The Up & Under 06.27.07: A Look in the Mirror

But I cannot turn away.

There are a lot of words being tossed around, and none of them seem to do justice to what Chris Benoit really was. “Murderer”. “Legend”. “Animal”. “Consummate Performer”. “Hitler”. Though some might begin to touch on parts of Chris Benoit, none truly encompasses the entirety of his being. Let me tell you what word I think would best describe Chris Benoit as I understand him now:

Human.

I refuse to sit here and type a diatribe defending Chris Benoit’s actions. What it seems that he has done is reprehensible and in many ways beyond redemption, no matter what your personal belief about an afterlife might be. He had a responsibility as a husband and father to throw himself fully into defending and protecting his wife and child, and in that he could not have failed more spectacularly.

However, I will share with you that life is not always quite as black-and-white as others would have you believe, nor as simple as it seems on the surface. There are moments of complete desperation that force healthy, rational, reasonable people to do unspeakable things. It is nearly impossible to describe what it feels like to be inside a depression so deep that one would be pushed to an absolute breaking point with reality. I’m not sure I could even hazard a legitimate attempt at it.

But I’m going to try.

A little over a year ago, I was in what seemed to be a massive downward spiral. I was dealing with a number of things, not the least of which was the continued fallout from an extensive drug addiction from years earlier. I was entering what would become the final stages of a very serious relationship, one that would end ugly and sadly. I was jobless, seemingly friendless, and felt like I had nothing to keep me going outside of going out to my local bar five or six nights a week. Looking around, approaching my twenty-third birthday, I decided that I was sick of all of it.

May 21, 2006.

That was the day I had picked to commit suicide.

The events that helped me to avoid that day, or at the very least my plan for it, were at best a confluence of luck and circumstance. Were it not for a luckily placed phone call by a good friend, I would not be here today, would never have written a column here on 411, would never have started bartending at my favorite bar, would never have taught the countless students I’ve worked with in the year since then, would never have been able to go to my friend’s wedding in August.

But this column isn’t about me.

Or is it.

Depression is an illness. I don’t know if Chris Benoit had it, but the first part of this entire story that wouldn’t shock me would be a revelation that he did. I have struggled with it, and if you think the club is small, you’re fooling yourself. Depression affects nearly ten percent of American adults and countless more young people. It remains, along with drug addiction, one of the most misunderstood conditions on earth; it is nearly impossible to describe from the inside and even more difficult to appreciate from the outside.

I have continued to read the nearly constant updates of “The Chris Benoit Story” since details began to leak out on Monday evening. The one thought that keeps creeping into my mind is ‘how can I look in the mirror?’. I wonder if Chris Benoit and I are really so different. My life has been filled with a history of depression, and at some of the most crushing moments I have threatened the most horrible things imaginable. Am I truly just a degree off of Chris Benoit?

In a professional wrestler’s life, there are long hours, extended periods away from your family, the potential for extreme physical damage, and the near-constant strain of having to be cordial and pleasant to droves of fans. I’m not saying there aren’t benefits to the fame and fortune of the business, but it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine excessive fatigue, anxiety, insomnia and irritability as a part of a wrestler’s daily existence. All of those also happen to be symptoms of depression.

Chris Benoit was screaming out for help. I don’t condone what he chose to do, but I perhaps begin to understand how it could have happened. It is beyond difficult in those lowest of moments to believe that things can get better. I was one of the lucky ones; I had people who cared about me enough and realized what they needed to do quickly enough to reach out and pull me up. Maybe Chris Benoit didn’t have that luxury. Maybe the people that cared about him just didn’t realize what was happening in time.

I want to believe that I’m a better man now than I was a year ago. Staring down your mortality and being helped to a place where you choose life can change a person. Knowing what I know now, I can see that life wasn’t nearly as bad as it seemed in those hardest of moments, but I also understand why I couldn’t see it from inside of my depression.

Chris Benoit couldn’t see it, and his wife and child paid the dearest price.

What Chris Benoit chose to do was beyond reprehensible. It has cast a pall on his life, his legacy, the business he helped to build, and all who are associated with it. But I am forced to wonder if any of us is truly that far away from Chris Benoit. He seemed so righteous and lucky and loved to all of us just a week ago. If a man so universally respected and seemingly cared about could do this, is anyone truly beyond reaching that breaking point?

I mean none of this as an accusation, simply as a warning. Chris Benoit seemed like the unlikeliest of candidates to commit such an act of violence. Do we all need to take a long look in the mirror to be sure that we keep another tragedy like this weekend’s from happening?

If you are depressed or know someone who is, please do what you can to find help. I sit here as a real, tangible example that there IS a tomorrow and that life CAN get better. It is not easy, and I will never tell you that it is, but it is possible. Look in the mirror, think about how you see Chris Benoit and his legacy now as opposed to a week ago, and then decide that there is something better than that for you. Choose to be better.