffering from crippling depression, which he often called his Black Dog. He also spent every waking moment in a constant buzz and smoked long cigars that I’ve tried but couldn’t handle.

Now for the most important example of all:

As mentioned before, I’m a convert to the Catholic Faith and would be nowhere today without it. Jesus appears sixth because I wanted to save the best for last.

The picture above speaks volumes to me. Here was a man who went through suffering of the most brutal kind. And he did it to give me and everyone else a second chance.

I don’t dare put myself in the same light as these individuals. I relate to what some of them went through in their lives, though, and here’s the point:

When work isn’t going the way I want or I’m going through an episode of depression or other compulsive behaviors, I can look up to the people tacked to my workspace walls and be reminded that my troubles are nothing compared to what the REALLY BIG ACHIEVERS went through.

And when my ego blows its banks, the sixth fellow on the list is there to take me down a few pegs and remind me of where I fit in the larger order of things.