This is my friend Tyler.
I had met Tyler in high school. He was a year behind me. For the brief time we were in the same building, I was a witness to his being on the receiving end of quite a bit of bullying due to his openly flamboyant and jovial nature. Tyler was one hundred percent larger than life.
Sadly, Tyler passed on Sunday, July 17, 2017, after being admitted to the hospital, unresponsive, the previous evening.
Almost no death at that age is from natural causes, and every indication seems his would reinforce that statistic. His family is asking for privacy at this time, so that's all I will say about it.
This guy I didn't know personally, but his age and star status struck me:
‘True Blood’ Star Nelsan Ellis Dies at 39
Nelson Ellis was three months younger than me, and one day older than Tyler. The cause was complications from heart failure. His family has issued a statement attributing the heart failure to complications of longtime alcohol and drug abuse.
Points from my family health history:
Biological grandmother on my father's side either died from ovarian cancer, or alcoholism. Varying stories from different sources. I don't know her name, and my bio dad won't tell me, so I don't know what's real.
Biological grandfather on my father's side died from "malnutrition" in Montana in the 90s. Likely alcoholism. I never knew the man.
Biological grandfather died from skin cancer. Six weeks (?) after it was discovered. I was fifteen.
Biological grandmother on my mother's side died during surgery for long-term treatment of various issues related to a brain aneurysm a few years previous. I was 29.
Multiple stories from relatives say alcohol was a negative factor in my grandparent's (on my mother's side) household.
Mother and a couple of Aunts test positive and treated, successfully at this point, for skin cancer. The youngest sister died in 2014 after a long battle with multiple types of cancer.
Adoptive Aunt from mother's second husband dies after several types of cancer and treatments when I was ten.
Adoptive Grandmother (her mother) dies the next year from Leukemia.
Adoptive father is an alcoholic. I still don't know how that man is alive.
Biological father, from all we can tell, is an alcoholic. I have no idea where he is and haven't received and email since last Christmas Season. For all I know he did what he said and moved to Belize.
Stepfather is currently in rehab for drug addition. I've said he also needs to be treated for narcissism, megalomania, and just being an asshole. Although I'm not sure that last one is curable. I'm glad he's getting help. I hope from here he will just leave us alone and move on with his life, leaving us to move on with ours.
My mother only talks superficially about what's ailing her. I'm not sure what she's actually been diagnosed with, but she's been in the hospital multiple times for mental and physical issues. She still smokes, as far as I know. And she's quit drinking, as far as she says. She's never admitted to me, or any of my siblings, whether she considers herself to have a drinking problem.
The first time I ever drank, the February of my senior year of high school, I successfully got crawling on the floor drunk at a friend's house when her parents were away. I had four beers. After that initial exposure, I don't recall drinking again until the summer after high school graduation. But I was off and running when I did.
As almost everyone knows, drinking is part of the culture of Wisconsin. Any who says it's not is lying. Every holiday, every birthday, every weekend, every night for some, alcohol is available (almost) everywhere. And it's cheap. The summer after I graduated high school I would have parties at my house. While my dad was home. We would get a $7 case of Kingsbury beer and just around and drink and shoot the shit. SEVEN DOLLARS. THE WHOLE CASE. And you could return the bottles for a teensy bottle return refund, which OF COURSE we would turn around and put into another case. We would rage in the living room until after midnight most of the time. Friends would ask, where's your dad?
Upstairs, drunk, passed out, I would say.
These past 21 years, alcohol has been my go to. Happy, sad, birthdays, weekends, bad traffic. All of it. I almost missed the first performance of my first professional acting gig because my roommate came home after a long trip and we partied too hard. I had to be picked up by from my house by my company manager who was none too happy. And neither were my castmates. After that embarrassing incident, I was basically the first person at the door of the tour van every morning after. I learn my lessons. I rarely repeat errors. I just make new ones. Different ones.
But its been about the past four years or so that I've started practicing quite a bit of self-analysis.
I've gone to counseling at the Chicago Women's Health Center (thanks, sliding scale healthcare), and have relied on Groupons for alternative treatments like massage and acupuncture. I've now made an active effort to have them be a part of my health regimen they've been so helpful. And I've found if you're upfront about your budget, you'll find the right people will work with you. They are healers, after all. The good ones.
And for the past couple of months I've really made an effort to start the yoga thing. Even though I've said I never would. "Too passive," I said. But I discovered this routine I really like that's just 30 minutes. It's meditative. And it's the privacy of my own bedroom, so I don't have to be around people. And it FORCES me to just stop for 30 minutes. JUST. STOP. Sold.
But also for the past several years I've thought about the role alcohol has played (and continues to play) in my life.
After my bike accident in 2015 (I'll get to that story another time), and the family history, and now all these recent events, the Universe just seem to be telling me to slow down. Take a break. You're moving to fast, kid. And I've been listening. And contemplating hitting the sober rode for a bit. If not for, well, ever. If I'm totally being honest with you, in the whole of my adult life, outside of my pregnancy, the longest break from alcohol I can remember taking was two weeks. Lord knows my body would be probably be thankful for the next 21 years without it.
So where as for quite a few years I just didn't think about it (willfully ignorant or otherwise), I've started MAKING the effort to think about it. How has alcohol affected me in the past? How has it affected my family and people I love? How has it impacted my adult life? Is it a crutch? Is it holding me back, dragging me down, an anchor on my heels? And while I would like to say it hasn't, what about those hangovers? What about hiding those feelings and emotions and hurt with a glass of wine? Or two? Or honestly the whole bottle? Or vodka. Or whiskey. Or whatever.
I don't have a rock bottom story. There isn't one.
But that doesn't mean I'm not risking my health with my behavior. On top of regular alcohol consumption (and way too much past binging consumption), there's also been the ten years of smoking (thankfully quit that), and regularly eating fast food since I was a kid. Thankfully, I'm trying to finally stop doing that as well. And I quit soda many years back. But my mind still races with the possible lasting damage.
So then the other part of this equation is that I'm not really good at going to the doctor. Outside of my accident, I haven't had any blood work in years. I haven't had a yearly physical in thirteen, maybe? The other one (I say that for the sensitive people) in three. Did you look at that list up there? I walk into a doctor's office and start sweating. I have actually sweat through the paper they put over the patient table (chair? whatever they call it?). In my family, in my head, going into the doctor's office is a bonafide death sentence. I think I've honestly developed iatrophobia (the fear of doctors, but you probably already knew that). Just another thing I have to work on. And I promise you, it's on my list. I hope to get up the courage to do the full gammit in the next month or so. Take whatever it is that's coming. I have to. If I'm going to fully make the changes I want to make.
About a year ago, I received a text from someone very important to me. 8:54am. "You busy?" Due to the nature of my relationship with this person, the time of day, and the message itself, I knew it was something serious. I stepped outside my day job office and made the call.
My person slowly started to tell me that they had been sober from alcohol for about two months. And the reason they had been so was because if they hadn't stopped, they were going to die. No ifs, or buts, about it. They had to quit drinking or not see 50. Actual words from their doctor. We spoke for about an hour of the ins and outs of what they had to go through and suffice it to say I don't need to repeat it, but it was horrifying. It shook me. It's still not very far from my thoughts on any given day.
They've had to go through lots of medical tests, and will have to go through them for the rest of their life. But from what I know, and what they've said, it's a small price to pay.
And thankfully, with the support of good people and a new lease on life, this person is sober to this day.
For all of this, and for taking control of my own health, I officially and thoughtfully stopped drinking on 7.7.17 with no plans to continue.
That's an official heads up.