My story: Battling Depression

Speaker 1: 0:41

I want to welcome you to another Brevis Talk, as we pull the lid off of mental illness and mental health in the church. We're going to talk about it. It may be uncomfortable, some may be in denial about it and some may have never heard these things, but we are going to talk about it. I'll tell you, if you're a pastor, that I would go on record as saying you've probably got more people in your church that struggle with depression than you realize. You may have 10% or 10% plus who are on medications and fighting depression. It's the taboo topic. We can't talk about it in the church, or at least we don't talk about it. It's not going away. I believe that you should put light in dark places. Someone who said that light is the best antiseptic, and it certainly is, and so let's talk about it and let's help one another and let's get some victory over some of these things that are holding us down and keeping us from being all we can be in Jesus and for Jesus. I want to give you a preface before this talk. I'm not going to follow the advice of one of my seminary professors. I was having some problems one time and reached out to who I believed to be a very wise man about my emotions. I was having crying spells that I could not control. Everyone had left after class. When I approached him and asked for help and I teared up telling him a quick version of what I was going through. I remember his response to me very, very well, as if it were just yesterday. It was very curt and he simply said something to this effect If you show weakness in the ministry, your career will be over. Show weakness and tell your church about this. And he turned and he walked away, and that was it. At that time in my life I was going to seminary evening classes once a week. I was a Bible occasional pastor and had a full time job. Stress, yes, but everyone has stress. My sleep had gotten all messed up. I wasn't consistent in my sleep and when I got sleep it was not what I would call restful sleep and I was starting to get sick. I guess the immune system gets down if you aren't resting, and so I was getting ill more and more often and going back and forth to the doctor several times, but things were okay. They weren't dark days. I have a wonderful wife, two precious children. A daughter at that time was six years of age and son less than a year old. And then one day I went back to the doctor and when he came in I started crying, uncontrollable, sad crying. And he was so kind to me and he asked several questions. I was a bit embarrassed that I didn't have control of my emotions that day. Nothing like this had ever happened to me. I have been around mourning people and God has given me strength to help people who are hurting and where you just lead a memorial service, and those situations to me would be the time that you would cry, when I had no control over my emotions in those days and I cried, and I cried and I cried and I would think this is silly. I do not know why I am crying. I didn't feel good, I didn't feel motivated, I didn't want to be around anyone. I simply got things done that day that were required of me and that's how I got through the day. And yes, the doctor said you're suffering from depression. My question was how? In a very informative and a kind manner I can't say too often or too much here what a kind manner my doctor had. He explained to me a lot about depression that I did not know. And he said I want to put you on a couple of medications One's going to help you with your sleep and the other is going to help you with depression. Now, they may not work to their full capacity until about four to six weeks, but we're going to have to stick this out. And it's sort of like he and I had a. He had made a compact with me, a covenant if you will, and he just like he and it was that's what he said we he kept saying, we are going to find this and we are going to get victory over this. Well, I remember that first medication he gave me. I had nausea that came out of nowhere, not a nausea that I've ever experienced before or since. It was horrible. I called his office. He said to very promptly cease taking that medication and gave me another medication. It didn't go so well either. I would take that medication and about 30 minutes later I would begin to violently vomiting. Of course, it's a great medication that's used quite often now, but it when, the early days when it came out, they didn't know that you need to take it with food. As a matter of fact, you don't take it without food, and so people take it today and they have that knowledge. They didn't have to take it with food and that takes care of the vomiting. Didn't know that, took a third medication and I mostly did OK. From that point my sleep got better and I will say that the antidepressants are not a cure all for most people's depression. They are one tool in the toolbox. I mostly did OK from that point. My sleep got better and I will say now that antidepressants are not a cure all for most people's depression. They are one tool in the toolbox in which to fight depression. Some individuals will say they feel 50 or maybe 75% better. That is going in the right direction, but please don't take a think that appeal is going to carry you to 100% and perhaps put your depression into what the professionals call remission, because you may have to have a second medication to join that first one is they fight together and we'll talk about this later and later episodes talk therapy. I cannot I cannot state how important it is to be able to spill to someone who's not going to judge you, who is going to love you and they're going to listen to you. They're not going to cut you off every two minutes and preach to you but they're going to listen to you and they're going to let you spill everything out and folks, if you'll do that and you have that kind of person in your life, you, they may not have the answers, they may not really be good and have a lot of wisdom and counseling, but I promise you, if they are a confidant and what you have told them stays between you and them and God, you will be helped by simply talking about it. So I cannot understate the power in talk therapy. I call it talk therapy. The professionals will say no, it's counseling, but it's, it's talk therapy and some use that interchangeably fast forward a few years in my life. I came upon a horrific scene in the community that I was pastoring in. An elderly couple had missed a scheduled lunch meeting with some of their friends. No one could reach them by telephone and I was called and I was asked to go check on them. That was February, the 22nd 1996, a few minutes past eight o'clock. You say well, how do you remember that friend? You can't forget that evening. I wish I could. It is etched in my mind and it will be there for the rest of my life. I know that it will. They lived a few miles from me and it was again. It was past eight o'clock, winter month, dark, dark evening, and the house was just lit up. Every light in the house was on and that didn't make a bit of sense to me. These were people raising the depression. They were very frugal people with their money and they would not light up their house just to have it lit up. They. They went into a room, they would turn a lot on, but they're not going to light that house up like that. Something was just off. It was wrong. So I went down to a neighbor's house. It was also a church member and a great guy. He and his wife, friends to this day and I'm not in their community anymore, their church, but they're just wonderful people. And I asked for a flashlight and this gentleman volunteered to go with me and I felt guilt ever since because he would see that terrible scene too, that scene that you can't unsee. We drove back into the driveway and it was my headlight or it was my headlight shown. There were many little sparkles. It looked like you pulled the stars out of heaven and just sprinkled them. If they were small enough to sprinkle them across the driveway, just light is the headlights would hit it Very bizarre. Well, we got out of the vehicle with our flashlight and it was quite obvious it was a glass and as we walked a little further we found a pair of eyeglasses, the frames and some of the glass and one of the lenses was broken. Looked down and we saw this black, dark, circular blotches. It looked like someone who had been painting and it had fallen off their brush. That's what it looked like to me and it was tried the dark coloration. And so we followed it. He went to one side of it, I went to one side, we didn't step in it. And then when we came to the storage, to the storage room, there's a door there with a window and it looked like that same coloration of whatever that paint was. Something was drugged through it. It had been spilled on the threshold and something had been drugged through it and it just went under the door. Kind of a huge smear, if you will. We took the flashlight and we looked down into that window and our eyes, they just couldn't take in what we saw. I know it was seems like forever, but it was milliseconds to take it in and I suppose get into shock. But they were our friends, they had been brutally murdered, this precious elderly couple, 69 years of age and 74, they were laying in unusual positions, not positions someone would lie down and have sleep, and there was this dark coloration everywhere. I would go and testify three years later at a trial and the perpetrator, the criminal who did this and I would use the word in my testimony. I remember this so well, being questioned and I said I think that's what a massacre looks like. It wasn't taking someone's life, it was. It was terrible, it was a massacre. Well, it wasn't a dream and I couldn't get rid of it. These precious, kind, salt of the earth people. It was surreal and they were gone. A few days later. We had a double funeral ceremony, memorial and honored their lives that were well lived, and then the lack of sleep kicked in again and I quit sleeping. My sleep got worse and something new to enter my life that I had never. I didn't know what it was. I didn't know what you call it, but I would almost say it was worse than oppression. It's a term that's used. It's anxiety. I found out later that quite often anxiety and depression are like conjoined twins. It's rare when you find one and you don't have the other. I didn't have anxiety when I was being treated for depression, but I definitely was struggling with anxiety at this point. I had bad dreams. I had a little bit of sleep, I had little sleep and the little sleep was interrupted. Sleep you go to bed at 9.30, 10 o'clock ona average evening and you just lay there. You don't sleep. You finally go to sleep. You look at the clock it's after midnight and somewhere in there you dozed off and you look back at the clock and it says you know 120, 130 and maybe you doze off again and you get back up and you are a zombie the next day. You feel like, as far as your mind goes and your body, you're walking through mud. You just you're going through the motions, you're doing the best you can but you're not getting rest. That went on for years, even with all the things that they threw at me medications. It went on for a long, long time. The doctor gave me a medication for anxiety and it worked. It helped. I took it once a day in the morning. Then I doubled up on the dosage. Doctor's order is not something I did. I doubled on the dosage and had another medication and I slept and I was so grateful for the sleep. Well, I ran out of that medication and I got a refill and I thought, okay, we found something here, this is going to work and I'm going to be able to get on with living and be in a husband, be in a daddy, be in a preacher and all those things. Then I ran out of that. That month later there were no refills and I called and they wouldn't give me a refill. They said that medication is a medication that can be addictive and we don't want you to be on it that long. I thought, wow, you rewarded my life and we finally found an answer, and now you're taking it away from me. I look back and I see the wisdom of that, but I didn't then. I did not, I just didn't see it. And so I went back to my interrupted sleep patterns and you know, things were just not so good. You remember the days when the cell phone came in. Not too long after the double homicide, the cell phones were coming in. I got a cell phone. It had just so many minutes a month and then after 9 pm you got unlimited numbers. Well, we didn't use it very often. Very, very scarcely did we use it. I also, at that time, continue to carry a pager, and so we didn't use the phone. My little daughter called me one day and she still, you know, really young, and she had some news buzzing in the community that there had been a very, very bad wreck and that someone had been hurt, someone had died and several people had been hurt. So she had called me that day and so I was not too far from it. So I ran to the or drove to the scene and the emergency vehicle had just gotten there before me and they were working with two of the boys that were in this accident and people were pulling over in their vehicles and parents had come up. They heard about these children, the ages of these children. They were in a panic, hoping it wasn't their child. And then I saw it. It was a body near the shoulder of the road. Blood was under this body, a lot of blood was under this body and no one was tending to this person. And I walked to this body and it was obvious that the young man was deceased and people were rushing in and coming in. The crowd was getting bigger and they were pushing in a little closer and one of the emergency men told me. He said get back. And I said, yes, sir, yes sir, I will, I'm going to, but please cover him up. Please cover this little boy up, his family, nobody should be gawking at his body. And they did, and I appreciate that Small community. A few days later, this family did not have a church home and so I was called upon to lead a memorial service for this young man. And he was a good kid, they were all good kids, the family was deceased for a good people. They just were not regular church attenders. We got through that service and young people as they do and things like that, they see and feel and experience something very new to them and it's called the reality of death. Let me say something here at this point Pray for first responders, law enforcement, ambulance workers, fire department personnel. You see, once you see something, it's impossible to unsee it. A few weeks after this terrible accident, an elderly neighbor friend was raking leaves in the yard. He saw me as I drove by and he grand and gave a hearty wave. Just a beautiful man, a beautiful person, sweet, spirited guy. As I was coming back I had gone to check on some shut-ins in a nearby city and as I came back, hours so later, there were cars everywhere, law enforcement and I saw some of the funeral home personnel and I pulled over and I said what's going on? They told me that my sweet elderly neighbor, within a Short-short time span and I could even narrow it down more because I remember when he was waving at me had taken his life. He'd shot himself. And I told him no, that's, that's got to be wrong. He was, he was waving at me earlier he's a very happy guy and then later the story would unfold that He'd gotten out to do some activity in his yard, just to get out of the house. He had been suffering depression For a number of days. Every year at the same time the anniversary of his son's death his son was killed in an automobile accident this man's mood would dip, it would just go into a valley. And so I guess, as I was driving by because he knew that that was the man, I knew he saw me and we had a friendship he believed he loved me, I loved him. And so he's waving at me because that's what he does. He's grinning at me because that's what he does around me, and it was a facade. I found out later this poor, poor man was dying inside and no one knew about it. No one saw this and it was terrible. I Can tell you a little bit about my own person. I Am a sensitive person. Now there may be some or a lot of tough guy persona and and I say things that I'm you know I'm not gonna do, but I may try to play the tough guy, but I really Am not that. I am a very Sensitive person and I wish I were not so sensitive, because you feel everything. If someone's hurting, you feel it. You know, of course, if someone's rejoicing, you feel that too. I Guess, of the four temperaments that were espoused by the Greek philosopher Hippocrates Maybe you learned that in school sanguine, caloric, phlegmatic and melancholy. I am a melancholy person, a mella, a melancholic person. I'm a thinker, I'm sensitive, I try to analyze things and I, I, I'm one of those people. I'll confess it. I overthink, that's just what I do. I Can't turn that off. This person a melancholy it sounds like I'm saying this, but that person is more susceptible to depression. It doesn't mean they're depressed. Some, some people are melancholy and they don't have, they don't suffer from depression any time in their life and Then there's some that are depressed, some, and there's some that are depressed a great great deal. But you add life events and you mix them together and it makes you even more susceptible to depression if you walk through certain events. There are those who are in total denial that strong, dedicated Christians Will be depressed or live with these struggles. I have known people far more godly than me, far more committed to me than me, greater people in prayer, greater people in God's word, and they struggle with depression. Many people quote in the church, the evangelical church, quote what's the gentleman that's called the prince of preachers, charles hadn't Spurgeon, and his volumes, his writings are read and reread and printed and printed and reprinted. Even all these years after his death, hundred plus years, charles hadn't Spurgeon suffered from a deep, deep, dark Depression and God used him alongside that, and God can and God will. God is wonderful, god is powerful, he is magnificent. I don't know why he didn't just take the depression, but he doesn't, and I suppose there's something there, a mechanism of learning there and humbling us along the way. But there is some depression. It's definitely not of God and it is. It is part of the, the enemy's plan of John 10 and that is to steal, kill and destroy and it is absolutely not of God. Biology has a place in our understanding, tendencies and directions that some of us are bent toward. My dad was very young when he passed away, was 38 years of age as I look back and it's been a long time, but I Knowledge I have today and I look back. I believe his personality If it were measured today, he would be a melancholic person. Any person can be depressed, but again I say that melancholic are more likely than others to become depressed. Often the most unexplainable and most difficult part of depression to comprehend is that things can be going great, no worries, no heartache, no trouble, and yet a person is depressed. There's a biological bend toward depression. That's probably not as much of your mind having problems as it is your body. Most people would define hypertension and diabetes as problems that overweight people struggle with. That. They might even say those are all weight related problems. No, they're not. I've known some extremely thin people who are treated for hypertension and diabetes. I Was a pastor to a man that never weighed more than 135 pounds and his blood pressure would soar to over 200 Without medication. That is a biological problem and there's there may or may not be an observable, explainable reason behind it. Sleep over the years is still been okay and just okay. I wouldn't use another word. Beyond that, I've mostly slept for short periods of time. A good night sleep for me, wow. Four hours sometimes is a good night sleep. Sometimes I can go three days in a row and then I can. I will sleep for maybe about eight hours, and it just still fluctuates. I finally went to a doctor who treated people for sleep, and he told me a lot of stuff. None of it worked. I did learn that I was low of vitamin D, and so to this day I do take vitamin D, so I guess I got something out of that. Well, fast forward several more years and I have had a few health challenges. One of those were migraine headaches, and the doctor said he wanted to take a look at all my meds, and so he was concerned about possible interactions with medication. You know meds help us, but no one has studied what do these meds do when they get together. Some meds do not play well with other meds. So he sent me to this psych doctor a lady psych doctor who was considered very, very good at seeing the overall picture of medication and that's what she was supposed to do. Just look at my medications. And I went to her three times. Each time she ran into the room she asked questions and anytime her phone rang or her text went off she answered it. That was unreal to me and just I thought that was very unprofessional and rude. And she would where were we? And then we would say a little bit and the phone would ring. She would answer it again and I thought I don't need to be here. I don't like paying someone like this to do nothing Incredible thing. About the migraine headaches I was having them for three, three times a week on average. Absolutely could count on three times a week At one point and we tried medication and you know, up until the time I started getting migraine headaches, I always thought if someone went to bed because they had a headache, that they were weak. We call them sissies in the South, the Southern part of the United States, that's what we call them. But that was until I found until a migraine found me actually unbelievable pain. My vision sometimes would get blurry for just a moment. It would cause nausea and vomiting and this went on for years. I went through trying to find out if caffeine was causing it, if it was a trigger, if it was chocolate or something else was triggering this. And then one day I noticed I'm not having any headaches. I don't know why they left, but now, several five plus years at least I'll have maybe one migraine headache a year. It's just absolutely incredible. I do not know why. I give God the credit, and his ways are above our ways. His thoughts are higher than our thoughts and there's no figuring that out. What I do. I give him praise and I'm very, very grateful that I don't have them and I'm very, very sensitive to those who have them and I don't judge them. In my heart they're not weak and they're not sissies. Well, I come to a place in this story that I wish I didn't have to talk about and it's troubling indeed. It's very, very bad, bad time in our lives or my family. It was a beautiful day in December. I'd gone to the nearby city where our son Tyler lived. He was four days away from turning 26 years old. He seemed to be doing okay in his life, he had a job and he was living in an apartment with a friend. He was my good friend, in a bright light in his mom's heart. I joke that he loved me, but he really loved his mom. That wasn't true. He loved his parents. He loved his big sister. He loved his brother-in-law, and his nephews and niece owned him. When he came around he was like a tree that they climbed on. He got on the floor and wrestled with them and was totally theirs when he was with them. Tyler was a sensitive kid he always was. If someone was hurting around him then he hurt too. They could walk in the room and if they were hurting he picked up on it. But I tell you, when he walked in the room, quite often he could light up a room. He had a hearty laugh and a contagious joy. Very enjoyable to be around, a quick-witted jokester. But behind that facade of a very happy kid was a very depressed young man. He was small, very small. During his childhood, the cruel taunting arrows that kids will sometimes hurl at each other often stuck in his heart. We as parents would try to tell him to ignore and stay away from those people and those kinds of people and all those other things that parents say. Somewhere sometime while he was in college, someone offered him an opioid, a pain med, and said this will make you feel better. And it did. It made him feel better and he became addicted to these powerful drugs and he said that when he took them he didn't feel sad, he didn't worry. Things that bothered him didn't bother him as much. But, unbeknownst to him and us, the evil talons of opioids dig deep into a person and are extremely difficult to pull out. We had no idea that he had a problem Totally naive, I guess you could say. He had recently started treatment for depression. He was going to a medical doctor for depression. He was in a doctor's office where he just broke down crying the depression. The medications were not working. He confessed everything in his life, his sorrow, his desire to end his life, to the doctor's nurse. Of course, the doctor came in and he talked and we received a phone call that day, as he was crying uncontrollably, we moved from that location to another location. Not sure how we got there that day, just nice people opening doors trying to help us. He was immediately able to speak with a counselor that we were really impressed with, a very, very good communicator, after calming Tyler down and assuring us that we worked through these things and we have to work hard and do these things and really encouraging us. We found out that this particular counselor that was his last week at that job and he would be leaving. Well, tyler came home with us. We watched him like a hawk. He went through some withdrawal symptoms from the opioids. It was terrible, terrible. The sweats, the itching, chills, hypertension, blood pressure rises as you're getting this poison out of your body. I kept an eagle eye on that blood pressure. I was told to watch it and I did. One of the first nights he was basically up all night and seemed to want his mom to be around him. She got no sleep that night because of all the changes. That night he was miserable. Things got better after about 48 hours with no opioids. We continued to watch him like a hawk, though A few weeks into that, on a Sunday, he went to church with us that morning and our church is the greatest. There's so much love in this place. It's just the hearts of people. It's just a welcoming, loving, kind place. I'm so blessed to be not only the pastor but a member. If I were not the pastor, I can see myself being there because I love these people so much and it's giving back. That evening he did not feel good that afternoon. We left him alone and we went to church. That evening. While home he called his opioid seller For a very hefty price. The seller drove 25 miles one way, drove him to an ATM, got him in his car to get the money and sold him one pill at an extremely high price. I forget what it was. When we got home, his mother who has a keen sense of when things are off with her babies knew something was amiss. He told her the whole story. She told me and we were as angry as we've ever been in our lives. We were frustrated at Tyler. We scolded him. We told him of our displeasure. There's just so much wrong with this. I made the phone call. Tyler gave me the phone he didn't have an option and Showed me the number of this punk and, without going into details, I simply called this Little punk peddler on the car on the phone. I got him on the phone. He saw it was Tyler's phone, so he answered it and I told him if you ever step foot on my property, you will cease to exist on this planet. I need to know that. You understand what I just said. And he said yes, I understand. I said well, all bargaining is off if you ever step on my property again and I think you're a horrible person and I'm gonna pray for you because you certainly need prayer. I made it very clear and I was so angry and I was frustrated at Tyler for calling him and we told him if you feel that You're gonna do something you don't need to do, you need to get in touch with us. We'll drop everything. And he didn't. And so that's what happened there. A Couple of weeks later, we ended up in the emergency room. My head, my son, was having strong thoughts of suicide. We didn't know what to do and if anyone wants to and entertain the thought of where is prayer in this story, I Can tell you that if prayer were footprints, then this whole story was stepped all over. We pleaded, our son pleaded, close friends pleaded for him. We were there at that hospital for hours. A social worker came in and the social worker was on the phone all that evening Looking for a door, looking for a bed, rather a place where he could go inpatient for in-house treatment, and I remember had no interest in it. Normally I would. The Super Bowl was on that night Falcons and the Patriots and I would look up and you know it's. It's something about when your life has changed and you see so much go before your face that some of the things that Maybe are a little bit important, they don't mean anything. Our sweet daughter came to the hospital she's the other, she in and Tyler's life and she was so concerned and step and we stepped out and they visited. They loved each other dearly, deeply, and God help a person if they had ever harmed her little brother, loved Sister. After several hours we were asked to leave, unbeknown to us that it would be hours, way up into the evening before they found a bed. The place was four hours from us. We were not able to speak with Tyler for 24 hours and the first time we were able to visit Soon as my wife got off work actually she, she left early. We made the four hours and we spoke with him. We visited with him and and it was so good just to hug him and we all cried, just cried. I Went down a few days later and I Would go down a few days later and visit with Tyler. He begged me to get him out and it was a scary place. I've been going into maximum security prisons, including Death row, in several states for decades, and I felt much more secure in those settings than this. While I was visiting, there were two very unstable and violent patients walking around and behind us Tyler told me about the fights he had seen while there. They brought one of his meals while he was visiting and the portions were unbelievably small. He said all the meals are like this. He said please get me out of this place. Well, he spent some time there and Again, medications were adjusted, fine-tuned. One thing was taken, something was added to it, and while he was in this facility, we were working on getting him to another place. A drug rehab ministry Closer to home called fresh start. A Place opened up and Tyler was able to go into it and they have strict protocol and rules. One of them, if I'm remembering this correctly, was no contact for the first week, and I did better than mama bear on that one. She had to see her baby. He went through this nine month program and Gave everything he had in being successful, I suppose, other than being a good, good person and selfless and a college graduate and going through this program. Those are the things that made me the most proud. And he worked. He really worked. The leadership of this ministry said he's, he's excelling faster than anyone we've seen. He's taking initiative, he's helping other people, and he was all in and that's what he would say. And he he was. We would visit on Saturdays, we would come down, they would allow us a few hours. We'd sit busy, would bring supplies, food, bottle, water, those things, and would bring him a hot meal, hamburg or something like that, and he was so happy. He was a lot happier to see us than the eat the food, but he certainly ate the food also they. He told me while he was in that program that people even there Sneak drugs in their family, will come visit, their friends will come visit and they'll bring them drugs. I don't know what they were thinking, because they are drug tested randomly and often and and no one gets away with anything down there and then you're bootied from the program and so many many people came and went. Things were going in the right direction and everything seemed well. He had gone into that in-house treatment. He had Been put on those different medications. He was doing better in that area and he had the exception of one med they were dealing with. It gave him vivid and terrible dreams. He seemed to be okay, except he wasn't. The treatment for depression was minuscule, I have like, and depression is having a black blanket over you. There's no light coming in. Anti depressants will help. They will punch holes into the darkness. They are rarely 100% effective. They are rarely 100% effective. They are rarely, they are rarely, they are rarely. They are rarely 100% effective. Again, talk therapy is successful. It will punch more holes into the blanket of darkness and then after that there's usually other means and other steps. It must be taken. You see, depression is a formidable opponent. It plays for keeps. It is not a gentleman and I would say that quite often, if you have fought depression Outside of the Lord's Healing hand giving you a miracle, you may find it the rest of your life. But please, please, fight it and please get the help you need, certainly leaning upon the Lord. Before anyone asked. I do not know why people are not always healed. Some people are healed when they pray for healing. The Lord healed me of migraine headaches. I pleaded and prayed For years and I still had them. Then afterward the Lord healed me. I only have three questions about that why, why, why? A man once asked me why are you getting so much rain in Louisiana and we have a drought in California? We were talking by phone. He was a tech support guy and he knew that I was in ministry. He said you know a lot about God. Why are you getting a lot of rain? Why are you not getting any? I said you may not like my answer, but it's an honest answer. I don't know. This question is above my pay scale. Tyler didn't want to trouble people so he could be happy in their presence that sunny day of December, the 14th 2017. My wife called me. She wasn't able to reach Tyler. Mama sensed that something wasn't right with her baby. She asked if I would try to reach him. I told her that I was currently near his apartment, that I would go by and I would check on him and I'd get back to her. I arrived at his apartment and as I was pulling into the parking lot, his roommate pulled in too. So he let me in and I began to call out listen, to try to hear something from outside of the bathroom door. Knocked on, it called out, finally opened the door and walked in. No one there. He knocked on his bedroom door and listened nothing. So I opened the door For a moment. I thought he was asleep just for a moment, and then I realized that something was very, very wrong. The brain takes pictures over something and it seems like to me that when there's too much it shuts down. That's what I remember. Knowing my precious son was gone. I remember very little after this. I called 911 and shouted so loud in a voice that I remember that sounded nothing like my voice Please, you have to help. Please, help my son. He's hurt. I knew he was gone, but I guess denial. I don't know. Maybe my conscience was saying you have to get help, you have to try, at least try. The lady operator kept asking the address. I don't know the address. Get someone over here. I thought they would identify your number and your location. I didn't know how that worked. She kept asking for the address. The volley went back and forth and we got nowhere, I don't know. Finally, I just couldn't talk anymore. I gave the roommate the phone and what probably sounded like an order give this woman the address. I don't know, give her the address. He took the phone and walked a few steps away. I remember first responders everywhere. So much I don't remember, but I do remember much of what happened soon afterward. I remember trying to make contact with my wife's dear friend of many years. I couldn't get in touch. Looking back, I'm pretty sure I dialed the wrong number. Who to call? I have no idea why I called the person that I called next, but she was a godsend. I explained to Ashley the situation and I would not tell my wife because I don't want her driving. She said I'll take care of it and she did. I called a friend from seminary days. I don't remember what I told Jason. I don't remember Soon he and a couple more guys from seminary would show up. God, I love those guys True friends to the end. A person is rich if they have friends like these. This is at least 25 miles from her home. Church friends and members show up. There were so many that day. In the coming days they were like angelic beings, coming and going and doing incredible things. My wife arrived. I wish I could forget the sound of her anguished voice and that cry. That cry that day Gutteral the depths of her soul. Oh God, I do wish I could forget that cry. I called my son-in-law for the same reason. Please get to Christy. I explained what I knew they showed up at the apartment. There were so many people that filled up that parking lot. My wife begged to go in the apartment and see her baby. She was insistent. She would not listen to me as I tried to explain that she couldn't. One of my seminary friends, who is a wise person and seemed to always say the right things, was near me. I turned and said Larry, will you please help me explain that she cannot see him in his kind way he took over from there. The next day people from our fine church neighborhood community were in and out of our home. Family from Texas came over. Four days later we had a memorial service and a large sanctuary that was beyond full. Hundreds of people were there. I do remember most of the service. It was a worship service. King Jesus was honored and glorified. Tyler was remembered. He would have been shocked to know how truly loved that he was. I remember at the wake that a lady drove several miles to tell us that when her house flooded from rising water that Tyler and his friend showed up at her house. They loaded their truck with her things and much of what she had was saved from the flood. She said they were complete strangers to her. We had seen his obituary in the newspaper and wanted us to know this. We wept all day for a couple of weeks. The crying would subside and then come like uncontrollable waves. Every night my wife and I sat in the dark, often saying nothing. We played and listened to David Crider's song All my Hope. If I ever meet the servant of God, I will tell him that his song, the message of this song, carried us. We played it over and over over. I met with law officials many times over the next few weeks. It was very frustrated and I think, because they were not forthcoming, that I was very hard on them. With a cooler mind today, I think I now realize that I wasn't dealing with a totally bad department, but just one extremely lazy officer. I'm human and if his name is mentioned I might still bristle. He's no longer in his position and I'm grateful for all who would have to deal with him that they have been spared that experience. My son ended his life. Yes, you heard that correctly. I'm not ashamed of him either. The kid hurt so much. I don't think he desired to end his life. I think he just wanted the hurt to stop. I love him so dearly. I am proud of the person he was. He's a good son, good brother, good uncle, good brother-in-law, a good friend, a good person. Time doesn't heal all wounds. I have no idea who came up with that misguided and erroneous saying. I know that the Lord is steadfast in our lives. I know, because of Jesus and Tyler's love for Jesus, that we will see him one day, son, one day. I promised my wife that if we arrived at the heaven at the same time, that I would grant her a half step before me, but no more than half a step. Depression yeah, I still fight. It's been a constant opponent for some time. Ministers come to me like Nicodemus. They come at night where no one knows. They come from other towns and cities to talk to me about depression. When they know about my struggles. They can't talk to those in their church. They don't feel like they can talk to their minister brethren in that area. Somebody will tell, someone will leak that out. They feel like their career will be over. It'll show weakness. Well, the truth is we're all weak. There's a promise from the Bible about that too. Second Corinthians tells us that when we're weak, he is strong. And, folks, whether you believe it or not, we're all weak. The strongest person I'm talking to today is still a weak person. These people come to me. They don't know what to do about depression. You see, there is a very real stigma. I want to be a part of knocking that stigma down so that people can get the help they need. I want to be a part of that. That's why I share my heart today. I didn't want to tell the story. I sat in my office as I'm telling the story. I have stopped taping this message three times just to get control, to be able to continue the taping of this message, this episode. So we're going to pull off the lid of silence in the church. At least that's my goal. I'm doing good at this time. Concerning my mental health, I now have a doctor who's not only a genius with medication, but he cares. He's a specialist. I tell him all the time I'm glad that you have gray hair. That means you've been around the block, he's a friend. I do believe he would say that I am a friend. I know he cares. He wants me to get better and I'm taking medication for depression and PTSD. It took years to find a doctor like this. Doctors are like any other profession. They're the good, the bad, the caring, the indifferent and, if needed, I hope you cross paths with a good, caring one. There's a tremendous shortage of mental health workers in our country. I hope that some young person may realize that God might call them into a ministry of helping those with mental illness. It should not be seen as a lesser ministry either. It's so, so needed in the church. So that's my story. You are welcome to come along with me on the journey as we put the light on a taboo topic in the church. Feel free to share this episode and podcast. The goal is simple to help the hurting. God bless, jesus loves you.