The Rocky Road to Relationship

I only had one woman in my life. She is my rock, the one who stands by me in every bad thing that has happened in my life. Sometimes I feel sorry that she married me, the same goes with my child. Fortunately, I only have one child and she will be living her own life in a couple of years.

My wife on the other hand, will be with me I hope, until death parts us. I feel sorry for her for sticking with me in spite of my shortcomings, my imbalanced mind, and my short fuse. I can admit that she is the only one who loved, loves and as she stated will love me forever. What she sees in me is beyond me, yes I love her and have no intentions of loving anyone else. But still, it is amazing how people stay together and take the rocky road to married life.

I Believe in God - I Endured My Past

I lived and grew up in a dysfunctional family caused by a controlling and abusive father. I never saw my father drink nor gamble (I actually never saw him much at home when i was younger), but he is a womanizer and he never hid his relationships with other women, even when we were already grown up. I have not seen him physically hurt my mother either (come to think of it, I never asked my mother to this day). But the emotional scar he caused my mother made her a weak person with low self-esteem.

We the children, bore the physical and verbal abuse he spared my mother. As in most culture in the early years, hitting or spanking is a part of disciplining a child. However, there is a clear  distinction between abuse and discipline.When you spank a child old enough to understand why he/she is being punished and you explained his/her mistake afterwards, I can take that as a form of discipline But when a child is too young to understand and you hit the child with any object you can get your hands on and on any part of the body, that is clearly abuse.

The physical pain quickly became tolerable and later not even make me cry.But the verbal abuses and insults left a mark that I endured for years. On the other hand, the things my sisters endured from him were far worst and unforgivable. It is during this time that I turned away from God. For years I did not go to church or even utter his name in prayers.

My parents have separated eventually and my father had a new family. Unfortunately, he has not changed and he still tries to control us all. But being a most headstrong son, I am the only one who stayed away from him. I have not spoken to him for years and I cannot help myself for not blaming him for all he did to us.

I love my mother and wanted her to stay with me but she chose to live with my other two siblings who live close together. Unfortunately, one of them took advantage of my mother's kindness and took all her money. This issue caused a major rift between me and my two siblings but I cannot do anything about it because my mother felt she owed them by staying with them.

I renewed my faith in God. I have outgrown the pain and moved on to have a family of my own. I have learned from my past and never find the necessity to hit my child and yet she grew up to be a good person. I faced a lot of trials and tribulations. But with God's blessings, I persevered and led a good and prosperous life with my wife and child.

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I Believe in God - The Father, the Almighty

Funny how a lot of people believe there is a supreme being who control our destiny, although we have not seen Him/Her.

There may be some people who are atheists or non-believers, not that there's anything wrong with that. But, if you do not believe, who can you blame when your life and everything around you seem to go from bad to worse? You cannot always blame yourself or other people, it would be insane.

Which reminded me of  my Sociology professor back in college years ago. She said that "God is the biggest wastebasket. When you can't blame anyone else or there is no one else to turn to, you put all the blame and everything wrong that go on in your life to God. And for those who are non-believers, you can see them call on God when they are about to die or in a serious situation."

As for me, I am not the most religious person but I do believe in God, although there was a time in my life when I completely turned away from life itself. My faith in God keeps me hoping for better times when times become rough and difficult to handle.

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The Happy Pill - What Causes Depression

As was explained too me by my doctor, depression is due to lack of neurotransmitters in the brain. These neurotransmitters are basically chemicals that regulate or help in the regulation of one's mood.

Depression can be caused and/or triggered by different factors, including genetics, life events, medications, etc.

Incidentally, Naproxen (a certain NSAID) caused my daughter to feel depressed to the point of contemplating suicide. We were not aware of it and she just told us about how she felt back then after a while, upon reading about the side effects of that drug.

Mine was triggered by different events all occurring one after another, life events, medication, surgery. Not to mention the genetic part about having a screwed up father, the physical and verbal abuses I have experienced from him and my childhood. It's amazing how some things from our past catches up on us as we get older.

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The Happy Pill - Depression

Before I knew about it as a medical disease, I thought of depression as a mental illness caused by one's weakness to face negative events. A total surrender to life's problems. This used to be my opinion, because my life was rich with experiences of miseries and hopelessness and yet I persevered. I triumphed over life's obstacles because of positive thinking and the hunger to leave my past behind and perhaps a little prayer helped.

However, "depression" is not just sadness or being in despair. Depression is a medical condition that lingers and if untreated or misdiagnosed, affects not only oneself but others around you, especially your loved ones.

As far as I can remember, I have been struggling to find happiness all my life. Memories of childhood, school, and events were all sad brought about by my environment, poverty, lack of guidance, and a screwed up father. Yet, my experiences helped me in turning my life around and provide for a better, comfortable life for my family.

Then a recent series of life events faced me like a ton of brick wall: a major surgery (with it's side effects and cost), impending job loss, a very ill parent I cannot help, my wife's dying parent, a child entering college, and people needing our financial help. The thought of all these and losing everything I worked hard for in just one moment caused me to feel desperate, suicidal, antagonistic and guilty at the same time. For months, I made life a living hell for me and my family, until my wife pleaded me to seek professional help.

I was mad and would not accept defeat from "depression". It just can't be, I have a strong will and has been proven by how I was able to turn my life around in the face of adversity. However at the back of my mind, I knew I needed help, if only to save my family from myself. I gave in to my wife's please and then the counselor sent me to my Physician for proper medication. As my doctor explains, depression hurts the ones you love the most and then you feel the guilt afterwards. And it hit me. I broke down crying incessantly for the pain I caused my family.

It's been over two months since and I thank God for my having a good wife and daughter who tried to understand me in my time of despair. I know I'd probably be dead now if I did not seek help. The only thing that prevented me from killing myself is the burden that it will bring to my family even long after I am gone.

"Suicide is definitely not a cure, it is a permanent solution to a temporary problem."

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The Happy Pill - What's in a name?

I was looking for a good title to this blog and thought of the above title, but variant of this title are already taken. And having the above as my blog title, will limit me to writing only about a single aspect of my life story.

I cannot focus on one thing for a long time, and reading a long story is no different. So for people with attention deficit like me, I will write with the above title in different sections.

Based on the title, the reader may have different ideas on what this topic is all about. Mood-altering drug perhaps, or a metaphor to suggest other meaning. Basically, "happy pill" was coined by my daughter, referring to a prescription medication that alters one's state of emotion brought about by depression.

Please feel free to share your thoughts and thanks for visiting.

What to write?

The topics of my stories will be in no specific order, depending on my mood, and whichever comes to mind.

My wish is to write stories that aim to relate to yours.

Please feel free to share your thoughts and thanks for visiting.