Depression, Addiction, and Forgiveness

Hi! It's Emily. You may already know that I like to write short stories, mostly fantastical fiction or memories. This is a story/memory that I’ve hesitated to post on my short stories Instagram account (@love.outlaw.stories) simply because it is very close to home and I cannot ever feel like it is done.

I know many of us have dealt with depression and/or addiction of family or friends. Depression had almost ruined my marriage, and is still a looming weight, probably always will be, on my relationship with my husband. Before I was married, before I moved out and then into college, it was my little brother.

I really have no idea if this is some kind of universal story or not.  I know the abuse and trauma of alcoholism can be so much more damaging and so I would never pretend to believe I know what anyone else has experienced. Johnny was an ADD kid so I do believe much of his depression was caused by medication and that led him to alcohol. There are so many anecdotes they wouldn’t fit in one story; these are simply two that run vivid for me.

There is something that changes in you when you are holding life in your  hands. I imagined that this only happened the moment you held your first child, maybe? I believe this happened for me when I found Johnny on the bathroom floor after forcing my way in, picking the lock with a bobby pin. He was unconscious, crumpled in a heap. It had been a year since he “graduated” from outpatient rehabilitation.

I was twenty years old. It was around two o’clock in the morning, and I couldn’t bear to wake up Momma and Daddy. I always knew. Knew he smelled odd, knew he was drunk, high, depressed. Knew if I didn't know he could die and it would all be my fault for not knowing. My parents were in textbook denial.

I checked his pulse and put my hand over his mouth and nose to make sure he was not dead. I pushed on his shoulder and called out “Johnny”, I used my foot to wiggle his hip. “JOHNNY”. He gave a slight groan. I slapped him in the face and leaned into his ear, and with a short, sharp burst, “JOHNNY!”. Another groan and his hand raised and flopped to the ground.

He weighed about 180 pounds then. Working out and bulking up in the pickling room seemed to be the only thing that kept him sober. Luckily, I was a dancer with strong legs too. I squatted down and dug my shoulder into his armpit. After some wobbling and adjusting, I drug him from the bathroom to his room next door.

I had to jump to get high enough for his weight to help me push him onto the bed. I laid him on his side the best I could. I spread a towel on the floor next to him just in case, but knew his liver was so taxed that he probably wouldn’t be lucky enough to throw up any of the poison.
I laid in bed wide awake all night, debating whether or not to call an ambulance, getting up every half hour to check in on his soaked with sweat body. He slept until the next evening. He did not remember. Does not remember, as far as I know.

Three years later it was his twenty-first birthday. My fiancé's band manager by coincidence was marrying a Baton Rouge girl that night, and my parents took an impulsive 60 mile drive to Lake Pontchartrain to sunset sail with friends.

When we got back from the wedding, we discovered that Johnny had decided to have a drink for every year he had been alive. This decision inspired a drunken boxing match.

It wasn’t the glove but the concrete jumping up to punch him in the head. Fifteen drunken twenty year olds teamed up to carry him into the house. “He’s fine. See, he’s walking.” they said as I followed behind his shoes dragging across the carport. “Someone call 911!” I said, scrambling behind. My heart was pounding.

They brought him into his room and laid him on the bed. He wasn’t moving or talking. “Call 911!” I said to his friend. He slurred “He’s fine, and you’ll get in trouble if the cops come because you are old.” I was scared to leave him but ran to the kitchen anyway and called 911. I told everyone to "get the fuck out of the room". I slapped his busted face hoping to stir him.  He was breathing. As long as he kept breathing.

The EMTs came in and started examining. Johnny suddenly came to and the paramedics had to hold him down in the bed. He no doubt had a concussion that triggered his defense mechanism, and he was pissed.  His eyes were blank with booze and shock. They brought in a gurney and wheeled him out. I got in he truck with him. En route one of the technicians checked his Blood Alcohol Content. It was more than double that of the legal limit.

I was scared. It was all on me. Again. But it was also a relief to be going to the hospital. That someone else could help me. I was not alone anymore, for now.  I was looking at him, watching his face to see if he was still conscious. His eyes caught mine and he stared for a minute, then said, “I hate you so much.”

The next day he hardly spoke to me. He would not look me in the eyes. I knew he was angry with me because I forced the situation to turn the corner into a mirrored hallway. I was the hands always catching, but I was in turn always the hands pushing his gaze onto his faults and weaknesses. I hated myself for that, too.

I had gone to get a coffee and when I returned my parents stepped out. “He wants to tell you something.”  I went in, eyes lowered. I finally raised them to his, and he started crying, blubbering out an apology, hardly able to use consonants his chest was convulsing so strongly.

He explained that the concussion had made him feel so strange and angry. He barely remembered anything from that night but he remembered very clearly feeling and saying he hated me. But he did not hate me at all. And he was grateful I had done the right thing.

I wish that was the end of these kinds of stories. It’s not. There’s always another boxing match. Depression and addiction are always. I do not feel like there is resolve in apologies anymore. They are absolutely important but they do not make a story full circle.

I’m curious what your take is on this, on apologies and forgiveness, on how you are able to nurture relationships that are laced with depression and addiction?