I didn’t think it would be this hard. Accepting the diagnosis of *permanently disabled* The fact is, that I have a brain injury. An invisible injury that no one but myself knows about unless we strike up a conversation. What’s the hardest part? The depression. The untreatable with medication depression. The PTSD and the pains haunt me. When I see another woman my age, so beautiful and fit, so full of energy and life, sometimes I’m hit with grief. Why is that you might ask? The days for me lately have been divided out and measured by how much, or how little energy I have that morning waking up. If my body is screaming at me or being kind to me. It all depends. I proudly carry the badge of a domestic violence survivor, but inside my invisible bruises smother my light as the depression tries to take over. My Dr told me that I was beautifully broken. My heart and my brain agree. I just want to be free from the sadness. It feels impossible. Be “mindful” they say. As the tears pour down my face. I hold on for dear life these days riding the waves. Learning to live myself again, and nurturing my invisible bruises. 🩶

Dear Self,

As I look back into my past actions, I realize that there were things that I should have changed. It’s interesting how so many authors, politicians, philosophers have written about ‘the past’ in relation to our present selves, but we continue to belabor the point. McCarthy states in All the Pretty Horses, that “Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real.” Without this reminder, we won’t learn the lessons that the past has taught us, but rather repeat them mindlessly as if we don’t know any better. As I recall my worst mistake, I realize today, that it could have been circumvented by simply communicating clearly. However, if you’re like me, and the problem is within the family, you omit speaking in order to be respectful and not hurt the feelings of those you love.
I’ve also learned, that when you speak your mind and express yourself concisely, you get the result you need: understanding. Without talking, how can others know how you’re feeling, or even how you’re affected by a particular event? Added to that, by discussing the problem, calmly, you get to see the different perspectives that each individual is coming from, rather than assuming you already know. I’ve learned that assuming someone’s motives for an action may be wrong, and that is what leads to greater misunderstandings and conflict.
I think that Katherine Anne Porter says it best, as she expresses it best in saying: “The past is never where you think you left it.” By that she means that with the information, maturity you had at the time, you can grasp a part of the events that occurred. However, in retrospect, having changed, become wiser through various experiences, makes your perspective of the event change with time. Here I don’t mean the actions that took place, but rather the reactions and assumptions that you had made.
I’ll sum up with my poetic version of this:

Communication is a tool
You use to oppress the pool
Of depression, that spawns from regret
Over actions taken in past event.

Couch your speech,
Make it into a delicate flower to preach
Behaviors that promote, compassion,
Understanding, love, and devotion.

Best,
Your wiser self

©️ Malak kalmoni chehab ©️

I could say I’ve known you forever, but that wouldn’t seem quite right. I guess I’ve known you for as long as I can remember. But even then, I’ve only known you partially. You’ve revealed yourself in different ways over the years and given me new reasons to love you. You’ve made days worth it. You find meaning in the little things and you know how to dress up a dollar. You go out of your way to make things inclusive and memorable. Most of all, you keep trying when you feel like you have no clue what you’re doing or where you are going.

We lose contact every once in a while. Sometimes I think I’ll never be with you again. It’s not like I lost your phone number, or you moved far away. It’s just sometimes I forget you’re there. I forget how to access you. In the past, I’d retreat further and further away before I remembered you exist and how to make contact. But now, I know to reach out a little sooner. You always know what to do and how to make things better.

There’s really no difference between me and you. The separation happens when I compare parts. I look at you as the “healthy version of me” but I should just be seeing me when I’m healthy. Rather than thinking of you as the “me” that I love, I’ll just love me. I’ve learned it’s a lot easier and more genuine to love when you aren’t doing it in parts. So, one day soon, I’ll just love me. After all, “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

I’ve been where you are. I’ve always been a bit of a perfectionist myself. I don’t think that’s all bad as we are called to excellence. However, it can make life kind of stressful. Your need for perfection can then spiral into overthinking every little move you make, criticizing yourself for things outside of your control, and shame that is totally unnecessary. You look in the mirror to find that your own worst enemy is staring back at you. You worry that if you make one mistake that people will see you as incapable and incompetent. You’ll show them you can do it all. Until you can’t. Suddenly you feel yourself teetering on the tightrope about to plummet to the ground. This was me before the pandemic started. I believed the lie that this rat race world feeds us that we must stay busy, we must produce results. So I took on added responsibility thinking I could juggle it all and also what was going on in my personal life. But really I was on the edge of burnout. My mental health was not good. My work was suffering. I was exhausted. To make matters worse my boss talked to me about my performance without asking what was going on in my personal life that was making it that way. She seemed to see my poor performance as a character flaw rather than the fact that a check engine light was on, and I desperately needed help. Deeply distressed and beating myself up for my mistakes I ended up with a fender bender. Luckily no one was hurt, but inside I was really hurting.

In 2020 the pandemic forced everything to a screeching halt. I went to my parents, house with no idea of how long I was going to be there. My parents and I were all working at home under one roof. The extra family time was a much needed blessing. My schedule usually filled to the brim with things to do was completely open for the first time in a long time. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I ended up doing a lot of thinking and realized that I don’t need to do everything. I am human, I make mistakes and I’m going to continue to. When I do make a mistake I can choose how I respond. I can choose to respond with grace and self-compassion. I don’t have to spiral, I don’t have to walk the tight rope. A mistake doesn’t automatically mean falling. I started to prioritize more and suddenly I was worrying less and less about what others thought about my mistakes and taking the opportunity to let my mistakes teach me a lesson.

Sweetheart I know you want to move mountains and you will. But spiraling won’t get you there. Beating yourself up won’t make you stronger, instead it will tear you down more. You need to learn to rest. You need to learn that your mistakes don’t define you. Learn to embrace your humanity. Learn to love yourself the way that you would love a friend. You are worthy of love. You are worthy of self-forgiveness. You are worthy to live a life that includes mistakes because if you haven’t noticed everyone else is too. When you learn these things you’ll be freer, happier, healthier, and holier. If you don’t hear anything else in this letter hear this; unlike St. Paul, you can’t be everything to everybody, but instead of being your own biggest enemy, you can learn to look in the mirror and embrace yourself in grace and self-compassion.

With love,

Fidgeting and nausea must be a natural state for you. Movement seems to disperse a bit of that nervous energy, but the feeling of your stomach turning is enough to make your mind go blank. I spent most of my life stuck in this mode, chalking it up to a hyperactive personality and a sensitive stomach. But looking closer at my life, I could see the mismatch that was provoking all of this movement. My body was telling me to go somewhere and all I was letting it do was twiddle thumbs and do internal somersaults. I needed to move, but not just physically, I needed to move into my body and start listening to what it was telling me.

I’ll never forget the beginning of my therapy journey when I explained my visceral anxiety and the advice I was given was “You need to breathe.” Breathe? I’m always breathing. How could I be breathing any better? I came back the next week to tell her “This breathing thing isn’t making a difference; I need something else.” She laughed at me and said, “That’s all I got for you.” So, I kept breathing. Deeper, longer, more fully, more expansive, more peacefully. And now when I start to squirm or my stomach starts to turn, I can take a deep breath and get clear about what I am feeling.

I know it feels like trying to stop a freight train with your bare hands when the nervousness gears up, but the more often you recognize that chugging and start to pump the brakes, the more often you won’t have to compare your feelings to four-ton vehicles going 50 mph. Also, the more often you get to be present in moments and make conscious decisions. Breath is a place of peace as much as power. And life is so much better when you take a deep breath.

Dear Me,

Thank you for taking the time to sit with yourself and process your thoughts and feelings. This year, you really took yourself & your ideas seriously. Your perseverance through rejection is admirable and I appreciate you, even when others don’t.

When you lost your job in January- you didn’t beat yourself up.

When the bank funds were low- you leaned on your family for support while pushing through to find a new job.

When you felt broke, busted, and disgusted- you sought wisdom in books, the Bible, and your family.

You manifested cool opportunities & got creative with the tools at your disposal.

To me, you may not be exactly where you want to be, however, you’ve come farther than you expected. You could’ve chosen to listen to well- meaning advice, but you listened to your gut & for that I respect you!

Thank you for being you- which is the hardest thing to do.

Love you for life,

Me (V) 🧡

“It is my duty, as an air rescueman, to save life and aid the injured. I will be prepared at all times to perform my assigned duties quickly and efficiently, placing these duties before personal desires and comforts. These things I do THAT OTHERS MAY LIVE.”

This is the code of Air Force Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR), my profession, and a sentiment that reflects much of my life. From 6 years of volunteer firefighting and EMS, to my 12 years in the USAF as a Combat Systems Officer (CSO) on HC-130’s the CSAR version of the C-130 cargo plane. I have spent my entire adult life even starting in High School training and preparing in hopes that I can prevent someone’s worst day from becoming their last. I have been blessed with the opportunity to do this a few times as well, and it is a level or rewarding bested only by being a husband and father. My life is dedicated to helping others, but sometimes, I need help.

I was always able to deal with the traumatic experiences my work has put me through by leaning on friends who understand. This is often the first line of help one can get and it is VITAL even if not always sufficient. Whether it was my first dead body, or seeing an unconscious classmates broken face wedged between the dash and windshield of her car 2 days after graduation, my many close calls, or losing a close friend; I could always find help and relief in the arms and ears of my friends and family. They gave me the strength and support to ensure post traumatic stress never became PTSD. But that doesn’t mean it was easy. All of these events gave me nightmares; sometimes for a night, sometimes for a week, occasionally for a month. There would be sadness, depression, anxiety. But all of this would fade with time and help.

But what about when that wasn’t enough? For the last 4-5 years I have been struggling with bouts of depression and anxiety. Nothing new, except that it was not tied to anything. I couldn’t get past it because I didn’t have a trauma, life event, or anything else I could associate it with and thus, could not worth through the cause.

In the early days I just shrugged it off, pushed through and got on with life. But the episodes were getting worse, and more frequent. After years of this I was sick and tired, I needed help. After all, being a good husband and father are my top priorities, and this was degrading that ability…

But… I’m a military aviator…

Now, no doubt some of you think you know where this is going. After all, you have seen movies about military aviation, aviators are macho, tough, so surely there is a stigma with getting help! No, actually there isn’t, in fact we share our feelings with each other pretty regularly. No, I was scared I would be grounded from flying and bound to a desk either temporarily or permanently. But enough was enough.

With the encouragement of my wife, I made an appointment with the aviation psychiatrist at my unit. He reassured me that grounding was unlikely and only even a possibility if I was diagnosed with a mental illness. Ok, so now I am less worried!

So I opened up about how I was feeling with the psychiatrist. He gave me some great techniques for dealing with the depression and anxiety such as mindfulness and grounding that have been helping. I have follow up appointments to keep working on this and life is already getting better

Emboldened by that experience, at my annual flight physical with the flight surgeon the next week, I discussed the issue with her as well. She asked some questions about other aspects of my health and determined we should check my red blood count and vitamin D levels. My RBC was in normal limits but low considering I live at 5500ft above sea level and do a lot of running and mountain biking. Probably not contributing to the issue but worth addressing. We also checked my iron which is good so I am now on a B complex supplement. But the real concern was my vitamin D, it was severely low. I never would have thought of it as I spend a ton of time outside. But one of the symptoms is mood swings and depression (hmmm… sounds familiar). So now I am on a high dose vitamin D supplement.

After 5 years of suffering and worrying I would lose my flight status, my fear was unfounded, and what I needed was vitamin D and professional counseling. My only regret is that I didn’t seek help sooner.

Please, if you are struggling, even if it is something you have handled without issue before, reach out. Talk to a friend or loved one. If that doesn’t work, or is insufficient, seek professional help. Please don’t suffer in silence. I am still flying, still doing my job, but I am now also a happier and healthier person on the road to further improvement. And most of all, I am able to be the best husband and father I can be.

Thanks for reading,
SEZ