DJ Ellis
English 112
Autobiographical Essay
Final Draft
The Monster
Test
yourself.. can you think back to a time in which you were so angry that you
physically harmed someone else or even yourself, for that matter? I can. Now think
about it.. what’s your deepest, darkest, and coldest secret? Would you tell? If
you would’ve asked me three years ago I would’ve said, “hell no.” But if you
were to ask me today, my answer is way different.
Battle
with your demons and face your fears. Run into them with a full head of steam
at full speed; all while daring to challenge yourself to find out whom the real
YOU is. I battled my own demons and always set out to never let them define who
I truly was. Write your own destiny and define yourself as what you want to be
remembered as.
I always knew I
was an angry kid, short tempered and hot headed, but never would I have thought
I was violent until my seventh grade year of middle school. Ryan Shiel decided
he wanted to get tough, maybe try to pick on me and call me names; I snapped. I
hit him so many times to the point where I blacked out and had to be pulled off
of his motionless body. I remember coming back into a state of almost
realization and seeing his bloodied face and what they thought was a broken
nose. I thought to myself, “I couldn’t have caused this?” If you ask some
people.. I’m sure they’d say this is when The Monster was formed. The Monster
that lived inside me and could be turned on just as easily as you’d turn on the
lights. That Monster followed me to high school, slept with me in my dreams,
and stared back at me every time I looked in mirror. Who was I? What have I
become? Those were constant questions that ran wild in my head and as much I
wanted to push them far out of my mental, I couldn’t. The anger was
inevitable.. inescapable. It lurked inside of me waiting for any little thing to
set it off.
As I got older and
finally touched down in high school, I formulated ways to calm The Monster. I
felt like a lion tamer to my own inner person, my own brain. “Keep cool
Monster! It’s never that serious.” was the only thing I found myself saying
inside of my head and sure enough, for the time being, it worked. Everything
was fine until The Monster decided to turn his back on me and betray me. This
anger turned towards self-anger and self-hate and seeing as I had just truly
started playing competitive team sports, the self-anger and self-hate worsened.
I hated failure but I loved to compete. Competing against others was fun and
all, and I was seen as dominant athletic force in Connecticut; but the daily
competition that took place inside my head was unexplainable. The angry
thoughts that The Monster had set free in my head began to resonate and turn to
the thought of self-harm. The Monster was fascinated by it.. He loved it. At
this point in time I was viewed as one of the nicest kids in school; no one
would have ever suspected that Good Ol, Athletic Deej wanted to die…. Or should
I say, no one would have ever suspected that The Monster wanted us to die? You
see, The Monster and I were two completely different people. The Monster was
fixated and infatuated with the thought of violence, more-so of the self-harm
nature and absolutely hated the real me. While I, my true self, was in love
with sports, my family, my friends, and the idea of being a normal teenager.
For some reason, The Monster’s thoughts and my own just didn’t quite coagulate.
People said they
understood and felt for my struggle, but I’m a firm believer in the fact that
you cannot understand or feel anyone’s struggle until you have walked a mile in
their shoes. For this exact reason I hated the idea of therapy and counseling.
The more I went to therapy and was diagnosed by someone who didn’t hate
themselves or had never felt an ounce of my pain and struggle, the more The
Monster took over and began to triumph from the inside out. The thoughts of
suicide became more vivid and more realistic; it was my fixation and my fucked
up fascination that played throughout my head over and over and over. It was
almost as if in my brain I had a single track CD on repeat.. only this track
was a blade maneuvering its way through skin and finding the main vein that
could put this struggle to a quiet end.
The monster finally won. I tried
to kill myself. I cut. I cut deep. I bled. I bled a lot. I was taken to a
hospital and questioned like no other. They checked me into the psych ward like
I was insane. I was dangerous and a threat, not to anyone else because I was
more than cooperative, but only dangerous and threat to myself. The question
finally hit me.. “Was I insane?” Shit, I might’ve been. I talked to myself,
well, I talked to The Monster; and to those white jacketed doctors they
insisted I had schizophrenia. This was the prognosis until I sat them all down
and handed the reins over to The Monster. He smooth talked our way out of the
psych ward a couple of days later. He told them everything they wanted to hear
just because he wanted to stay my little secret concealed away and only let out
in privacy, making me literally crazy in my own head. He convinced them I was
normal and far too bright and to in depth with reality to be schizophrenic. Some
tests were run and the actual prognosis was that I was suffering from clinical
depression, chronic anger disorder, chronic temper control disorder, and just
to top it all off like you would a chocolate sundae with a cherry; for shits
and giggles, they added a slight case clinical anxiety.
All of my
disorders led to therapy and you already know how I to this day feel about
therapy. After the therapy came medication. When I had the monster completely
tucked away, I was the most fun and outgoing kid.. completely normal. I had this
secret and I was extremely good at hiding it, but The Monster finally fought
its way out. I swear I had no intentions of letting The Monster be known, but
he had grown tired of being my little secret.
As much as I hated
the medication, it was a stronger kryptonite to The Monster than I ever could
have been; so without my 80 milligram Prozacs, which is the highest dosage
prescribed to a patient, who knows where I’d be today. When I had The Monster
tucked away as my own little secret, if you asked me where I’d be in 2014, I’d
tell you all the aspirations and goals that I had fooled everyone into thinking
I had. But if you asked me the same question when The Monster was let out to
run wild, I’d answer in a short-mannered, simple, one-word answer.. “Dead.” I’d
answer this question showing absolutely no feeling, emotion, or remorse. But I
promise if you looked closely and deep enough into my eyes, you’d see not my
own eyes but the eyes of The Monster staring back at you with fear, sorrow,
hope, and hate all at the same time. The only reason I can tell you what The
Monster’s eyes were like is because whenever I took a look in the mirror, a
smiling happy Deej isn’t what I’d see. I’d see eyes that were elaborated with
so much pain and hate. I’d see eyes that fed and thrived off of my weaknesses.
I’d see eyes that became filled with joy when my normal eyes were filled with
self-hatred and sorrow. I’d see eyes dark enough and strong enough to pierce
into anyone and send chills down their spine.
I guess it all
makes sense now. Everyday someone would tell me that my actions and attitude
were affecting others around me and I just couldn’t quite seem to understand.
But those piercing eyes were only the beginning; my actions started to change
once The Monster was released and would break down those who cared for me
slowly but surely. After I tried to kill myself, I finally decided it was time
to face my fears. I stopped taking my medication one year after I attempted to
commit suicide and decided it was time to face The Monster head on; to be my
OWN, more powerful kryptonite to this dreaded Monster. I felt that I no longer
needed my medication and three years later the doctor’s feel so too.
That suicidal,
dangerous, threat of a teenage is no more. I’m no longer on medication, and no
longer feel the need to harm myself. I can honestly say that what I went
through in my life was a bittersweet struggle. I recall saying it was
bittersweet around someone and they gave me the upmost craziest death stare
ever.. they were in utter disbelief. They just could not understand how having
been diagnosed as almost psychotic and schizophrenic came back to be something
that I’m proud of. Well it is.
I’m happily alive
and able to say that without this struggle I would not know how much I truly
can endure as a human being. I’ve broken bones, had multiple surgeries, and
even went through the windshield of car; but no physical pain will ever compare
to the pain of hating yourself and the pain of having a mental breakdown. No
pain will ever amount to the pain in having to put on a charade every day in
public just to hide The Monster that lurked within. No obstacle in life will
ever be harder than what The Monster had put me through in the four years I
spent in high school. I can truthfully say that this struggle and what felt
like a never ending battle with The Monster made me; it shaped the man that
I’ve become today.
Because of my
struggle and what it has taught me, as ironic as it may be, I plan on taking my
story and my struggle into a career of mental therapy. I plan on being a psycho
therapist, working with teens that in short, hate themselves or find themselves
dealing with their own demons or Monster within. Think about it.. who better to
talk to than someone who has once been trapped in solitary confinement in their
own mind? Who better to talk to than someone who has danced with the devil? And
who better to talk to than someone who can teach you the things necessary to
become your OWN kryptonite to The Monster.
