The Very Crusty Demon

A story, a metaphor, and a few things that happened that brought me back to basics.

Dec 15, 2023

The Story

Maybe 27 years ago, we visited some family at their farm outside Goulburn, NSW. They had a Peewee 80 motorbike. I would’ve been around eight years old. I’d never ridden a motorbike before, but we were in a big paddock, and it was only a tiny motorbike, even for an eight-year-old.

My brother and cousins were taking turns putting around the paddock when it came to my turn for a ride. After a quick rundown on where the throttle, brakes and gears were and an even faster run down on how to stay upright on the thing, I, too, was putting around the paddock.

Initially, I was shitting myself. I still do when I try something I’ve never done before. Fear is something of a constant state for me. But after a few laps, my confidence started to build, and I actually started to really enjoy myself.

Being the clever little dickheads we were, we decided to build a small dirt jump in the middle of the paddock. I was confident enough cutting laps of the paddock, but a fuckin’ 20cm dirt jump was a whole new level.

After watching my brother and a couple of cousins confidently navigate the jump, getting all 21cm of air, I figured it couldn’t be too hard. So when it came to my turn, I threw on the sweaty old helmet we were all sharing and cut another lap around the paddock to refamiliarise myself with the beast of a bike.

No one other than me felt the need for the extra lap before taking on the mammoth dirt jump. But I wanted to be sure I had my shit together before taking on such a daring feat. I could hear my brother and cousins telling to stop fucking around and just do the jump already.

Not wanting anyone to know how scared I was, I took off down to the bottom corner of the paddock, got a run up about ten times longer than necessary, lined up the jump and rang the fucking neck out of the motorbikes throttle. I remember thinking I had to hit it pretty fast because the dirt we built the jump out of came from a hole we dug… immediately behind the jump.

As I approached the jump, absolutely fucking shitting myself, I put my head down, tucked my elbows in and launched all of a metre or so, easily clearing the small hole behind the jump. I’d done it, or so I thought.

Because I was so scared of getting my back wheel caught up in the hole behind the jump, and I had a poor understanding of fundamental physics at that age (still do), I’d hit the jump way fucking faster than anyone else had and way quicker than necessary.

As the bike came down from the wuthering 21cm height, I was too concerned with clearing the hole to remember to brace for landing, and I landed with rigid knees rather than soft knees, which would cushion the landing. As the bike landed on the ground, the force of the landing and the tension in my legs forced my feet off the footpegs.

Because I was so fucking scared, I was still ringing the throttles neck. So I was hurtling through the paddock at full noise, laid across the top of the bike, legs dangling off the back. It was like I was doing a Superman. Only the wheels were on the ground, with my feet dragging along the dirt and grass.

I remember looking down, and all I could see was the nubs of the rear tyre. We were using an open-face helmet, and there was no way I was letting go of the bike. I wasn’t keen on smashing my face against the tyre and having the nubs rip all my teeth out or tearing my face up, but the heat from the exhaust was starting to burn my arm.

The other problem was the tighter I held onto the bike, the harder I pulled the throttle back. So there I was, stuck on my belly, laying across the top of a fucking motorbike, with no way of seeing where I was going, feet dragging through the dirt, grass and, by this point, sticks and rocks with no fucking clue when or how this was going to end until fuckin’ BANG!

I crashed into a farm gate…

I looked over, and everyone was laughing. I didn’t get it. Thirty seconds ago, I was certain I was going to die. I wish I could have seen it because, at the time, it was extremely traumatic, but seeing a kid dangling off the back of a motorbike, slowly putting along in a paddock and then crashing into a fence would be pretty funny.

My uncle came over and checked his gate, then the motorbike and then asked if I was okay. I had some slight cuts and grazes on my legs, and my shoes were fucked, much to mum’s dismay, but I was okay.

I was barred from using the motorbike for the rest of the day. Although I was embarrassed, and it upset me that everyone else was allowed to use it except for me and me only, honestly, at that point, I would’ve told them to bash their stupid fucking motorbike up their arse.

The Metaphor

So, what’s the point of this story? On top of the story being a good laugh, I feel like the part where I was hanging on for dear life but only making the motorbike pull even harder in the same direction is the perfect metaphor for how I’ve been feeling over the last couple of months.

Life is the motorbike, and I’m just barely fucking hanging on, wondering when the prick of a thing is going to run out of fuel and/or crash into a fucking gate. I’ve been feeling a complete lack of control. Everything is happening around me. The days and weeks are flying by; people at work are talking to me; people at home are talking to me; my extended family and friends are talking to me, and it’s all just blurred into one extended experience that has become fucking overwhelming.

As I mentioned in last week’s blog, I’ve enjoyed many of the things I’ve done over the previous month or two, but it’s taught me that I need my downtime more than ever. Busy periods mean we don’t get as much of that as we’d like, and often, we forget to prioritise or ensure we make that time to ourselves. When you’re a people pleaser like me, it’s often the first thing sacrificed.

Towards the end of my drinking and substance abuse, most of my nefarious activities were done at home, on my own, late into the night when other people were asleep. I wasn’t getting work call after work call or email after email. Finally, I could switch off. The substances just helped me supercharge that switching off.

I’m realising there was nothing wrong with wanting to switch off. In fact, it was essential to maintain some level of survivable mental health. All this time, I thought every aspect of my actions was wrong or unhealthy, but it wasn’t. Just how I got to that point of switching off was damaging.

I’ve learned that you need to listen to your mind and body and, to a degree, ignore your brain. Ignore the part of the brain that tells you there’s something wrong with spending a weekend at home. When you feel like you’re on the brink of burning out, there’s nothing heroic or tough about continuing.

That’s the exact mindset that led me down the dark path of abusing drugs and alcohol to a point where I was doing damage to my relationships with people I cared about and my relationship with myself. Nothing was wrong with what I was doing, just the method I used to get there.

Drugs and alcohol can help you achieve that switch-off point almost instantly, and I think that’s where the appeal lies. That first drink or line can feel like a literal, physical weight has been lifted from your shoulders. A weight that you put there yourself, perhaps even subconsciously.

To a degree, I had accepted that I wasn’t going to crash my metaphorical Peewee 80 into a gate until I finished work the following Thursday. I’d have to keep holding onto the throttle for dear life until I crashed into the Christmas holiday gate.

The thing about crashing motorbikes into gates is that you can’t really choose how and when you do it. If you do, you’re a fucking psychopath. So maybe the Christmas break was more the motorbike running out of fuel for me. Given the holidays are still over a week away, and right now, I’m referring to things that have happened over the last week, it probably wasn’t very healthy of me to keep hanging on for another two weeks, but I didn’t know what else to do.

Thing 1

We had a weekend at home. I made it abundantly clear to my partner that I needed the most regular weekend possible. Just simple, boring, gown up, normal shit… plus a long run.

We did groceries and plodded around the house, catching up on some chores that had fallen by the wayside in the madness of the previous month or so. It sounds fucking stupid, but something is refreshing about getting your affairs in order around the house. You feel organised and in control. Mentally, you feel like you’re on top of things. You don’t have to stress about where you’re going to find the time to get your shit together.

Thing 2

In the middle of last week, I started to feel like I was due for a good long run. I’ve never run to a training plan. I don’t like having to go for a long run on a day; I feel like a short run. Or a slow run when I feel great and want to try to run faster. That’s not what I do it for.

It sounds fucking stupid. Complaining about having too much going on. Feeling like you’re only just holding on, but then wanting to spend six hours out of your Sunday to drive into the bush, run for an extended period for no apparent reason, physically exhausting yourself and rendering yourself physically useless to the family for the rest of the afternoon.

Physically, though, I’m not tired. It’s mental and emotional fatigue that has been dragging me down. Running has always been an escape for me. Even when I was at the lowest point of my substance abuse, I was still managing to run three or four times a week. I’m sure there’s a science to it, and other runners understand that there’s just something about running, particularly long distance, that feels fucking amazing.

So, mid-week, I reached out to a mate who mentioned he was keen to try to run 50k for the first time. I told him I would do it on Sunday and sent him a map of a bush trail I’d been eyeing for a while.

I got up at 4 am and picked my mate up, and by just after 5 am, we were running on Runnyford Rd, from the Princes Highway between Mogo and Batemans Bay, through to Nelligan and back. It was perfect. There was light, misty rain the entire time, and although it made it a little humid, it was just enough to cool us off. We ran up hills, down hills, past farms, horses, cows, fucked up old rusty tractors, rivers, creeks, and bushland, all while talking mindless shit the whole time. Well, most of the time. There were some extended periods of silence towards the end, but those were just as nice.

You feel completely and utterly fucked when you finish. I felt fucked 15k before I finished. But you also feel fucking amazing. I’ve used running to switch off and escape from the rigours of life for a long time now. I use it the exact same way I use drugs and alcohol. The more I stress, the more I want to use it.

I’ve been sore most of the week, but it feels good. Most importantly, though, my mood has been notably better since Sunday. I don’t know how it happens, but I feel like I took some mental rubbish out to the trail on Sunday and left a lot of it out there; mentally, I’m so much better for it.

Thing 3

A friend rang me early this week, and the conversation started as any normal conversation between two mates would. We exchanged typical pleasantries. “Hey man, what’s happening? What have you been up to?” Out of nowhere, he said, “I think I’m going to go to an NA (Narcotics Anonymous) meeting”.

Trying to play it cool, I asked, “Oh really? Why? What’s been happening?”.

He was in a pretty bad way as he explained what had been happening over the last few months. I was shocked for two reasons.

I had no idea he’d been struggling this much. We speak regularly. He has his shit together.

The second reason was how eerily similar his story was to my own. He had done so many of the same things I did only 20 to 24 months ago.

The universe works in funny ways. I’d never wish this experience on anyone, but I’m glad he chose to ring me. I’m glad it happened when it did, too. Just last week, I was talking about how I’d been going through the motions and somewhat neglecting my sobriety and how that was concerning coming into a period where I’d lose the structure of work for an extended period.

I’ve been speaking to my mate every day, multiple times a day. On the phone, via text and in person. It’s been like taking a walk down memory lane. I can see so much of my old self in him. He’s a good person, doing it tough, and his behaviours have become unaligned with his values, and I think that is what we struggle with the most. Often, we can’t believe what we have let happen. That’s the hardest thing to accept.

In our conversations, we’ve been exchanging stories. I’ve been sharing so much of what I have learned over the last almost 20 months, and as much as it’s been a horrible time for him, it’s been exactly what I needed. Every time I say something to him, I have to think about it, then I have to say or type it, and then I have to hear it. By helping him, I am reinforcing all the things that I have done and continue to do to help manage my sobriety and, in turn, my mental health.

It feels good to help others, especially when you feel like you have the knowledge and experience to do so. It gives a sense of purpose and value. I have something to offer my friend that can genuinely help him. I had to go through some shit to get it, but now that I have it, it’s wasted if I don’t share it.

My mate has a tough road ahead, but he’s doing well, and hopefully, I can be as involved as he needs or wants me to be in helping him dig his way out of this shit. I told him that as wild as it sounds, this is a fantastic opportunity for him. He gets to start from scratch and rebuild himself how he wants. As I said, I wouldn’t wish this experience on anyone, but I know I’m better for going through it and coming out the other side, for now…

Back To Basics

There are some obvious takeaways from this last week or so for me. Namely, having soft knee’s when getting fucking sick air on a motorbike jump…

Seriously though, I think that the answers we are looking for are often correct before our eyes, but we’re looking for them elsewhere. We believe there has to be some grandiose solution to our ever-so-complex problems, but it’s rarely the case.

The things that helped me snap out of my own bullshit were simple.

I set aside time to spend at home with my family, with no time-critical tasks to be done. We created an environment without pressure to get a certain amount of work done by a specific time. An environment where spending time together was the main activity, and anything else done during that time was nothing more than a bonus. Almost actively doing nothing together.

The second thing I did was take myself away from all the places that were causing me stress. I got out in nature, challenged myself physically, and had conversations that weren’t important. Conversations where the result wouldn’t make the difference between the business I run does or doesn’t make money that day. Agendaless, mindless fuckin’ drivel. Something I realised I hadn’t done much of lately. Everything had become so severe recently. I needed to balance that out.

Lastly, I helped someone who needed my help more than I needed my own help. I don’t go to AA or NA or do any programs, but I do believe they are beneficial. One of their core beliefs is that to keep it, you have to give it away. This means that if you want to maintain your sobriety, you have to help others achieve and maintain their own sobriety, too.

I think I was getting too caught up in my own bullshit. I was too far inside my head to see what was happening. It’s like I had tunnel vision, so focused on making it through to the Christmas break that I had forgotten that I was living right here, right now.

I’d shifted away from some of the very things that helped me make so much of the progress I’ve made over the last 20 months. Less time being fully present with my family. Less effort is made to connect with friends. Less time and energy spent on practising sobriety. Although I’ve been running every morning, I’ve been running the same track, at the same time, in the dark and been doing minimal running in nature, away from the buildings, concrete, cars, trucks and buses.

I feel like I’ve learned a lot this week and am in a much better place. I know what to do to snap out of these funks.

The challenge from here is, how do I identify that I’m slipping into a funk sooner and prevent it from dragging on as long as this one has?

I’d love to know your ideas!