October 21, 2022 • 15 mins
Interludes are short segments between regular episodes with no editing but WITH leather creaking. It's a chance to hear a little more about what's going on in my life. In this interlude I discuss my recent experience with depression. Good news! I'm doing better.
Ask Edge! Go to https://www.speakpipe.com/LTHREDGE to leave ask a question or leave feedback. Find Edge's other content on Instagram and Twitter. Also visit his archive of educational videos, Tchick-Tchick.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:00):
Welcome to full carnivore podcast about leather
(00:02):
kink and BDSM. My name is edgeMy pronouns are he him and I am
your host. And this is anotherinterlude in the episode between
episodes offered raw andunedited. But with Langlands
leather creaking, an opportunityfor me to discuss a little bit
about what's going on in my lifeat the moment. And I will admit,
(00:24):
I had to think very hard aboutwhether or not to make this
particular interlude. Becausewhat's going on in my life at
the moment is that I have beendealing with some mild
depression. And I startedantidepressants a little over
two weeks ago.
And I hesitated to talk aboutthis, in part, because, you
know, this is my actual medicalinformation. And I'm not sure I
(00:45):
want to put it out there on theinterwebs. But also, because
I've tried to pry open a littlebit of space between edge of
this larger than life persona Iembody on social media, and who
I am as a person and in myprivate life, and sort of craft
some spaces there to create aparticular intimacy for people
(01:08):
who are close to me, and to sortof protect parts of myself from
that larger public performance.
But I felt it perhaps wasimportant to continue to
normalize issues around mentalhealth, particularly in the
leather kink and BDSM community,and perhaps, particularly, for
people who are in any waydominant identified. So I
(01:29):
thought I would share what'sbeen going on with me.
You know, it started months ago,really, and I would say,
February or March, maybe Istarted feeling not just
physically tired. I feel like inthis world, we're all always
(01:51):
physically tired. But I startedfeeling like my spirit was
weary, I was justlosing steam on the inside. And
I thought I just needed avacation, and I had a beautiful
trip to Ireland coming up. Andso I just sort of kept chugging
along, and I had a reallyfantastic time in Ireland. And
(02:11):
as much as thatenriched me as much as it filled
my Well, the well, did not stayfor very long. And in fact, as
soon as I got back from Ireland,things felt worse quite
suddenly. Part of that was I hadCOVID, very, very, very mild
when I got home, I mean, somild, I didn't even realize I
(02:33):
had it until I accidentallythought to test.
And COVID can be associated withsome mental health issues. When
I was talking to my doctor aboutit, she said she was seeing a
lot of people with anxietyissues. So that's could be
playing a role here. Butcertainly, it left me a little
isolated because I wasquarantining at home.
(02:54):
But I don't know that thatexplains everything. What I
noticed when I got back fromIreland is that increasingly, I
just didn't want to be aroundpeople, I just didn't have the
inner resources to be social inany way. Now, I'm an introvert.
And this is in many ways, mydefault mode, I have to gather
(03:14):
up energy to participate insocial activities, like
particularly parties are goingout to the bar, I do pretty good
one on one, and I stay until theenergy is gone. And then I have
to leave and I have to comehome, home is my sanctuary. And
when I'm home alone, or when Ihave a partner, if I'm home with
my partner, that is when andwhere I can renew. So a lot of
(03:35):
this wasn't in any way unusualfor me at first, but
it felt different. It felt morethan just my introversion. And I
also noticed that both at workand in the gym, I felt like I
was going through the motions. Ijust didn't have any oomph. I
(03:58):
didn't have any investment.
There were days where I couldn'teven get through an entire
workout. At work, I kept thetrains running on time, but I
wasn't able to really initiateany new projects. And I spent a
lot of time just sort ofmindlessly looking at the
Internet until it got to thepoint where I'd wake up,
(04:18):
kind of get to the gym somehowdo as much as I could, and go to
work. Just wondering when Icould come home and crawl into
bed for a nap. So I wasexperiencing both an increased
desire for isolation, a completeinability to kind of cope with
people or social situations anda complete going through the
(04:39):
motions. No, this is not myfirst time dealing with
depression. I would not say Ihave chronic depression,
fortunately, but I have hadseveral periods in my life where
have I experienced somethingsimilar? And I have decided to
go on antidepressants of thosetimes as well. This depression
feels a little bitdifferent to me, you know, it's
(05:00):
not, I'm not sad. It's not likeI can't get out of bed, it's not
a sadness, it is an absoluteblondeness every day feels blah,
every day feels like something Ijust need to get through. But
there's nothing at the end of itright, I get through it, I wake
(05:20):
up, and I get through the nextone. And that that just sort of
feltreally kind of empty, really
kind of empty. And it's not thatI didn't have moments of getting
together with friends. It's notthat I did have some moments
where I get together with a boy.
But overall, it felt very muchlike I had run out of some
(05:42):
essential fuel inside and didn'thave enough fuel to get to the
fueling station. Like I didn'tquite know what that substance
was. Maybe it was joy, maybe itwas connectivity, there was
something that I just run out.
And,and so I went to see my doctor,
and we talked about it. And wedecided for me to start
(06:04):
antidepressants again.
You know, when you startantidepressants, there's like a
little bit of hopefulness.
You're like, wow, I am doingsomething for my help. Wow, I'm
going to get better. But ifyou've ever been on
antidepressants, you know, thething about them is that they
take weeks, weeks to come fullyonline. And so now I'm in this
particularly gray period, whereeveryday remains a trudge, and
(06:30):
it remains a charge until thepoint where I know there will
come a day when I wake up and Iwant to do something.
I'm excited about the gym, or Iwant to go shopping or I want to
do a video for Twitter, andthere will be a come a day when
(06:51):
I will want to do things again.
And I will want to do thingsthat fill my well. I will want
to do Joy making things andthings like the gym that are
normally Joy making things willreturn to joyfulness I know that
is coming. I know that for meantidepressants work. I know
that it is just a matter oftime.
(07:16):
It's still it's not a greatperiod, you know, the moment I
started them. I knew I startedat the right time because my
depression actually felt alittle bit worse, the past
couple of weeks.
You know, I haven't wanted toeven put in contact lenses. I
haven't wanted to trim my hairor beard. I just haven't wanted
to do hardly anything. And ithas been a particular chore for
(07:38):
me to try and be social. Infact, it is Labor Day here in
the United States. I'm recordingthis on September 5. And I was
invited to a pool party thisweekend. Now, pool parties are a
big deal in Florida. They arethe bread and butter of the
social scene. And it was thefirst pool party I had been
invited to all summer thatreally struck me. It struck me
(08:01):
how disconnected I had becomefrom people around Fort
Lauderdale that no one hadthought to invite me to a pool
party. I didn't blame them.
Right? I did. I did thedisconnecting. So it was very
important for me that I makethis party because I didn't want
to completely disappear offeveryone's list. And I thought I
thought wow, I've been onantidepressants, two weeks this,
this will be great. I can go.
(08:23):
And I went and I stayed for anhour. And it was hard. It was
hard. It actually put me Ipushed myself a little bit too
hard. And I had a struggle buskind of day, yesterday and part
of today, of Sunday and part oftoday.
And that's fine. That's fine.
You know, I do what I can and Ileave the less go.
(08:44):
What's been really interestingabout this whole experience, and
one of the reasons I felt itimportant to share my experience
in this venue is seeing howpeople in my life react to me
telling them that I'm depressed.
And I have so many loving peoplein my world. And I am so
grateful for that, right. AndI don't want to devalue that.
(09:08):
Nor do I want to judge people'sreactions. And it's not like
their reactions have been wrong.
It's just that a lot of timespeople feel this need to support
me in ways that arecounterproductive to my own
continued healing. So, for me,since the manifestation of my
depression is I don't want toget together with people, you
(09:30):
know, people who really wantedto get together with me, because
they heard I was depressed. Thatwas not something that would
have been really useful to me, Ithink coded behind some of the
reactions I got from people, orperhaps some misunderstandings
of depression. And I don't wantto go into details about what
their reactions were and why Ithink those are not appropriate
(09:52):
for me, because they were allacting out of love and I don't
want to call any of them out ormake them feel poorly for the
choices they made. I wassimply say this, here's a lesson
for you. If someone you careabout someone, you know, someone
in your life tells you that theyare depressed, I find it most
useful in my own experience tosort of ask them, How can I
support you, and then dowhatever the hell they ask. And
(10:15):
sometimes that's check on me,sometimes that's I really don't
want to be alone right now. Andsometimes it's, you know, what,
just give me some space. So Ican move through this. So I
really want to invite all ofthat. But I think part of the
reactions I was experiencing,indicated what I would find, or
what I would argue is partialcultural myth.
(10:39):
You know, my understanding ofdepression is that it is a
biochemical condition, my brainis not producing the proper
amount of neuro chemicals, forme to be at a baseline, for
whatever reason, and I could gointo wall, you know, what may
have caused this depression, Idon't know that that's useful,
(10:59):
because I don't know thatundoing that cause would make
the depression go away. At thispoint, I have a medical
condition, and I need treatment,I need medical treatment. And I
have my therapist, I'vediscussed this with my
therapist. But I believe thatsometimes we feel that
depression is something that canbe talked through. And I think
that's true for when you'refeeling down, or when you're
(11:23):
really troubled. Or if youhaven't, if you're anxious about
something, and certainly allthat's great. And I don't you
know, that may be yourmanifestation of depression, it
may be that you need to talkthrough things. But I know that
for me, where I'm at with thisparticular flavor of depression,
talking will not solve anything.
Because talking is not going toalter the neuro chemistry in my
(11:45):
brain, will will alter it arethe medications I am taking,
which eventually will raisethose neurotransmitters to
baseline for me.
Now, you're listening to this, Ibelieve, in October, if I have
my schedule, correct, thisshould be the interlude for
October. And my sincere hope andexpectation is that by the time
(12:10):
you're hearing this, I'mprobably better. Because that's
right around. I got aboutanother two, three weeks before
the antidepressant should becoming online. So the good news
is that if you have any urge tohelp me,
I think I've already beenhelped.
I think I'm doing okay, and ifnot, I can tell you that I am at
(12:32):
this moment in the future,talking to my doctor again about
adjusting dosages. Sothe takeaways here are
dominant, submissive, switch,whatever your sexual identity
is,anyone, any one of us can get
depressed. Depression can intimes be an emotional situation,
something very situational,something you're moving through
(12:54):
and dealing with a grievingprocess, and those things
perhaps will pass on their own.
But I sincerely believe formyself, and I invite you into
this belief that depression canalso be an actual medical
condition that actually requiresmedical treatment. At the very
least, I think we need tocompletely normalize discussions
(13:15):
of mental health. You know, kinkis an extraordinarily powerful
practice that actually can be sohealing, and so good for our
mental health. But we doencounter a lot of difficulties
with our mental health as well,from our position as outcasts in
society. Oftentimes, becausekids wrapped up with different
(13:39):
post traumatic behaviors fromhistories of abuse and trauma,
then we carry a lot of mentalbaggage into the dungeon. And so
I think our ability to normalizetalking about that is is a way
to really create betternegotiations for scenes, better
negotiations, and communicationand relationships so that
(14:01):
partners can understand wherethey are, and where they each
need to be.
And that's it for thisinterlude. I appreciate your
attention and listening. That'svaluable for me. And I'm, and
it's a very good sign that I'meven doing this. This is the
second interlude I have recordedtoday, the fact that I had the
(14:22):
oomph to do something like this,to do something that in normal
times would bring me a greatdeal of fulfillment and joy is a
sign that I am moving in theright direction. So thank you
all for being a part of myworld. I hope you found my
revelation and discussionuseful, perhaps to connect your
(14:42):
own experience or the experienceof those who care for I hope as
well that wherever you on yourleather journey, you are making
progress, and you have hope andthat you are finding the things
you need. So that's just anotherway of saying that I hope
Your leather journey is alwaysblessed
Welcome to full carnivore podcast about leather
(00:02):
kink and BDSM. My name is edgeMy pronouns are he him and I am
your host. And this is anotherinterlude in the episode between
episodes offered raw andunedited. But with Langlands
leather creaking, an opportunityfor me to discuss a little bit
about what's going on in my lifeat the moment. And I will admit,
(00:24):
I had to think very hard aboutwhether or not to make this
particular interlude. Becausewhat's going on in my life at
the moment is that I have beendealing with some mild
depression. And I startedantidepressants a little over
two weeks ago.
And I hesitated to talk aboutthis, in part, because, you
know, this is my actual medicalinformation. And I'm not sure I
(00:45):
want to put it out there on theinterwebs. But also, because
I've tried to pry open a littlebit of space between edge of
this larger than life persona Iembody on social media, and who
I am as a person and in myprivate life, and sort of craft
some spaces there to create aparticular intimacy for people
(01:08):
who are close to me, and to sortof protect parts of myself from
that larger public performance.
But I felt it perhaps wasimportant to continue to
normalize issues around mentalhealth, particularly in the
leather kink and BDSM community,and perhaps, particularly, for
people who are in any waydominant identified. So I
(01:29):
thought I would share what'sbeen going on with me.
You know, it started months ago,really, and I would say,
February or March, maybe Istarted feeling not just
physically tired. I feel like inthis world, we're all always
(01:51):
physically tired. But I startedfeeling like my spirit was
weary, I was justlosing steam on the inside. And
I thought I just needed avacation, and I had a beautiful
trip to Ireland coming up. Andso I just sort of kept chugging
along, and I had a reallyfantastic time in Ireland. And
(02:11):
as much as thatenriched me as much as it filled
my Well, the well, did not stayfor very long. And in fact, as
soon as I got back from Ireland,things felt worse quite
suddenly. Part of that was I hadCOVID, very, very, very mild
when I got home, I mean, somild, I didn't even realize I
(02:33):
had it until I accidentallythought to test.
And COVID can be associated withsome mental health issues. When
I was talking to my doctor aboutit, she said she was seeing a
lot of people with anxietyissues. So that's could be
playing a role here. Butcertainly, it left me a little
isolated because I wasquarantining at home.
(02:54):
But I don't know that thatexplains everything. What I
noticed when I got back fromIreland is that increasingly, I
just didn't want to be aroundpeople, I just didn't have the
inner resources to be social inany way. Now, I'm an introvert.
And this is in many ways, mydefault mode, I have to gather
(03:14):
up energy to participate insocial activities, like
particularly parties are goingout to the bar, I do pretty good
one on one, and I stay until theenergy is gone. And then I have
to leave and I have to comehome, home is my sanctuary. And
when I'm home alone, or when Ihave a partner, if I'm home with
my partner, that is when andwhere I can renew. So a lot of
(03:35):
this wasn't in any way unusualfor me at first, but
it felt different. It felt morethan just my introversion. And I
also noticed that both at workand in the gym, I felt like I
was going through the motions. Ijust didn't have any oomph. I
(03:58):
didn't have any investment.
There were days where I couldn'teven get through an entire
workout. At work, I kept thetrains running on time, but I
wasn't able to really initiateany new projects. And I spent a
lot of time just sort ofmindlessly looking at the
Internet until it got to thepoint where I'd wake up,
(04:18):
kind of get to the gym somehowdo as much as I could, and go to
work. Just wondering when Icould come home and crawl into
bed for a nap. So I wasexperiencing both an increased
desire for isolation, a completeinability to kind of cope with
people or social situations anda complete going through the
(04:39):
motions. No, this is not myfirst time dealing with
depression. I would not say Ihave chronic depression,
fortunately, but I have hadseveral periods in my life where
have I experienced somethingsimilar? And I have decided to
go on antidepressants of thosetimes as well. This depression
feels a little bitdifferent to me, you know, it's
(05:00):
not, I'm not sad. It's not likeI can't get out of bed, it's not
a sadness, it is an absoluteblondeness every day feels blah,
every day feels like something Ijust need to get through. But
there's nothing at the end of itright, I get through it, I wake
(05:20):
up, and I get through the nextone. And that that just sort of
feltreally kind of empty, really
kind of empty. And it's not thatI didn't have moments of getting
together with friends. It's notthat I did have some moments
where I get together with a boy.
But overall, it felt very muchlike I had run out of some
(05:42):
essential fuel inside and didn'thave enough fuel to get to the
fueling station. Like I didn'tquite know what that substance
was. Maybe it was joy, maybe itwas connectivity, there was
something that I just run out.
And,and so I went to see my doctor,
and we talked about it. And wedecided for me to start
(06:04):
antidepressants again.
You know, when you startantidepressants, there's like a
little bit of hopefulness.
You're like, wow, I am doingsomething for my help. Wow, I'm
going to get better. But ifyou've ever been on
antidepressants, you know, thething about them is that they
take weeks, weeks to come fullyonline. And so now I'm in this
particularly gray period, whereeveryday remains a trudge, and
(06:30):
it remains a charge until thepoint where I know there will
come a day when I wake up and Iwant to do something.
I'm excited about the gym, or Iwant to go shopping or I want to
do a video for Twitter, andthere will be a come a day when
(06:51):
I will want to do things again.
And I will want to do thingsthat fill my well. I will want
to do Joy making things andthings like the gym that are
normally Joy making things willreturn to joyfulness I know that
is coming. I know that for meantidepressants work. I know
that it is just a matter oftime.
(07:16):
It's still it's not a greatperiod, you know, the moment I
started them. I knew I startedat the right time because my
depression actually felt alittle bit worse, the past
couple of weeks.
You know, I haven't wanted toeven put in contact lenses. I
haven't wanted to trim my hairor beard. I just haven't wanted
to do hardly anything. And ithas been a particular chore for
(07:38):
me to try and be social. Infact, it is Labor Day here in
the United States. I'm recordingthis on September 5. And I was
invited to a pool party thisweekend. Now, pool parties are a
big deal in Florida. They arethe bread and butter of the
social scene. And it was thefirst pool party I had been
invited to all summer thatreally struck me. It struck me
(08:01):
how disconnected I had becomefrom people around Fort
Lauderdale that no one hadthought to invite me to a pool
party. I didn't blame them.
Right? I did. I did thedisconnecting. So it was very
important for me that I makethis party because I didn't want
to completely disappear offeveryone's list. And I thought I
thought wow, I've been onantidepressants, two weeks this,
this will be great. I can go.
(08:23):
And I went and I stayed for anhour. And it was hard. It was
hard. It actually put me Ipushed myself a little bit too
hard. And I had a struggle buskind of day, yesterday and part
of today, of Sunday and part oftoday.
And that's fine. That's fine.
You know, I do what I can and Ileave the less go.
(08:44):
What's been really interestingabout this whole experience, and
one of the reasons I felt itimportant to share my experience
in this venue is seeing howpeople in my life react to me
telling them that I'm depressed.
And I have so many loving peoplein my world. And I am so
grateful for that, right. AndI don't want to devalue that.
(09:08):
Nor do I want to judge people'sreactions. And it's not like
their reactions have been wrong.
It's just that a lot of timespeople feel this need to support
me in ways that arecounterproductive to my own
continued healing. So, for me,since the manifestation of my
depression is I don't want toget together with people, you
(09:30):
know, people who really wantedto get together with me, because
they heard I was depressed. Thatwas not something that would
have been really useful to me, Ithink coded behind some of the
reactions I got from people, orperhaps some misunderstandings
of depression. And I don't wantto go into details about what
their reactions were and why Ithink those are not appropriate
(09:52):
for me, because they were allacting out of love and I don't
want to call any of them out ormake them feel poorly for the
choices they made. I wassimply say this, here's a lesson
for you. If someone you careabout someone, you know, someone
in your life tells you that theyare depressed, I find it most
useful in my own experience tosort of ask them, How can I
support you, and then dowhatever the hell they ask. And
(10:15):
sometimes that's check on me,sometimes that's I really don't
want to be alone right now. Andsometimes it's, you know, what,
just give me some space. So Ican move through this. So I
really want to invite all ofthat. But I think part of the
reactions I was experiencing,indicated what I would find, or
what I would argue is partialcultural myth.
(10:39):
You know, my understanding ofdepression is that it is a
biochemical condition, my brainis not producing the proper
amount of neuro chemicals, forme to be at a baseline, for
whatever reason, and I could gointo wall, you know, what may
have caused this depression, Idon't know that that's useful,
(10:59):
because I don't know thatundoing that cause would make
the depression go away. At thispoint, I have a medical
condition, and I need treatment,I need medical treatment. And I
have my therapist, I'vediscussed this with my
therapist. But I believe thatsometimes we feel that
depression is something that canbe talked through. And I think
that's true for when you'refeeling down, or when you're
(11:23):
really troubled. Or if youhaven't, if you're anxious about
something, and certainly allthat's great. And I don't you
know, that may be yourmanifestation of depression, it
may be that you need to talkthrough things. But I know that
for me, where I'm at with thisparticular flavor of depression,
talking will not solve anything.
Because talking is not going toalter the neuro chemistry in my
(11:45):
brain, will will alter it arethe medications I am taking,
which eventually will raisethose neurotransmitters to
baseline for me.
Now, you're listening to this, Ibelieve, in October, if I have
my schedule, correct, thisshould be the interlude for
October. And my sincere hope andexpectation is that by the time
(12:10):
you're hearing this, I'mprobably better. Because that's
right around. I got aboutanother two, three weeks before
the antidepressant should becoming online. So the good news
is that if you have any urge tohelp me,
I think I've already beenhelped.
I think I'm doing okay, and ifnot, I can tell you that I am at
(12:32):
this moment in the future,talking to my doctor again about
adjusting dosages. Sothe takeaways here are
dominant, submissive, switch,whatever your sexual identity
is,anyone, any one of us can get
depressed. Depression can intimes be an emotional situation,
something very situational,something you're moving through
(12:54):
and dealing with a grievingprocess, and those things
perhaps will pass on their own.
But I sincerely believe formyself, and I invite you into
this belief that depression canalso be an actual medical
condition that actually requiresmedical treatment. At the very
least, I think we need tocompletely normalize discussions
(13:15):
of mental health. You know, kinkis an extraordinarily powerful
practice that actually can be sohealing, and so good for our
mental health. But we doencounter a lot of difficulties
with our mental health as well,from our position as outcasts in
society. Oftentimes, becausekids wrapped up with different
(13:39):
post traumatic behaviors fromhistories of abuse and trauma,
then we carry a lot of mentalbaggage into the dungeon. And so
I think our ability to normalizetalking about that is is a way
to really create betternegotiations for scenes, better
negotiations, and communicationand relationships so that
(14:01):
partners can understand wherethey are, and where they each
need to be.
And that's it for thisinterlude. I appreciate your
attention and listening. That'svaluable for me. And I'm, and
it's a very good sign that I'meven doing this. This is the
second interlude I have recordedtoday, the fact that I had the
(14:22):
oomph to do something like this,to do something that in normal
times would bring me a greatdeal of fulfillment and joy is a
sign that I am moving in theright direction. So thank you
all for being a part of myworld. I hope you found my
revelation and discussionuseful, perhaps to connect your
(14:42):
own experience or the experienceof those who care for I hope as
well that wherever you on yourleather journey, you are making
progress, and you have hope andthat you are finding the things
you need. So that's just anotherway of saying that I hope
Your leather journey is alwaysblessed
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