I'll just put this out on the table - I hate writing bios for myself. In most social sites I use the About Me section is either blank, a list of my gaming handles, or some cryptic phrase that probably makes me look like a douchenozzle. But I've realized some of the things I've been writing lately would be better served by having a little background behind them. I'm sure once I get going I will find an eyebrow-raisingly large amount of things to talk about, however. Off we go, then!
My name is Sarah, known to my internet friends as nomikkh and don't ask me why I don't capitalize it. I've had that handle since I was in high school back in the olden times of dial-up and 3.5 inch floppies, and now that its been ages since then it looks weird to me capitalized. I've been blogging on and on for a long time, starting with an online journal about my experiences being a barista in college - I say online journal because blogs hadn't been invented yet, which gives you an idea of my age I suppose. Get those damn monkeys off my lawn, you misbegotten snot-rockets! After college I started a personal blog which was mainly stories about working in the restaurant industry. As you can imagine, not many of those stories were positive and eventually I shut it down because it was feeding my growing sense of misanthropy, one that is unfortunately (but in a lot of cases justified) all too common in that business. Because, as much as I claim to be a cynic and a hater, I honestly enjoy helping people. I'd like to leave this planet in a better state than I found it in. Now I work for a non-profit organization, and I can honestly say I've never been more content with what I do for a living. This will be relevant later, so hopefully that doesn't sound like a bunch of self-righteous chest puffery.
Clearly I love games. PC, console, tabletop, mobile, and physical. I was probably a chance meeting away from a serious LARPing habit in high school. Also, like many gamers, I grew up surrounded by the attitude that my passion was a junk hobby. A couple years ago I started this blog because of the following conversation about what my dream job would be:
"Well, what I'd really love to do is story and character development for video games."
"Don't you want to do something meaningful with your life?"
You can imagine how well that went over. I started writing here because games are art; at their very best they are as meaningful, inspiring, beautiful, and tragic as any other recognized "fine art". I didn't expect anyone to read it, but it felt good to shout into the darkness about the things I believed. And the things I thought were funny, frustrating, and downright rage-inducing. Eventually it became clear that I don't have time to play enough games to really sustain a gaming blog so I started talking about other things - including the gaming/mental health conceptual thingy I've called Project Obrigado.
Here's where the unpleasantness comes in. Before I get into it there's one thing I want very clear - I am not a miserable person. I haven't had a bad life, and what follows is not a plea for sympathy or a bid for attention. They're simply events which might provide a better understanding of some of my writing. Mental illness in this country continues to be stigmatized and since I'm in a position to do so I'm attaching these events to my real name. I hope one day everyone who suffers from a mental illness will be able to speak about their struggles without being judged, accused of histrionics, or be told to just "get over it". And if any future employers pass over my resume because of it, I didn't want to work for them anyway. I wasn't officially diagnosed with MDD (Major Depressive Disorder) until fairly recently, but I've been dealing with it for a lot longer than that. When I was in high school a therapist told me I was depressed and should probably be on medication, but I didn't listen and stopped going to therapy. In college I developed a habit of self-injury that was significant enough to alarm my friends. This continued for several years. A few months ago I was hospitalized and put under a 5150 psychiatric hold as being a danger to myself, and then again a little over a month later. I started thinking and then writing about combining gaming with coping skills because I realized that through all those years if I'd had something like what I envision Project Obrigado to be things might not have gotten to the point that they did. If I'd had a game that leveled up my avatar, gave me a new quest or better gear in exchange for not hurting myself that day, things might have been a different. I don't think I'm the only person for whom this is true.
Alright, that's it - sad stuff over. When someone with depression is in trouble, they need an anchor. It can be just about anything, but it has to affect them enough to be visible through all the horror. My anchor was a group of people that I've met over the Internet, through the Geek & Sundry and Day9tv communities. Many of them I've never met in person, but they all saved my life. Beyond that, having that kind of support gave me the motivation to stop simply existing and start living. Cheesy, perhaps, but in some ways just existing is easier. Living with this illness is work - there's medication and therapy of course, but you also have necessary lifestyle changes and sometimes you have to stop hanging out with people you genuinely like because they don't bring out the best in you. I can't do it without my anchor, and I'm acutely aware that some people aren't lucky enough to have one. Blending mental health management with gaming is an interesting concept to me, but the core of what I imagine is something that will give people a safe place to form the connections that might safe their life one day. The fact is there aren't a whole lot of maintenance resources available for people dealing with mental illness compared to chronic physical ones. Having a game community where a person could not only have fun but also bitch about the side effects they're dealing with or the random inexplicable sadness is something I think people would use. Let's face it, there are a lot of depressed geeks out there.
Alright, so that's the reason for this blog in a nutshell. Like I said on the home page, there's yammering. It might be silly or serious. But I hope it always gives you something to think about.
