How to Survive and Succeed When Life Wants You to Fail
Lessons from years and years of bad luck and emergencies
My life has been, to put it bluntly, pretty crappy the past few years. There have been a lot of good things, sure — I got a new job that is the best one I’ve ever had, I got married — but by and large, it’s been a waterfall of bad luck, some of it self-inflicted.
It started about three and a half years ago, in the fall of 2016. My soon-to-be mother-in-law came to me with a problem: her house had been sold in a tax auction due to unpaid property taxes, and we had less than a year to come up with three years of taxes plus fees and interest or she’d lose the house.
I, being a person who likes to help people, immediately volunteered to save her house. I scraped together my savings and borrowed from my 401(k) to get the money, and we saved the house. We set about planning how to recoup my investment and came up with a few good ideas.
Then my cat Darby got sick and died. He was only about two years old, so it was unexpected and hurt a lot. He was one of three brothers that came to my wife and me not long after we bought our house and was our first cat together, so it stung. I cried for the first time in decades after he died.
During this time, I had been composing and editing two emails to my father and sister to bring up some issues I had with them. Having gotten through the process, I sent them off not long after Darby died. I had intended to open a line of dialogue with both of them. They both reacted poorly.
With my father, in particular, we had a massive blow-up. Instead of opening a dialogue, we shut down communications until after Thanksgiving. It was my first year away from my family holidays.
The house situation started degrading, and we decided to sell it to recoup most of my losses and get her into a better, more affordable living arrangement. We started that process in December. In January, we found out that there were several liens on the property that we weren’t aware of, and that I would, in effect, sacrifice the money I put into the thing, to the tune of about $15,000 all told.
During this time, I had a tense makeup with my father, and we even saw each other for Christmas a little. It was…less than ideal, and I wasn’t thrilled with it. When we found out that I would be losing my money in the house situation, we told my mother about it. They hadn’t known about the whole situation, so we were looking for moral support.
Instead, I got scolded for, in their view, getting scammed out of so much money by an ungrateful future in-law. Whatever relationship we were reconstructing fell apart, and I stopped talking to them temporarily to get a grasp of the house situation.
We sold the house, and there was exactly enough money for my future mother-in-law to get a new place while leaving me nothing. We moved her in, and she’s been there ever since. I paid for the movers and spent a day ferrying stuff between the old and new houses. My wife and I were a physical and emotional wreck.
After settling that, I eventually reconnected with my parents. I met with my mother to try and reconcile and failed. After asking for a break in communication and an apology, I got a sternly-worded letter from my father that I took to mean that I had been disowned. I severed all remaining ties with my family, save for the occasional text with my mother, and haven’t seen them since.
That was the worst of my issues, and it has colored the past several years in many ways. We have had many emergencies pop up, seemingly every time we get back on our feet. I needed some expensive dental work that put us back $3,500. My wife almost died on a float trip accident that necessitated some medical bills.
We had various cat, car, and house emergencies that drained our finances and energy. Now, we’re dealing with a pandemic.
Every time something seemed to let up, something else would appear. We couldn’t seem to catch our breath at any point. Weekends stopped being restful, and vacations barely dented my stress levels. Our savings were being drained and it didn’t feel like there was anything to be done about it.
My wife pointed out this spring that it seemed like my winter mood has been ruined the past few years. Every year, when October rolls around, my mood declines and I start acting depressed and erratic. The best we can figure is that it’s a mix of seasonal depression and reliving a terrible time from 2016.
And yet, we’ve kept on going. Through depression, suicidal urges, financial emergencies, and near-death experiences, we’ve somehow managed to survive.
Looking back, it’s a bit strange that we’ve made it so far.
So, with the benefit of hindsight, I’d like to share some lessons I’ve learned from more than three years of tragedy, depression, and sometimes downright misery.
Take care of yourself.
I talk about self-care a lot, and that’s part of this equation, so I won’t beat that drum too much. But taking care of yourself is more than just doing basic self-care. That’s an important aspect, sure — doing hobbies and things that bring you joy are key parts of taking care of yourself, but they’re not the only parts.
Do your best to eat well and exercise, at least as much as you can. Try to find inexpensive, healthful meals that are tasty and easy to prepare. Go out on a walk around the block now and then. If you can’t do it every day, do it as much as you can manage. You’re not a failure if you can’t do it every day, or even most days. If you feel like you’re eating like crap, start taking a multivitamin. If you can’t do 30 minutes of exercise every day, do ten. Whatever you can manage.
Try to cut back on harmful coping mechanisms. If you smoke, try to smoke less. Don’t consume too much caffeine if you can avoid it. Replace one coping mechanism with another. There is a treatment method called Harm Reduction, which is just what it sounds like. Sometimes that means replacing more harmful drugs with less harmful ones. If you can replace a cocaine habit with cigarettes, that’s a form of harm reduction, even though smoking is still bad. Do what you can to reduce the harmful things in your life.
Build your support network. Figure out who in your life you can talk to and lean on, and talk to them. Let your significant other know what you need from them, and let them tell you what they need from you. Be there for each other as much as you can.
Take care of yourself in as many ways as possible in whatever way works the best at the time. It’s more than bubble baths and Netflix.
Seek professional help.
Everyone bashes on therapy and meds, but they’ve both saved my life quite a lot. I literally wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for my medication and at least one or two of my past therapists.
Go to therapy and talk about your problems. Don’t be afraid of a therapist because of popular media. They are here to help you, and they won’t judge you. Also, don’t be afraid to find a new therapist if your current one isn’t working for you. It’s like finding a partner — not everyone goes together.
Go to a psychiatrist and get prescribed meds if you need them. Stigma is a bitch, but so is killing yourself in your 30s, and I’ll take stigma over that. My meds keep me stable enough to function in everyday life, and without them, I’d likely be depressed and suicidal a lot. It’s not a failure if you take psychiatric meds any more than it’s a failing for a diabetic to take insulin.
Therapists and psychiatrists are there to help you with your mental health. Take advantage of them.
Put things in perspective.
That’s not to say that you should compare your life to others. Some people have it harder than others, and looking at someone else and saying “they’ve got it so much harder than me, I shouldn’t be depressed” does a disservice to both of you. Hard is hard. Someone else’s suffering doesn’t diminish your own.
Instead, compare yourself to yourself. I was feeling pretty down this past winter like the world was out to get me and everything was terrible. Then a very good friend reminded me that a few years ago, things were ten times worse since my family relationship was falling apart and I was $15,000 in the hole. That made me feel a bit better about things.
You have survived 100% of your worst days up to this point, and unless you’ve lived a charmed life, you’ve likely been in just as bad or worse a spot than you are in now.
If you can get through that, you can get through this.
Hopefully, you will make it to the end of whatever your crisis is and come out stronger for it. Even if you’re like me and have experienced multiple years of crap, it will come to an end eventually.
Life is unpredictable. Sometimes it goes your way, sometimes it doesn’t. When it doesn’t, and particularly when it really doesn’t, remember that you are strong and you can get through this. With the benefit of self-care, professional help, and a little perspective, you can survive whatever life throws at you.
