Personal

9 years ago I started a weblog when I was 16. I was an angry, impulsive, unfiltered kid with the power of the internet. The site was one of the most popular blogs on blogger.com. It was so successful that I decided this was what I wanted to do with my life. Not write – but give my opinion. I decided that my future would be… radio.

Inspired by my obsession with talk radio, I thought I could do radio. It was time to get my shit together. My girlfriend was pregnant and I was a delivery driver and pizza maker. I went to school and quickly got a job at my local radio station. At the time, I didn’t know that getting a radio job was like winning the lottery. Radio jobs do not exist. One time while visiting CBS Radio in Tampa, FL – the Program Director, a very nice 20-something year veteran at the station told me you get a radio job when someone dies.

I was answering the phones and doing production and voice-over work. I was still doing the pizza job and working about 65  hours a week to support my family. Life was good. But a point came when life really came to be what it is for most people – a yoyo of ups and downs. A roller coaster. Great successes and terrible tragedies.

I started doing weekends on the air. I was really good – quite a natural. But this wasn’t what I expected. I was actually never really allowed to give my opinion and for good reason. The station I worked at was a Hot AC – basically Adult Top 40. Music for Moms that still like the new stuff without the rap. I couldn’t make fun of the President or say “fuck”. But I had a stage to own music and say funny stuff. I was a host.

I love music and I’ve always loved radio – so even though I didn’t get into radio for this, it was still my passion. I eventually became the Afternoon Drive host and was later promoted to Program Director. At a local station, the PD is in charge. I am the General Manager’s right hand man. I was running the radio station. I was married. I would soon have another baby, a little girl coming soon. Things were good.

However, somewhere along the way my blog was found. On one stupid comment in some random post, for some reason I has posted my full name – and it’s not a common last name so it showed up easily in Google. The boss found it and told me I had to stop. If anyone discovered these past writings, I could be fired. So it had to end.

Life wouldn’t be completely kind for me though. On July 25th, 2009, my younger brother, Jason was killed by a drunk driver a month after his 21st birthday. He was someone I spent every single day with in our tiny house from the day he was born until I moved out when I was 20. Countless Disney vacations, summer camps, board games, video games, Nick Toons, Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Invader Zim, Starcraft, Hollywood Undead, rock shows and a million other things. He was my brother. And some dumb cocksucker killed him.

When someone that close to you dies, it really fucks you up. I was engaged to my girlfriend, our wedding was coming up and I had no choice but to be strong. I had a four siblings and two parents who needed someone to be strong. I did well in this role, but eventually it was just too much. I never stopped to deal with myself. I didn’t quite crack up – I just slowly deteriorated. The  first year went as good as it could. The second year after is when things started turning.

The stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. My therapist told me I was stuck in the bargaining phase of the cycle of grieving. In the beginning, I had no beliefs in the afterlife. When this tragic event happened to me, I couldn’t help but see signs and miracles everywhere and I truly believed that somehow my brother’s consciousness survived death and there might be something to this afterlife thing. This really was an amazing belief and it got me through the worst.

I came to found out that entire first year was most likely the denial phase. After a while I just slowly started doubting this belief until it was gone. N0w things were worse emotionally than the start of this thing. I was receiving mental health care and the Doc put me on a few different medications. Abilify, Klonopin, Trazadone. Talk about playing chemistry with your body. This stuff fucked my head up. My identity was gone. I was another person. One caused me to suffer from a condition called “akathasia” which was basically the most uncomfortable feeling ever. I couldn’t drive my car because I couldn’t stand sitting for that long. I couldn’t watch tv, just sitting there watching was almost painful. I just felt like existing inside my skin was the most torture I could take. I wanted to explode. It’s a truly insane feeling. Read about it here.

So then for the next year I was basically this Doctor’s guinea pig. They changed my medicine around so much trying to find the cure to cope with a brother’s death. They gave me one drug that made my hair fall out. A sleeping pill that lasted two days. And lots of Klonopin. Ooh boy. People love Klonopin. Not me – I fucking hate it and I blame it and my stupid Doctor for drugging me to death. My life was falling apart. I was barely alive.

I would go to work, I hated my job. I would do a shit job on the radio and I’d do a shit job at running the station. I would sleep in my car as often as possible and I’d even just lay down and sleep behind my desk. I didn’t give a shit. I was emceeing a lot of events throughout the years and I just did a shit job at these too. I was anti-social guy – it just didn’t work. I was failing.

The time came where I could take no more. I went to a new, very expensive Doctor. This guy was an actual MD Psychiatrist. The real deal helping me now. A true mental health expert. Not an idiot playing guessing games on my brain making my fucking hair fall out. At this point, my brain was mush with all these different drugs and going  through them all and stopping them for months at a time. It was damaging.

New Doc takes me off everything and puts me on some new stuff. Works great. Very good decision. Things are going to get better, I’m feeling very optimistic that I am now getting proper care in dealing with the death of my brother. I also have a therapist helping me. I’m going to get through this.

Two weeks later my boss calls me into his office. My boss was not just my boss. He was my mentor and my friend. A very trusted mentor and friend. He fired me. I was given a letter that was mostly bullshit, explaining the decision. Truth is, my shit job on the radio was better than EVERYTHING out there. I am a radio God. I am beyond talented at this point. I am major market talent. However, the big boss, the guy at the corporate level heard the weekend guy and just made a split decision to get rid of me and my on-air talent salary as well as my management salary and replace it with a minimum wage loser who copied everything I did on the radio. He was literally, the generic version of me. He sucks. Sorry Ryan, but it’s true. And just know – I saved his job multiple times because he was a shitty employee with a shitty attitude but he had a baby on the way so I let him keep his job.

So here I am – back to writing. Off the pills and slowly getting my brain back.  Things are going to get crazy again. But so much has changed since I wrote this stuff. For 5 years I wrote a lot of crazy shit and I was definitely a specific guy. I’ll say this – when you have kids, everything changes. We’ll get into that next time.

For now, I declare that The Sick is back and it’s time to rock this motherfucker once again.