Breakdown
Thoughts on hitting bottom and bouncing back
Three weeks ago today, I had a breakdown at school. It happened after I presented photographs I’d taken for an assignment that I found very difficult because it pushed me way out of my comfort zone. Though I did not enjoy the project, I was proud of myself for having pushed through the fear and discomfort, and I was excited about quite a number of the resulting photos.
The instructor, however, was considerably less enthusiastic about them than me, and said in so many words that he thought I’d missed the mark and hadn’t really fulfilled the assignment. At that point, we’d already been going for about two hours (I was the last student to present.), so he called for a coffee break. I was stunned and rather speechless at having received a reaction so completely different than I’d expected. So I grabbed my jacket and went down to the interior courtyard of the school so I could catch my breath and collect myself.
But when I got outside, I found I was furious. And crushed. And completely alone. As the minutes ticked by, I only got more angry as I paced back and forth, back and forth, my heart and mind racing. After a while, I knew the coffee break was long since over, but I realized it would be foolish to go back to class, because I had lost control of myself. I didn’t even really know what was happening, only that I was out of control. I was aware that I was behaving irrationally, and that I had backed myself into an awkward and embarrassing corner by staying outside, but I felt paralyzed, unable to do anything, and with no idea of what I even could do. So I just kept pacing in the freezing cold.
After probably close to an hour had gone by, one of my classmates texted to say that they were breaking for lunch. I saw my chance, so I went back inside and packed up my stuff, texted my classmates a brief apology, and then went home, where I proceeded to rant and rave to my husband about it all.
It was really one of the more surreal experiences of my life. But even while it was happening, I knew that this was about way, way more than having received critical feedback. The dam had finally cracked, and what flowed out was several years’ worth of stress and anxiety and fear and rage and grief. The global pandemic, the racial unrest, the increasingly radical religious and political extremism, the many cancer diagnoses and deaths around me, the severe drought and insane wildfires, the mass shootings, the ongoing traumas of growing up in a doomsday fundamentalist cult, the move overseas, my career upheaval and school stresses, an always-lurking feeling of impostor syndrome, and on and on and on—it all finally caught up to me, and I just broke.*
That evening, I went out for a drink, and the tears started. I wiped them away openly and without shame; every one was fully justified and long overdue.
Later that night, the instructor sent me several kind, thoughtful, caring texts. And he also explained the next assignment, which he said he suspected I would find very interesting. The last thing I wanted in that moment was more homework, but I thanked him anyway.
I spent Saturday trying to regroup, occasionally shedding some more tears, and assuring my husband that I knew I was definitely not okay, and that I would be reaching out to a therapist to start dealing with all of this.
On Sunday, I needed to tackle the aforementioned next school assignment, which was loosely based on some of the work of American photographer Arthur Tress. In a nutshell, I was to use photography of the outside world to try to express my inner thoughts and emotions. How timely.
I told Andrew that I wanted to go hiking somewhere ugly, because that was how I was still feeling. So we went to a park east of Milan in a fairly industrial area, much of which was abandoned.
I began shooting shortly after getting off the train, and I soon found that I was settling into the rhythm of the exercise quite easily. I had a LOT of emotions to express, and I shot indiscriminately, almost wildly. There was bleakness all around me, and I reveled in shooting it all, in ways I’d never done before. I deliberately overexposed, and underexposed, and jerked my camera around while using a slow shutter speed to blur my subjects. I felt unleashed.
I believe this 2-hour shoot was a turning point for me. It changed the way I think about my camera and my relationship to it. I found it exhilarating to intentionally try to speak through photography. I finally began to understand what one of our earlier instructors had meant when he said that we should think of ourselves as “authors” rather than merely “photographers,” and that we should always try to communicate our own point of view, rather than simply documenting what is in front of us. (I recognize that this might seem like a pretty basic principle for a photographer to understand, but for me it felt revelatory.)
In the weeks since, I’ve been climbing out of the rubble. It felt like such a relief to have hit bottom. The experience triggered an (ongoing) conversation with leadership at the school, as well as with my classmates, about some of the many frustrations we had with how the year was unfolding, and I think that's already bringing about positive changes. I’ve also been working with a new therapist, and while it’s too early to tell if she’s the right fit, it feels reassuring just to have a professional involved. Finally, I’ve been kinder and gentler with myself since the breakdown. Twice—TWICE!—I’ve even taken a day off from my massive To Do list, because I realized I didn’t feel like doing anything except taking care of myself and “simply being” (as my meditation app puts it). Yesterday I was on the couch, just reading and watching Netflix all day. It felt lovely; it’s what I needed, and I didn’t want it to end.
Anyway, I share this unpretty and, frankly, embarrassing tale because I have to believe that I am far from the only one who is struggling right now. Everyone has their own story, with varying levels of severity, but we have all been through A LOT in recent years. Glancing at social media might easily lead one to suppose that everyone has just moved on, that all that is over and things are back to “normal.” But that is not my experience, and I suspect it’s the same for many of you. Many very real mental health challenges remain, for many people.
If you find yourself in that boat—sinking from stress, or anxiety, or depression, or anger, or fear—please don’t let yourself unravel to the point of a breakdown like I did. This is a case of do as I say, not as I did.
Be intentionally kind to yourself. (It feels good, I promise!) Treat yourself like you would treat your best friend. Ask for help! Reach out to those in your life you love and trust. And if you need more than they can offer, call a professional. Therapists and coaches can work wonders!
I made all the photographs featured here on that Sunday, and I think they captured those moments in time in a perfectly imperfect way for me. I’m fond of all of them, though I’m also grateful to no longer be in as dark of a place.
Take care of you. And peace be with us all.
-Michael
*Looking back, something somewhat similar happened maybe a year into the pandemic. While working from home, I had a call that I found to be exasperating and infuriating, and when I went downstairs for lunch afterward, I was raging and cursing, and I realized that I was so angry that I wanted to punch my fist through the sliding glass doors of our dining room. I’d never had such a thought before, and it scared me. So in hindsight, my eventual trip to Urgent Care after an anxiety attack seems rather easily predicted.
Breakdowns and breakthroughs seem closely related.
The photos are beautiful. You are expressing what many of us are feeling. Keep on keeping on!