September 27, 2023
Cindy Lopez:
Welcome. My name is Cindy Lopez, the host of this CHC podcast, Voices of Compassion. We hope you find a little courage, feel connected and experience compassion every time you listen. Today’s podcast episode underscores the power of resilience, understanding and growth in the face of mental health challenges. Join us for this conversation with Jack and his mom, Cheri. Jack was a teen who seemingly had it all, popular with his peers, strong friendships, a leader on the varsity track team and a really strong student, graduated as valedictorian of his class. Yet, beneath the surface, Jack grappled with an internal battle with anxiety and OCD that would reshape his life in unexpected ways. How could this accomplished student and leader on the track struggle with these feelings that seemed insurmountable? Cheri, Jack’s mom, expresses that she knew something wasn’t quite right, but wasn’t sure how to help. And then Jack started talking about what was going on underneath the surface. Cheri knew that Jack needed help and she was determined to find that help even though it proved challenging. Join us to hear this conversation with Jack and his mom. It’s a story about struggle, but it’s also about hope and resilience.
So why don’t you start Jack and Cheri just by telling us a little bit about yourselves.
Jack:
So, I’m 18. I just graduated high school a couple months ago. I’m going off to college. I’m going to study biology, which I’m super excited about.
During high school, I did cross country. I was really into the running teams. I was a really good student. I did all the like difficult classes, put a lot of work into that.
Cindy Lopez:
He’s being a little, what’s the word?… thank you. Modest. He’s being a little modest because he was valedictorian.
Jack:
Yeah. Yeah, that was fun.
Cindy Lopez:
That too.
Jack:
But yeah, I mean, high school wasn’t easy, and I’m sure we’ll get into it. There was a lot of, uh, difficult things going on.
Cheri:
And I’m Cheri, I’m mom, and as Cindy said, you know, we are a very typical family. Jack has a younger sister. They’re both into athletics and academics and pretty well rounded kids. So, and he is a pretty good kid.
Cindy Lopez:
Cheri then, as Jack’s mom, like he described himself a little bit. How would you describe him today, you said, kind of typical, well rounded kid?
Cheri:
You know, he is from the outside a very normal looking kid. He is a bit of a perfectionist. After we’ve kind of gone through the anxiety and mental health struggles that we’ve gone through with him in the last couple of years, I can actually go back and look at him when he was younger and point out things like, oh, this was probably a sign of him being, you know, the perfectionist that he is and the amount of, like, stress he would put on himself, you know, to the point of at three wanting to learn to write his letters and being really angry when his A didn’t look like my A because it wasn’t perfect and, you know, trying to get him to realize, there is no perfect. He’s always strived to be, you know, the top in his class and, you know, and things like that. So he’s put a lot of pressure on himself.
Cindy Lopez:
Is that also part of your growing up? Like, do you have the perfectionist thing too or are you totally different?
Cheri:
I can see myself in it definitely.
Jack:
She definitely does a little bit.
Cheri:
Totally. I think more now as an adult than when I was a kid. I mean I’d have to ask my mom, but I don’t think I was a perfectionist as a kid, but definitely as I got older you know, I would want to do the best I could do. You know, things had to be a certain way and having kids, you know, you kind of have to learn to throw some of that out the window.
Jack:
Even, my grandparents, like both of them are pretty perfectionists.
Cindy Lopez:
Oh, really?
Jack:
Definitely kind of runs in the family there.
Cindy Lopez:
So you might come by it kind of naturally.
So, Jack, I did obviously mention that you were valedictorian at your high school this past spring, and in your address to the school community at the graduation ceremony, you talked about your challenges with anxiety and OCD. Do you want to talk a little bit more about that time in your life?
Jack:
Yeah, so that speech, I’m still super proud of it. I just really wanted to like say something that was a little bit more, I guess, real. I feel like a lot of the valedictorian speeches I’ve heard have been like really good, but they kind of just surface level like we did it. And I wanted to talk about like a little bit more, so I went into my experience with anxiety and OCD, which was pretty tied to my experience throughout high school. I mean, I’ve always been like a nervous, kind of anxious person as my mom just mentioned, but like going into high school, I feel like it started to get worse or at least I started to have a lot harder of a time managing it. And so I believe I told my mom that I thought I had anxiety back in like sophomore year. And so then I started getting treatment, but then my junior year ramped up because I took on way more than I probably should have, and then that got super overwhelming, and it kind of reached a point where like I was a super competitive cross country and track runner, and then I couldn’t compete anymore, because there was just, like, the anxiety of competing was just way too high, and I felt like I would rather just not race than win because there was that super high stress on competition. And then in school it was like something about being in class taking tests being around the people it just got super super overwhelming, and I started having like panic attacks every week and like I couldn’t go to school dances because it was just way too much, and it really just like started to kind of dictate my life managing the experience of anxiety.
Cheri:
It was really hard as a parent to watch him go through this because we didn’t know, I mean, he always seemed to handle things so well. You know, eighth grade is notorious, at least in our school district, for being really hard and really stressful on the kids, and you know he definitely was stressed out, and it definitely had an impact on him, but he handled it so well. I mean, he delivered a debate that he did an amazing job on, a 10 minute speech that, he would sit there and say, oh, that was fun, it was no big deal. And, you know, so then to see him start to struggle with this anxiety and be like, I can’t go to school.
Cheri:
It was completely surprising, you know, and we were getting phone calls from him, you know, that I’m having an anxiety attack at school, and I can’t be here. And, when it all started he and I had, you know, your typical parent teenager argument and as we sat down to discuss it afterwards, you know, and kind of try to calmly go through why each one of us reacted the way we did. The conversation just kind of went sideways, and he was getting really upset and really emotional and, you know, not to discount how he was feeling about things. His reaction and his emotion was just so out of character for him, and I said, what’s going on here? You know, I said, I feel like you’re more upset than you should be. And I said, like, is there something more going on here and, you know, should we contact your doctor? That was my first instinct.
Cindy Lopez:
And so what was that like for you, Jack, did you also think you needed help at that time?
Jack:
Yeah, at that point I had been thinking about it for a while, but it’s a very difficult thing to bring up and kind of talk about and get to a point in a conversation where you can say that, and so that was like honestly kind of a lucky way to segue into it and kind of have that conversation.
Cindy Lopez:
So Jack, did your thinking about how you’re feeling, was there a stigma associated with that? Were there some preconceived ideas about how you thought others might react?
Jack:
Yeah for sure. There’s just the huge stigma around like saying that you need help, that you can’t handle it because from the outset it looks like everyone else can handle it, everyone else is doing fine, like why can’t I do it?
Jack:
There’s a lot of like culturally of like people being like, oh, the kids are just faking it, or oh, it’s just for attention, or you know, mental illness is a trend, and so that makes it even harder to try and say hey, I need help, because then there’s the worry that like, societally, or even like by specific people, you’re just gonna be brushed off as just like someone who’s part of the wave.
Cheri:
Well, and when this all started for you, you know, we were just coming out of the first COVID wave I mean, at this point it was February of ’21 and he hadn’t even gone back to in person school yet, but there was already, like he said, this trend of mental health, you know, it was, you were starting to hear about it a lot and it was becoming very tied to COVID and, oh, it’s because of COVID and one of the things that I remember when we started seeking help, Jack said to me, this is not because of COVID, and he says, “I don’t want anyone to say, oh, it’s because of COVID.” And, you know, so that was a really real thing. And to be perfectly honest, you know, from my perspective, I’ve never had an experience with someone with anxiety disorder, and I didn’t know. And frankly, there was a part of me that was like, let’s just go down this path, we’ll get through it because it really truly is COVID related. And that’s where my brain was in the very beginning, you know, but I kept that to myself.
Cindy Lopez:
So. You know, speaking of COVID, mental health, like you can’t really hear or look at headlines and not see a mental health headline these days. So, Jack, does that make it easier to talk about? …like, with your friends, do you talk about it? And does it make it easier because it’s like part of a kind of national conversation right now, or is it dismissed as like, oh, everybody’s talking about that?
Jack:
Yeah. It’s kind of yes and no. It is like easier to bring up and starting the conversation has become a lot easier, but I’ve noticed with friends and other people who have talked about like trying to bring it up to parents, there’s just that worry that you are going to be dismissed; what you’re trying to say is going to be dismissed as you just following that trend of, you know, everyone has a mental illness these days, everyone wants to be special. It’s kind of like the type of thing you hear, which I think makes it harder, and then also like in my generation it’s become kind of like a joking, like superficial thing to kind of talk about mental health, which I think in a way is helpful because it does help destigmatize things, but then it becomes harder to have like the real conversation about what’s happening.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah. And are you able to have the real conversation with your friends?
Jack:
Yeah, certainly with some of them that I’m particularly close to, like, we’re able to have those, you know, harder more difficult conversations, which is super valuable of course.
Cindy Lopez:
And they get it.
Jack:
Yeah.
Cheri:
There was the initial conversation, and we started seeking help and he had therapy and then we went into summer and everything seemed fine and then the new school year started and things kind of went sideways. And I remember having a conversation with a mom who he runs with her son, and he had tried to share with the cross country team that you know, I’m going through this, I’m not going to be able to compete, the support from his coach was amazing, and he’s like, you run when you can, you race when you can, if you don’t race, that’s fine too, but you’re still part of the team. And when he tried to have this conversation with his teammates, what translated back was Jack’s taking too many IB classes at school, he’s too stressed out.
Cheri:
And when I said, let me tell you exactly what’s going on. So the way kids understand it and interpreted what was going on was different too.
Cindy Lopez:
Right. So that time, so you were on the varsity track team and at some point in time you realized that you had to do something differently. So it sounds like you just went to the coach what was that conversation like?
Jack:
Yeah, there’s like a specific point because there’s summer training, which I was fine with. And then at the end of sophomore year, there was track season, and I thought I was just burnt out from the races, but I was having a harder and harder time with competition. It was really freaking me out. And there was one race, the last race of the year that was optional, and I just like pulled out of it the night before cause I was like, I can’t do this, but I kind of brushed that off as like, oh, I’m just, you know, burnt out. And then going into junior year with cross country season, part of it is that we had a super competitive team, like we had runners that got like these huge scholarships to schools. We were trying to like go to state finals and place really high, maybe even win. And so there was like kind of that pressure on it, and it was the first little mini race of the year that was just on the team, just supposed to kind of figure out where you’re at after summer training, and I just couldn’t do it. Like the entire day at school leading up to it, I was just like feeling super panicky, I was super freaked out. And then when it came time for practice, like, I couldn’t even go to where the team was meeting. I was kind of like hiding near the gym, and I tried to call mom and dad, but they were on the other side of the country doing a family thing.
Cheri:
We were at a funeral.
Jack:
Yeah. So I couldn’t get to them and it was just like this mounting, like I just could not imagine racing. It just felt like way too much, and I just didn’t want to do it. It wasn’t even that I was worried about losing, like, I just would rather not race, that was just it.
Cheri:
That day was terrible, because we did get the call from him as we were leaving the reception following the funeral, and he was like I can’t do this, and he’s like, I’m hiding in my car, you know, my teammates are calling me. I mean, I didn’t know what to do. I’m on the other side of the country. There was nothing I could do, and I said, you need to get to your coach. And he says, he’s busy. He’s up there. And their old coach was still there, and there was like a transition with the coaches. And I said, just call coach. He will come find you, and he did. He sat with him and then it was about a week later that I contacted the coach again and said, “hey, can we have a conversation cause you know, there’s issues going on,” and he came to our house and that’s when he and Jack talked.
Jack:
Yeah. And it was basically like, I can’t race right now, like I don’t want to race right now. And he was like, that’s fine, take a few weeks, like, do whatever you need. Like, he was super, super kind about it. He’s an amazing guy. And then the season kept going and it was just, I couldn’t do it. Like, we went to a race course prior to a race just to like practice it. And I like had a panic attack just trying to run it, like, not even racing, just run a race course, and so I didn’t race for the majority of that season. And then when I did, I was not nearly as good or competitive as I used to be.
Mike:
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Cindy Lopez:
So… I’m wondering Jack, we’re talking more and more to educators and schools whose teachers are seeing students have panic attacks in the classroom, and they’re not sure how to respond. So we’re working with teachers on that front, but I wonder for you as a student having a panic attack experience, what’s that like?
Jack:
It’s terrifying, and if you know what’s happening it’s slightly better, cause once you’ve had enough of them, once you’ve spoken to a professional who can kind of tell you like this is what your body is doing, you can like notice the signs of when it’s coming, but even then you kind of just lose control. It’s just like fear, like it’s a very, I don’t want to say primal, but it’s like something deep down, a lizard brain response, like I can’t do this, hyperventilating. Some people are like crying while they’re doing it, like it’s different for different people. For me personally, it’s just like hyperventilating and then hyperventilating makes me like start to cry. And then I just like can’t do anything. I can’t talk if it gets really bad like my muscles get so tense, I can’t really move, but that’s like the really, really bad ones. And so when they’re happening in class, like I just kind of have to get out of class. I don’t want to be like that around people.
Cindy Lopez:
How would you like people to respond to you if they see that’s happening? Jack:
The best thingfor me personally is just to be ignored. Like, act like you don’t notice it, just like… you know, don’t even ask, like, hey, are you okay? Can I get you anything? Because at that point, it’s like, I can’t respond. I don’t want to respond. Just, let me get over this type thing.
Cheri:
That was a hard thing to learn because my instinct was are you okay? What’s going on? What can I do? You know, those kinds of things. And to learn just don’t talk to him, you know, and maybe we talk about it a few hours later, but in the throes of it because I would go and pick him up from school, and he would be out of the panic attack and at that point frustrated and angry and upset, and I would try to talk to him like any parent would, and it took me a while to realize just don’t talk. He just needs to know I’m there, you know, and the support is there, but to just let him be for a while.
Cindy Lopez:
So it sounds like you did have some resources at school. We hear this a lot, mental health professionals talk about having allies and basically like trusted adults for students who they can talk to. It sounds like your coach is one of those, but maybe talk a little bit about were there other resources at your school? Every school is set up differently. So just wondering what that was like for you at your school. Was there a place you could go?
Jack:
Yeah, so there were school counselors, but I didn’t for me personally find them particularly helpful, but what was super helpful for me, there was a school therapist who was there maybe three days a week. The first time I had like a really big panic attack and just needed to leave school he was there. He brought me into his office and just kind of sat me down and kind of forced me to talk, which I was not happy about at the time, but I think in the end was somewhat helpful. And he continued to meet with me like every week or two and couldn’t do it consistently and definitely wouldn’t be like a way to treat mental illness, but it’s just like having a person on campus who knows what’s going on and is just there to say like, “hey, how are things going? How are you doing?”… that was pretty helpful, and it just was nice to know. And then the other thing that was helpful is one of the secretaries, she was amazing, and she knew it was happening, and she understood that sometimes I just needed to go. And so, she just being so understanding about that was also really, really helpful.
Cindy Lopez:
So we’ve talked about your panic attacks, kind of the severe anxiety sounds like led to panic attacks. When did the OCD come in? And for our listeners, in case you don’t know, OCD, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
Jack:
Yeah, it was something that I had always kind of like guessed, like, oh, you know, maybe I have this just because I am a perfectionist and there are like little things I do, but it hasn’t really been, at least from my understanding, I didn’t think it was a particularly significant thing until I had a checkup with my psychiatrist at some point. I don’t even remember when.
Cheri:
It was… April of ’22.
Jack:
Okay, yeah, and then all of a sudden he started asking me these questions that just kept going and all of a sudden our 15 minute appointment was an hour and 15 minutes and at the end of it he was like, alright, yeah, so you have OCD.
And, so, from my understanding, the way that kind of like manifests in me is there are like the classic OCD things that you think of. So there’s some things I do where it’s like if I touch something with one hand, or foot, or whatever, I have to touch it with the other, and then you keep bouncing back and forth because now it’s too much on the left, too much on the right, and then you’re kind of just stuck there, you just keep doing it, and if your anxiety’s really bad you keep doing that more and more and more. And so there’s little things like that, those are like your, you know, your classic, what you think about OCD things.
Yeah. And then there’s also just like times where your brain just says like you want to do this and you can’t stop thinking about doing this. And that’s just like all you’re thinking about, and it’s like really hard to try and like manage where your head’s at, type thing, and it’s always anxiety makes it worse, like I can remember, I think it was before senior year, I was really nervous to go to school, and I started reading a book, and I like reading, but I’m not the type of person to finish a book in one sitting, but then I just kind of got into this OCD spiral of like, you have to keep reading, you have to keep going, you have to keep going. And then it got dark outside, and I was straining my eyes, but I just kept reading it and reading it and I read for four hours and I finished the entire book in one sitting, which I just don’t do, but it was because, like, I couldn’t stop myself. I couldn’t fight it. And that was, of course, you know, like, when I’m feeling good, when I’m happy, I can manage it. I can work with it. But when the anxiety is getting bad, there’s not much you can do.
Cindy Lopez:
I’m a worrier. And so I can relate to, you know, the thoughts kind of getting stuck, and getting stuck with your thoughts. Does that happen with you? Is that kind of like anxiety driven?
Jack:
Yeah, for sure. To my understanding, there is like an element of OCD and anxiety that interact where OCD will just like take a thought and just like keep it. You can’t stop thinking about it. And then it becomes the second layer where you’re just like, but why can’t I stop thinking about this? Why does this keep going? And then it becomes you can’t stop thinking about that, and then all of a sudden, like, all of your brain space is taken up, just, like, spinning around, one innocuous thought you had that you can’t get rid of.
Cindy Lopez:
So Jack, I know your mom just said a few minutes ago, like, you know, we need to contact the doctor. And then it sounds like you’re also now seeing a psychiatrist, but let’s talk about, what are the tools that have been most helpful for you? Treatment, therapy, are there strategies that you’re learning in therapy that help you?
Jack:
Yeah, so, I’ve kind of had a series of therapists, professionals, etc. The first time we went to the doctor, I got kind of their, I can’t remember what they call it, like, emergency, or…
Cheri:
Yeah, they had a…yeah, it was a crisis therapy, they had an acronym for it, and it was like, rapid therapy, and it was like, 6 to 8 one hour visits like every other week, and he maxed out on those and came out of it fine, like he thought he was good. We thought we’ve gotten through this hump, which again, going back to what I said earlier, kind of reinforced my original thoughts of, ah, I see it was COVID. We’ll let him think what it was, but it truly was COVID. We were getting ready to go back to school in person, blah, blah, blah. You know, so that unfortunately for me, reinforced that, you know, it was just related to COVID, and we’ve now gotten through this, and he’ll be fine.
Jack:
Yeah, so the second time, uh, in my junior year, we went back to the doctor, and I got like a long term therapist, but because, you know, there’s so many people who are dealing with it, I couldn’t get very many appointments. And so then, it started being, well then let’s try to find like something outside, so we started doing like the online therapy options, and those just weren’t really working for me. The people I was meeting I didn’t really click with. And so then finally, after the OCD diagnosis came in, that qualified us for financial assistance to get outside therapy.
Cheri:
I’m going to change your timeline just a little bit. The therapist that he saw at school, recommended this facility here locally. And, it was kind of one of those places where the therapists are getting their clinical hours and they’re overseen by therapists. And so I reached out to them, and we started seeing them and at this point I was in such a triage mode it was like I’m just going to throw my credit card, and I don’t care how much it cost. And thankfully because of the way this facility is set up it wasn’t an astronomical fee and then the OCD diagnosis came in and because of that the insurance company approved additional outside therapy.
And so then we had the therapist he had been seeing, which was very unstable. It would be again, the practice was full and so it be three weeks, four weeks, five weeks, two weeks, you know and so he would have anxiety attacks and things happening between these visits and not getting the support within these visits, and I was at this point where I needed this kid to be able to be a kid and to feel like a 16 year old kid. And he was not. And I wanted him to look back on high school and not hate the four years. I wanted him to be able to go into his senior year and enjoy it and embrace it and have fun. And so, that was my goal with this new therapist. And I said, I don’t care at this point how often you need to see him, if it’s twice a week, if it’s once a week, you know, every other week, whatever he needs. And thankfully the insurance company then with this additional OCD diagnosis, while it was surprising, it was the biggest blessing to us because it enabled us to get the outside therapy covered, which has been fantastic, and it’s given him the freedom and so much changed for him.
I can remember talking with that new therapist, the short term goal was, you know, what do you want in the next 4 weeks? And I said, prom is coming up, he’s never been able to make it through a dance without an anxiety attack. I want him to go to prom, I want him to have fun, and we had a whole plan around prom. Their school travels out of town for their prom. My husband and I went and had dinner nearby, and we were on call in case we to go pick him up and bring him home, and he made it through prom. So we met that short term goal. And then the next goal, you know, and we slowly went on. Prior to that, just before he started seeing the therapist we’d just come back from a vacation in Hawaii, and you think, okay, we’re in Hawaii, everything’s relaxed, we’re having a great time, and you had an anxiety attack when we arrived, one or two while we were there, another one when we got home. And I’m like, how? How? You know, we’re on vacation you know, this shouldn’t happen.
Cindy Lopez:
So, also, that says to me too, it’s not necessarily related to, you know, what’s happening around you, your environment, right? That it’s something about how you’re wired and how you respond.
Cheri:
Yeah, those were all the eye opening things for me that was when things really started clicking with me that, you know, this isn’t related to, you’re stressed out from school, you just had a whole bunch of tests, which was true, but that’s not the reason.
Cindy Lopez:
So Jack, are there strategies that you’ve learned and use now that help you?
Jack:
Yeah, there’s the kind of like instant ones for like when you’re having a panic attack, you know, like try to get to a space where you feel more comfortable, try to take deep breaths, remind yourself that, like, it will end, it will pass, this won’t happen forever. And so that kind of helps you get through the panic attacks, and then for the more, like, long term anxiety, there’s a ton of things, and it’s gonna be different for every person what actually ends up helping, but the things that in working with my therapist I found that particularly helped me is, one thing he says all the time is just watch your thoughts without, you know, clenching on to them or judging them. If you have like a self-critical anxious thought if you can almost like sit there and watch it like ticker tape and then instead of judging yourself for having that thought, which will make it worse, or internalizing that thought, which makes it worse, just be like, oh, there’s a thought and then go on with your life, which is obviously very difficult, but and it’s very hard when you’re in like a very anxious mode to kind of like take a step back and just kind of look at your thoughts from that kind of objective view, but that’s something that is helpful for me, for my personality just to be able to just look at it.
Cheri:
You haven’t told me that he told you to do that, that’s actually pretty cool.
Cindy Lopez:
Obviously you’re a runner, does exercise help?
Jack:
Yeah, for sure. I mean, when it comes to running, it’s like, competition definitely made it worse, so there’s kind of like that double edged sword, but in terms of just like, if I don’t go for a run for a few days, I start to feel kind of bad and going for a run is just there’s like, of course, exercise releases endorphins and serotonin, et cetera, et cetera, but there’s also just like, running is really helpful because it just kind of lets you think, you know, your body’s occupied. It’s really hard to get like, particularly anxious while you’re just out for a run, and it’s a really nice way to step away from things.
Cindy Lopez:
So Cheri, as a mom, like, what do you really want parents to hear from you today? What do you think is most important for parents to hear?
Cheri:
Don’t give up. Don’t give up. Don’t give up. It’s a fight. One of my mom’s friends is a healthcare professional, and she was the one who I was having the conversation with about, you know, the interpretation of it being stress versus the anxiety, and she’s the one who told me, she said, you are in triage mode now, you’re in the battle and she said, you have to fight hard because this age group, especially with boys is more susceptible to self-harm and suicide. There were three boys in our community who did die by suicide. And so that was my biggest fear and it was like, I’m not going to give this up. I cried on every shoulder I could find, you know, that would listen to me cause in the beginning he didn’t want anybody to know, and he didn’t want us to talk about it. And so I found people that I could trust, that I could talk to, and say, I need help you know, and support and stuff, but it really truly is, don’t give up.
Find the help for your kid. Our first call was to the doctor, which led to that first rapid therapy. I reached out to that therapist when things started going sideways, the beginning of his junior year and that therapist could no longer see him, but she actually did have a bridge appointment with him until we could get in with the long term therapist and while the long term therapist was good, it just wasn’t enough. I think she would have been fine if there had been the frequent, like the ability to see her every week, but that didn’t exist. And so then it was a continuous fight for more therapy, you know, so that’s when we tried online and then, it was a constant trying to just get him the help he needed, you know, and it was at every turn, like, I’m doing the best I can. Jack, I’m trying to find you somebody, you know, and so we landed on, you know, this golden guy that is perfect for Jack and, you know, he’s been phenomenal but it was, you know, from September to April, I was constantly fighting, you know. I was begging the therapist, to see him more, and she’s like, I can’t.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah I mean that is a reality I think of the world we’re living in we don’t have enough mental health therapists really. And so for our listeners, you can find out more about what we do at chconline.org. We do have free parent consultations. So if you’re interested, you can call our care team or contact our care team, careteam@chconline.org. If you’re in crisis, we also have crisis resources, numbers you can call. So we’ll have that in the show notes for you if you’re in that space and you’re just in crisis mode.
Cindy Lopez:
So, Jack, did you ever consider any self-harm or suicide ideation?
Jack:
No. Not really. I mean, of course all the medical professionals like ask you that all the time. And, cause it’s a really common case for anxiety and depression and suicidal ideation all get mixed up, but it was a pretty clear cut case of I was very anxious, very OCD.
Cindy Lopez:
So Jack, You’re not alone. Our listeners may be students or parents or teachers of those students are going through what you have gone through. Cindy Lopez:
So Jack, it kind of sounds like you’re on the other side. Like you’ve, I’m going to say, been through the worst of it. How does this continue to be part of your life?
Jack:
I mean, it’s never done, like, there’s always going to be stressors. There’s always going to be anxiety. I guess the part of not knowing what was going on and not having the tools to be able to manage things is over because now I do have a support network, I have people who know what’s happening, and, you know, I have professionals who I can reach out to, and so even if the anxiety isn’t over, even if I continue to have panic attacks and it gets worse again, at least I have people to reach out to, and I know how to get through it. And I think that’s the really important part.
Cindy Lopez:
Jack I was so impressed when I heard your valedictorian speech, I asked your mom if I could listen to the recording. I was so impressed with your comments that you shared with the school community, and I’m hoping you could share a little bit of that with us today.
Jack:
Yeah, for sure.
Hello everyone. I am so proud to be up here today with all of my fellow classmates. It has been a long, long road to get here for all of us. I am so grateful to have each and every one of you in my life and for the memories, experiences, and friendships that we’ve shared together. I also cannot understate how thankful I am for the SVHS teachers and staff who have worked tirelessly to give us an amazing experience at this school, and without whom none of us would be here today. More personally, I’d like to thank Todd Hoffman, for being the kindest, most amazing human I have ever been lucky enough to meet, and my parents, for always supporting me for all these years.
As I said, our road to this point has not been easy, and our journeys through high school have presented us with countless challenges. I know how I seem to many of you, the stereotypical smart kid who coasts into straight A’s and always seems to come out on top. Honestly, it’s easy to hide behind that image. In fact, we all know how easy it is to hide behind the expectations set for us, to pretend that everything is fine, to keep our every conversation behind that all too comfortable mask of superficiality, but it is not, and is never, the truth. So what is? The truth is, I am psychiatrically diagnosed with severe anxiety disorder and OCD. The truth is, I go to therapy every week and take antidepressants every morning. The truth is, that my junior year was the most difficult experience of my entire life, that I had severe anxiety attacks at school constantly, causing me to miss school weekly for months on end, that I nearly quit running, that I went from being one of the fastest cross country athletes in this county to not being on this school’s varsity, that I dropped out of the full IB program and submitted a request to drop my history class twice. The truth is, I have felt inadequate, like a failure, like I would never be enough. The truth is, we’ve all felt this way at some point in our lives, but we don’t talk about it, because it’s wildly difficult to discuss, and always far easier to hide it from each other and from ourselves. While vulnerability is terrifying, it is also liberating, beautiful, and honest. There’s no greater feeling than to open your heart fully to someone, despite the inevitable, unavoidable fear of doing so. As Todd Hoffman has told me, the bravest words a person can say are, “I need help.” So class of 2023, as we end this chapter of our lives and begin the next, be brave, be honest, and be vulnerable.
We will need this courage, as the next chapter of our lives is sure to be a daunting one. There have been and most certainly will be times when we look to our future and feel inadequate next to the enormity of the tasks set before us. However, we must remember that the most important step a person can take is always the next. That we always have the power to do something now, no matter how small, to push ourselves forward. That we can achieve amazing things by focusing on what step can be the next on the path to our goals. This lesson is especially important now as we take one of the biggest next steps of our lives. As we, no matter what path we have chosen, take on a new level of independence, discovery, and reinvention for ourselves. After getting to know this class for the last 13 years, I wholeheartedly believe that each and every one of you will succeed, and that the world will be all the better for it. That not only will you each achieve amazing things, but do so with incredible kindness, vulnerability, and bravery. I cannot wait to see what we as a class become and the amazing individuals we grow into. To close a speech that has been, as you all probably should have expected from me at this point, well over my time limit, I’d like to leave you with a quote from one of the greatest philosophers of our era, Elle Woods from hit 2001 film Legally Blonde: “it is with passion, courage of conviction and strong sense of self that we take our next steps into the world, remembering that first impressions are not always correct. You must have faith in people, and most importantly, you must always have faith in yourself. Congratulations, we did it.” And with that class of 2023 in each of your future endeavors, I wish you all the best.
Cheri:
I know, standing ovation.
Cindy Lopez:
That’s awesome.
Cheri:
There were two things about his valedictorian speech that you know were pretty amazing. I mean, other than the fact that, you know, the speech itself was pretty incredible to be that open and honest, and we didn’t know exactly what he was going to say. He said afterwards, when he started speaking, he said all of a sudden he could see a visual shift in the audience. And he said it was like a wave coming over the audience of people paying attention. And, you know, I told him, I said, well, the standard valedictorian speech was how you started out. You know, thanking everybody and here we are, we did it. And then you said these words, I’m psychiatrically diagnosed. And I said, no one has said that, you know, especially a kid your age, in front of 1500 people, you know saying that. And so it was really cool to hear that he saw that reaction immediately.
And then I was following him around after graduation as he was taking pictures with friends and the amount of people that stopped him and thanked him. And said things like you know I’m so glad you said that and thank you and you know, there was someone that we didn’t know that grabbed him by his arm and said, “hey, weren’t you the valedictorian, that was an amazing speech. Thank you so much.” There was a dad that must have talked to you for five minutes about his personal anxiety journey and how he felt the first time he had a panic attack and was thanking Jack for sharing that and, you know, getting it out there and helping kids.
Cindy Lopez:
Part of the story, I think that you’re trying to hit home with that Cheri is too is it’s important to talk about it. It’s important to talk about it because you’d never know what another person’s experience is or has been and Jack, you talking about it, you were able to impact other’s lives. So…
Cindy Lopez:
Jack, what is it, maybe something from your valedictorian speech, but what is it that you want to make sure your peers and or their parents or their teachers really hear from you today?
Jack:
Yeah, so for my peers, for other students and kids my age, the two biggest things to me are something I mentioned in the speech was be vulnerable, like it’s really difficult, but it’s really valuable as well because the way I kind of think about it is, you know, ten years from now, looking back, you’re not going to regret it being embarrassing I guess is what I’m thinking, like, that isn’t going to matter in the long term or that it’s awkward. What you’re going to remember is that you had that difficult conversation, that it was really valuable, and that’s what’s important. So, even though it’s hard, even though it’s awkward, fighting for that vulnerability is, I think, very important.
And then the second thing is, another thing I mentioned in the speech is that the most important step you can take is the next one, that was my senior quote. It comes from a very nerdy, thick fantasy book, but it was something that was really helpful to me, was this understanding that, you know, your first step, your last step, those don’t actually end up mattering, what matters is what you do now, what you can do right at this moment because it becomes really easy to be like, “oh, there’s no way I’ll ever be able to finish this. I’ll never be able to complete the classes. I’ll never be able to do whatever,” but really that’s in the future that doesn’t matter right now. What matters right now is just taking that step to be able to get there. And that’s important with mental health just as much as it is with everything.
And then when it comes to parents, and to the same extent, teachers, I mean, one of the big things is don’t dismiss things that kids tell you. It is very easy to say that, oh, they’re getting caught up in the trend, oh, this is just what everyone’s doing. And even if that is true, from a wide lens, it’s not true to the kid. To the kid, it’s something that’s very important. And so listening to them, believing them, trusting them, that’s what’s really going to matter, and that’s what’s going to be helpful. So that’s the biggest thing I can say. And also just being supportive, and if the kid says this is what I think will help me, just trusting. It’s difficult, you may think that you know what they need, and you can try and push for that, but ultimately it’s their journey, and the most helpful thing is to be there to support them. And so that’s kind of more parent focused. And then when it comes to teachers, kids may or may not reach out to you. They may or may not say anything, but the teachers who were most helpful to me were the ones I could tell understood what was happening or maybe they knew what was happening and they kind of let me figure it out for myself if I left class all of a sudden they weren’t you know going to embarrass me in front of the class. They weren’t going to call me out, they were just going to allow me to have that space and be understanding and so that was particularly helpful.
Cindy Lopez:
Thank you, Jack. It’s so important, I think, especially for educators, even for parents, for peers, to know that there are 1 in 5 of us who are dealing with some mental health challenges. So if you’re a teacher and you’re looking across your classes, you have a handful of students in every classroom that are dealing with stuff and you may or may not see it, but if you have that perspective in your mind as an educator, as a parent, as a peer, even with your friends, you tend to be more aware and more open to how you can help and to be looking for ways you can help. So thank you so much Jack and Cheri for sharing your time with us, for sharing the conversation and your journey and for being so honest about it.
To our listeners thank you again for joining us.
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