Ep. 3 - The Stigma Around Men's Mental Health

Justin Tyler dives into the complexities of men's mental health, drawing from personal experiences. In this episode of the Refill Podcast, he explores themes of vulnerability, therapy, and societal stigma. Justin shares poignant reflections on dealing with anger and depression, emphasizing the importance of proactive mental health care. He also pays tribute to Al Levin, host of the Depression Files podcast, and offers resources for those in need. This heartfelt narrative encourages listeners to prioritize their mental well-being and support others in doing the same.

About Justin:

Justin Tyler is the host of the Refill Podcast, where he engages in candid conversations about personal growth and self-discovery around life transitions. As a father navigating the complexities of parenting amidst personal struggles, he openly shares his journey through therapy and finding himself. Justin's background includes working with mental health resources in educational environments, offering him a unique perspective on wellness and emotional resilience.

Key Takeaways:

• Therapy should be viewed not only as a reactionary measure during crises but as an ongoing practice for mental wellness and maintenance.
• Addressing men's mental health is crucial to breaking stigmas, facilitating emotional dialogue, and fostering healthier lives.
• Parenting requires self-awareness and emotional growth, where acknowledging one's struggles can lead to being a better support for children.
• The Refill Podcast episode stresses the importance of seeking help, highlighting that mental struggles do not need to be faced alone and emphasizing the need for a broader conversation regarding men's mental health.
• Resources like the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline are critical for those experiencing emotional distress and needing support.

Notable Quotes:

1. "Asking for help doesn't make you weak. It makes you human."
2. "The farthest strides that I've made in my life have come when I've let other people in to help."
3. "Therapy really is a place where you build strength before a crisis."
4. "Even when you feel like you're doing okay…underneath all of that, your struggles are still there."
5. "Strength isn't pretending you're okay. Strength is being honest when you're not."

Resources:

• The Depression Files podcast by Al Levin
• 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. Available by calling or texting "988" or visiting 988lifeline.org

Listeners are encouraged to tune into this deeply personal episode to gain insights into the realities of men's mental health and discover the resources available for support. Stay connected with the Refill Podcast for more enlightening and heartfelt episodes.

Thanks for listening to Refill! Conversations for when life runs low. If this episode resonated with you, follow the show and share it with someone who might need it. Connect, send thoughts, or suggest future guests at jntyler19@gmail.com or IG: jntyler. New episodes coming soon.

Transcript

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So a few days ago, um, I found myself sitting in a therapist office again, and I wasn't sure what I was going to talk about. I thought maybe we'd discuss my separation, maybe the uncertainty, maybe my future. Um, instead, I spent most of the session talking about my kids, about whether I'm doing enough, about whether I'm making the right decisions, about whether I'm helping them through this in the way that they need. And it reminded me of something that I've spent most of my life learning and relearning. Asking for help doesn't make you weak, it makes you human. With that being said, welcome to a special uh solo episode of the Refill podcast. Typically, the month of June is associated with Pride Month, um, but it's also men's mental health awareness month. And I thought this would be a really good time, um, especially because I I feel like I'll be releasing this on Father's Day to kind of just talk about a lot of the stigma around men's mental health and kind of open up about some of my my own experiences. And right now a lot of that is is very much around uh parenthood and just everything that's going on in my life with with all of these changes. And uh yeah, I just I really want to open up a conversation trying to to break down some of those ceilings that a lot of men um put on themselves when it comes to their mental health and taking care of that. Uh so with that being said, welcome to my continued midlife crisis. Before we get started, I do want to give a brief content note. In this episode, I'll be talking a lot about depression, therapy, men's mental health, and suicide. Um, while I'm not going to be discussing graphic details, some of these topics might be difficult for certain listeners. If you need to pause and come back later, that's okay. And if anything in this conversation brings up something you're struggling with, I hope you'll consider reaching out to someone you trust, a mental health professional or a crisis resource. You don't have to carry those things alone. Getting that out of the way, let's jump into it. So I've I've kind of dipped my toes in and out of therapy um throughout my life at different stages. The one thing that I'm not proud of, it's always been reactionary and not proactive or for maintenance reasons. And that's something that I am trying to uh get in a better place with, like not going because I need it, but going because one day I might need it, or just to keep myself level. And we'll we'll get into some of my uh more recent experiences and um kind of why I felt like this was a good topic for for this episode here in just a bit. But first I I kind of want to just uh give you some of my earlier experiences with going to therapy and uh kind of as a child and um why I was there and uh you know some of the parallels that I worry about with my kids now. So the first experience with therapy that I ever had um was in the second grade, and that came about because of my parents' divorce when I was eight years old. One of the things that really hits me about this specific age is that is exactly the age that Milo is now. And at that age, a lot of little boys don't really know what to do with the things that they're feeling. And for me, uh going through, you know, like my parents getting divorced, I I did what most little boys do, and that's turned to anger. Uh I mean, when you don't know how to process that grief and um you don't really know what to do with all of those feelings that you're having, um, it just it, I don't know, to me, it made sense to to act out. Um, I was mean to my little sister, I was mean to my parents, I was mean to people around me. I don't know, maybe I was just a mean kid. I don't think that's how my son is. I mean, he's a he's a very sweet little boy, uh, very affectionate, but at the same time, he's a he's a quiet little boy. And sometimes it's it's hard to gauge where his head is and what he's feeling. Um, but yeah, so I mean it kind of started out like I I saw like a more of a traditional um just kind of family therapist around that time. Um I got in I remember I got involved in this program they had at school that was actually kind of a a group program. I don't remember if the other kids in the group were also experienced going through um like their parents divorcing or if it was just kind of like a catch-all for any of like the the troubled kids in the school, like that kind of um prevention and early intervention uh program programming that they had back in that day. Um, but I I do remember it not really helping a lot. And I don't know if it was just again, because it wasn't really a specialized program, but it it never really, I don't know, it never really clicked for me. And like even I don't know, just therapy in general at that age, like I didn't really know the the the purpose of it. You know, to me it was just something that adults had decided that I needed. And shortly after uh my parents' divorce and um you know, like me starting therapy and going through all of this, uh the you know, the next year in third grade, um, my my grandfather who lived down in Kentucky had passed away. And uh, I think with just everything going on and uh my grandpa's passing, uh, my mom moved us down to Kentucky. So, you know, here I am in the third grade, nine years old. Parents just went through a messy divorce the year before, and I'm I'm being moved away from the only support system that I know, which is my friends. And that, I mean, again, like that is something that I still am struggling with uh in my in my current situation. I want to make sure that my my kids are able to, you know, keep as much of that stability as possible because like I know um, you know, especially in these first couple of years, like they're they're gonna need people to to lean on. And it's not always gonna be able to be their parents or you know, like those types of family members. Like sometimes it's friends, sometimes it's their teachers that they get comfortable with. I went through that firsthand, having that kind of ripped away and put into an entirely new setting. And though I mean, I I did eventually adapt. I mean, it's it's hard being that young and uh just transitioning into a completely different life around people you don't know. And I think the the one thing that I I do appreciate about um getting to or like going down to Kentucky at that age was getting to live with my grandma for a while. And I think that, you know, though she was uh pretty typical, uh like down in the boonies, Kentucky, um, very religious Pentecostal person, there was comfort in having her around. I don't think that I necessarily ever opened up to her about a lot of the struggles that I was going through. Like I don't think that I needed to. She just knew what I needed. And um, you know, she was there to to comfort me and to cook for me. And uh, you know, my mom, she worked a lot and my my grandma was just there for me. And that was probably one of the one of the saving graces of that that first year being down there. Um, so I mean I I think that having just that that person in your life that you know, like even if you can't talk to them about what's going on, um, just having somebody there to to just anticipate those needs and just love you unconditionally, I think that that's really important. You know, going back to therapy, which is like the the big topic here, I don't know, like I don't know like what an eight or nine-year-old really expects it to be. I mean, back in this is back in the 90s, um, the only thing that I knew about therapy was, you know, how it was portrayed on television or in the movies. And, you know, it wasn't it was typically one of those things that was reserved for, you know, like nutcases or people who were like just really, really, really depressed, or um, you know, you don't really think of it as being uh more of a maintenance thing just for for typical people in dealing with um your everyday stresses and and just everything else that's going on in your life. You know, for for little boys uh who then grow up into men, um they don't usually have the language for emotions. Uh, you know, it's not just that I was depressed, it was more like I was confused, I was angry, I was hurting. I I feel like the word depressed is kind of again one of those catch-alls that a lot of people they use to describe something that they don't understand. And I I think that a lot of where therapy is is good is is understanding what those what those feelings or emotions are and uh just kind of learning how to how to manage that. Even though I don't think I I realized it at the time, as an adult, looking back now, that therapy that I took at that age was probably the first time that I learned something that would take me decades to fully appreciate, and that is talking actually helps. You can't just sit on everything. And I know that a lot of a lot of men specifically, um, they you know, they they tend to to struggle in silence. And that takes a toll. I mean, that literally takes years off of your life. And I don't know about you listeners, but that's you know, I'm not I'm not looking to to shorten my life over something as trivial as like, oh, like I'm I'm too I'm too macho to talk about what I'm feeling, or you know, like and I don't I don't want that for for my son either. Like I I want him to to learn to talk through the feelings that he has. And that doesn't mean that you have to be a burden on people or you always have to like dump all of your your trauma on others, but you know, like confide in people that you can trust and at the very least go see a fucking therapist. Shortly after I moved down to Kentucky, um, I stopped doing therapy. I mean, a lot of at least at the time, I felt like a lot of my uh initial anger issues that I had after my parents' divorce had kind of uh mellowed out. I was still pretty mean to my sister. I'm sure she would have appreciated me um doing a little bit more at that stage in my life. But, you know, I I don't know. I don't know if it was more like me just not being interested in doing it anymore, or um, if money was tight and we we couldn't afford the therapy anymore. I'm not quite sure what happened, but you know, you kind of get into those uh adolescent and teen years, and I don't know, I just I felt like I had everything together and therapy wasn't for me. Which is crazy because like those are probably the years that most people, like boys and girls, need it the most. You're going through so many, so many changes and so many uh just kind of like literal chemical changes in your body, not just your feelings, but physical changes that do lead to depression, anxiety, and just all of these internal struggles. And for a lot of people, like they don't feel comfortable asking for for help in this age. Maybe, I mean, maybe they it's not that they they don't feel comfortable, but they see it as this I don't know, like this stigma, like this thing that you shouldn't ask for. Boys specifically, they're told to be tough, to get over it, handle it yourself, don't burden other people. That's such garbage. Everybody needs somebody that they can lean on and talk to. Maybe I'm a little bit of a hypocrite because I'm, I don't know, like like most people, like I'm a I'm a proud person who likes to overcome obstacles and get through things on my own, but I I think that the farthest strides that I've made in my life have come when I've let other people in to help because they're able to lift you up more than you can lift yourself. The National Institute of Mental Health notes that men are significantly less likely than women to receive mental health treatment. Even though mental health disorders affect both groups, men are also far more likely to die by suicide. The problems that I went through all growing up, like it wasn't it wasn't that I didn't struggle. It was that I thought struggling was something that I was supposed to handle alone. And I'm gonna go out of the limb here and say that most of you listening probably felt the same as a teenager, especially. And because I didn't I didn't do that work early on to to really um you know learn how to manage my my emotions and feelings and uh especially the the the anger issues that I had at that at that young age, um, I feel like these are these were wounds that I carried over into adulthood, into, you know, like my early days as a parent. When I say that like I was angry, that that doesn't mean that I've I've never been physically abusive, but I do have a a tendency to have a short temper. You know, I get I get frustrated uh when I'm stressed out or um you know like worked up about something. Like I tend to raise my voice and I yell. I feel like a lot of that just comes from emotional exhaustion. I don't know that on my own I ever would have realized that it was a problem because I mean that was how my dad parented me. I'm sure a lot of uh, especially those of you in the millennial age group, you probably also had parents that um reacted this way. So like that's just what we learned, and that's what we also did as parents. And, you know, it's it it wasn't okay. And I mean, I am thankful that uh, you know, my my wife at the time, she she pointed out a lot of these behaviors, and that was one of the things that in my adulthood kind of started gearing me toward looking into therapy again, just because like I, you know, I was realizing that I wasn't the dad that I wanted to be. You know, I I always said growing up like I would never ever be like my dad. And, you know, for the most part, I don't feel like I was, but there was always like these little little cracks that would show um when something became too overwhelming for me, where you know, I I I would raise my voice. I and I to me it was just I don't know, it was everything coming out, and it was a relief to not hold that in anymore. But from my kids' perspective, that probably seemed very scary for them. And I I honestly I I hate that even now, uh, you know, I still I still struggle with it. I I'm more aware of it as a problem. I feel like I'm able to um see more from their perspective how it how it feels, uh, even though I've I've lived it. I don't know like why that's a thing that you know we do as parents is we we forget how these things made us feel when we were on the other end of it. But therapy, you know what what I've learned is I mean, it wasn't about fixing the anger. It was about understanding what was underneath it, the stress, the fear, the pressure, the expectations, just everything that builds and builds and builds, and you you don't know how to vocalize it or how to, you know, get it out in a healthy way. And nothing that I had ever experienced in my life up to that point had prepared me for the role of being a dad. And in a lot of ways, I feel like I failed right out of the gate. But that's that's what parenting is. You're gonna fail. You fail, you learn, you improve. And it's not something that you just, you know, like you go to a few sessions and you're good. Uh it's it takes years of work, it takes habit building, lifestyle changes. And you know, what's the one thing that sucks about it is by the time you really start to feel like you've you've actually like seen a change in yourself and you and you feel the difference, you know, your kids are a little bit older and you're you're stuck wondering at that point, like, was it too late? And there's a lot of self-doubt that starts kicking in, and you you wonder if you're a good parent. And by that point, there's not really a lot that you can do. So while my my kids were were younger, I mean, I was at least I was I was made a aware of some of my behaviors, and I, you know, I I did, I I tried my best on my own at that point to calm down, to step away when I needed it. Uh, but there's only there's only so much you can do on instinct. And it took me a few more years to really get to a point where I was willing to to try uh try therapy. Um, and really what kind of pushed me uh to that was a a job change that I had. Uh, this was not even that long ago. Um, this would have been about four, four and a half years ago. Um, I started working at the Ohio School-based center of excellence out of Miami University. And essentially what this department was, they were they were funded by both state and federal government grants uh to work within the schools in Ohio to help with mental health resources, um, especially where prevention and early intervention um were concerned. Uh, but what it did for me was it just made me realize that the these types of of wellness practices, like they really they do take time. They take sometimes your whole life. Uh, and it's not something that you just get to a certain point and then you're done. It's it's the same as going to the gym. I mean, you you're there to exercise your your mental health and capacity. And if you don't go, I mean, same as going to the gym. Like if you don't go often, uh, you lose that progress. Like you can slide back, like you might, you know, you might start gaining weight again, or maybe your stamina isn't as good. Or, you know, like it's it's the same as your your physical health. Like you have to exercise your mental health the same way. So yeah, I mean, up to that point, I had really viewed therapy as like kind of like an emergency room when you were in the thick of it. You went when something was broken, and I just happened to have this great group of people that I got a chance to work with to help me realize that therapy really is a place where you build strength before a crisis. I had another experience while while working in this job um, you know, that I would I would really like to talk about. And it's kind of the reason that I'm even doing this podcast in the first place. Um, so this is where uh this is where the uh the suicide warning that I had earlier in the episode kind of comes into play. Uh one of the projects that I got to be involved with while I was working here um was a school wellness podcast that was meant for educators in the state of Ohio and just kind of opening them up to some of these mental health practices. For the first season of this podcast, we had reached out to a school administrator out in Minnesota who some of my coworkers were already familiar with, but he also had uh an existing podcast that he had been doing for years. Um, his name was Allah Ven, and he had a podcast called The Depression Files. And I would just really like to take a second. Um, these episodes uh for his podcast, um they are still live. You can find them on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, uh anywhere else that you would be listening to this. Um, but again, that's the Depression Files. And the host, Al Levin. Al is he was an advocate for men's mental health. And one thing that I was immediately drawn to him on was just his openness and willing to share his own struggles, and that's not that's not something I'd I had ever had from excuse me. That's not something that I'd ever had from a male role model before. And it just completely changed my my entire world. The way that Al talked about his struggles and some of the some of the guests that he had on his podcast and you know, like talking about theirs, and it it was just like it was very life-changing. I'm I'm very appreciative that I got to work on this project with him uh doing, you know, like something that I love, which is podcasting. And uh over the course of you know, like that first season that we produced with Al, um, you know, I I got to spend months talking with him and collaborating with him and just talking to him and seeing, you know, where where his mind was. And the thing was, like, I I thought Al was brilliant. I mean he's he was one of those people that like he just he knew how to talk to others and he really he didn't need a lot of prep to do it well either, and he he was always second guessing. Himself though, which resonates with a lot of what I'm feeling now. Yeah, I mean, he he always had this anxiety around how how good the work that he was doing was. He always wanted that reassurance. Uh, we would we would meet for a little bit after each episode that we recorded. We would just kind of have like a I don't know, decompression conversation where, you know, I just I would I would give him assurance, like that was that was fantastic. That was that went really well. Um, you did a great job. Like, I I don't know, like I felt compelled to tell him these things because like I could see that he that wasn't clicking for him. You know, we hit we had spent an entire summer recording these episodes, and our plan was to release them um regularly once the school year started back up, and uh three episodes into this season, I I got the unfortunate news that Al had taken his life, and that just that that crushed me a lot. Again, Al spent a lot of time encouraging men to have conversations that many of us avoid conversations about depression, about loneliness, about asking for help, and Al, he was not alone. Um he had, you know, he he had his wife and his kids, and he still just felt this void. And even talking about mental health so much over the years, and and being an advocate and having these conversations with other people who were going through similar struggles. I mean, in the end, it he's I mean, he still lost that battle. And losing him reinforced something I already knew intellectually, but I hadn't fully accepted emotionally, and that mental health struggles don't always look the way we expect them to. I I got myself back into therapy at this stage because I, you know, like this this did open up a lot of things uh for me personally, and I I knew that not only did I need it at that moment to be uh reactive to what I was experiencing, but I I needed it to be proactive. I needed to put in the work to maintain a healthier mindset to be there for my kids to to grow emotionally in the ways that I needed, not only for myself, but in in a way to be an example to my children so that they didn't go through the same struggles and the same self-doubt that I did. So I I I spent some time at that point uh kind of just dipping my toe back into to therapy, uh doing online therapy. Um this was I mean, this was a couple years after COVID, but um there was still there was still a lot that was you know being done virtually and I'd never tried I'd never tried virtual counseling before. So I was just like my busy life and you know having a family and everything else that I have going on. Um I tried that for a bit. Uh ultimately it it wasn't really for me doing it virtually. Um I kind of realized very quickly like I need to be able to see somebody face to face so I can I don't know, I you shouldn't probably be worried about gauging reactions in therapy, but um just knowing that you're being heard and that they're actively listening. So I mean, I did that for a little while and then I I stepped away from it because like I realized that I needed to to to put the work into finding uh an in-person therapist that I I could really talk to. Um around this same time I had a a job transition, and uh, I mean, I didn't really know exactly what was going on at the time, but there were there were some personal issues in my my marriage that were starting to kind of crop up around that same time that did eventually leap lead to my separation. So um, you know, I I did it took me a little bit to to finally find an in-person therapist that I wanted to try out and another life crisis to give me the push that I needed to actually um get into the office and see them. Uh, so I I did that though. And um, you know, it's I think another thing that it's it's important to note about therapy is uh not every therapist is gonna click for every person. And I didn't have the the best experience with the online therapist that I had been seeing, um, mostly because of the online aspect of it, not necessarily the therapist themselves, you know, whereas I I things did start out well with the the therapist that I was seeing in person. Some of the advice that I had been given from my in-person therapist didn't really sit well with me. And I felt like I was being pulled against what my my gut was telling me, which I don't really think is the the place for a therapist to to kind of point you in any one direction or the other. It's more about guiding you. Really quickly, I before I I move on to kind of wrapping this up and and really getting into the point that I'm I was wanting to make with this with this podcast episode, I said one thing to myself when I started this podcast, and that was that I would never ask a guest to go deeper than I'm willing to go myself. If I'm gonna ask people to talk honestly about uh you know their life experiences and you know the the good and the bad and how they overcame it, then I've gotta be willing to do the same. So this is me doing that. Um I kind of spoke earlier uh when while I was talking about Al about this this void. Um and that that word, I don't know, it comes it comes up for me a lot. Um I I have never I've never necessarily had suicidal thoughts. I think that everybody questions, I guess, what everyone around them's lives would be like if they weren't around. Like I think that that's a normal thing that a lot of us think about, but never anything beyond that. I I had uh and I'm not gonna I'm not gonna get into details. I I I mentioned this in episode one. Um, this is not the place for me to talk about my my my marital issues and what what led to my separation, but I I will kind of share this story around um an experience that I I had last summer that was kind of again one of these things that reinforced for me the importance of of therapy and kind of gave me that nudge that I needed at the time to uh step away from the therapist I was seeing and um look for somebody else. And uh essentially, you know, I had I had just gone through a pretty major ordeal, and uh we were we were on a family vacation. Uh we went and stayed at our resort by the ocean, and there was a night where you know things just got to be too much, and I needed to step away for a minute. So I took a walk, and uh our resort was you know it was right on this public beach. And I I don't know, I just I I walked out onto the beach and just sat and it was just pure darkness around me. It was quiet. There weren't a lot of other people on the beach. If they were, they were walking from pretty far away. You couldn't hear anything over the the sound of the waves crashing. Um, but it was it was just a really dark night, not a lot of stars out, the moon was somewhere else. So I don't know, it just as I was sitting there, it it felt like I was staring into this just void, which again is a common theme that seems to to come up when talking about depression. But in that moment, I I did have a thought kind of going back to what I was saying a minute ago, you know, like what what would happen if I just walked into this void and didn't come back. And I I sat there with that for a minute and I I felt a little silly because that was not the way that my my brain is wired. I've not really thought things like that before. And you know, I've I've always had to overcome adversity in my life, and I've never let it get to me in that way. And I sort of questioning, like, why why am I having this thought? Why is this this there? And I I don't know, I I realized that you know, this experience of sitting on this dark beach, staring out into this endless ocean, the void wasn't what was causing this feeling. I was experiencing this level of calm that I don't think that I had ever felt in that moment. And it was pushing away a lot of the the more immediate struggles that I was experiencing, and that thought that I had was kind of what I was left with, which I guess was, I don't know, that that was buried deep down. Um, again, it's not something that I would typically ever think, and it's not something that I had really thought prior to that point. And I think that that was kind of a an eye-opening experience for me, that even when you feel like you're doing okay, or at least in my case, when you feel like you're going through some shit, but you know you're gonna get through it, underneath all of that, you know, your struggles are still there. You still have that self-doubt, all of those things that you've been building since you were a kid, those those negative emotions and just that that struggle, it's still there. And I think that like what that that void did was it stripped away everything else to where that's the only thought that I had left. And luckily for me, like that's that's all it was. It was it was just a thought. And I quickly kind of realized that even though like that was something that I you know, I in the moment I felt stupid for even even thinking that I you know I'm I'm sitting here on this beach and I'm looking out into the ocean again, and I realize like I realized that that calmness that I was experiencing was something that I'd never really had before. And in a funny twist of fate, like I I think that that might be one of my favorite experiences that I've ever had. I oftentimes say that I I love mountains because it makes me feel so small, like being up on this massive rock, just feeling so above the world, but also just in comparison, feeling so tiny. I think it it's similar to that that void, um, maybe not to the same extreme as just looking out into an abyss, but um it it has a calming effect on me, uh, where a lot of like no matter what I'm going through or whatever I'm struggling with, like it strips away a lot of that and just kind of leaves me with, you know, like what is really the root problem here. Um, and so in that that moment, I, you know, I I realized that I was maybe sitting on some struggles that went beyond just what I was experiencing at home, beyond just my impending separation. And I think that's you know, that's honestly kind of where it clicked for me that not only do I need to to really take therapy seriously um because of the things that I'm currently going through, but it's a long-term commitment. In some capacity, like I need to continually grow my mental state and my emotional strength. Because, you know, even even as you work through one problem, you know, there's there's breadcrumbs that get left behind from every problem before that. And you know, those those start to to build up so that it makes your future problems, even smaller ones, feel a lot bigger than they are. Fast forward to current day. I I finally um I I found myself with a therapist that I actually really like. Um I had had a very, very brief stunt with this therapist doing couples counseling. Um, I waited a little bit after that couples counseling to consider seeing this person for for one-on-one therapy. Obviously, now I'm in a place where like it's okay for me to to do that. But I I went into that that first session with her. I really didn't know what I was gonna walk in there and and and discuss. Uh, I thought that I would be talking about my my separation, um, current stress that I have going on, maybe with with work, uh, and I don't know, like my future and just uh all the unknown. But instead, what I ended up talking about mostly was my my kids and all of the the parenting fears that I currently have going around. Like, am I am I doing enough for them? Am I there for them in the the way that I I need to be or that they need me to be? Um, so I I you know I I really talked about just self-doubt. And I I didn't realize until that moment that like that was something that I was I was having a hard time with post-separation, uh, was it was more on the parenting side of it. So whereas I thought that I was gonna go in there talking about my future, what I found was that I needed permission to admit that I was worried about being a good dad. And I again I can assume that that's something that a lot of you probably have in common with me, not just fathers, but everybody. Like we all we all worry that we're not doing enough for our kids, um, whether we are going through something as upsetting as a separation or even just getting through life. So I don't know, like it's it's it's got me, it's got me thinking a lot about just um my my mental health journey and you know, like where I came from as that little eight-year-old boy with anger issues because his parents got divorced, to now I'm on the other side of that, and I have a little eight-year-old boy. I don't want him to be angry, I don't want him to be confused. I I want him to know that everything's gonna be okay and that he can come to me and talk to me if he ever needs it. And in order for me to be there in that way, I have I have to take care of myself, and I think of the whole point of this of this podcast episode, uh especially for the other dads out there, is uh take care of yourself so that you can take care of your kids and they can take care of their kids and uh just break break that cycle of the this stupid stigma that we have around fucking mental health. There's nothing masculine about ignoring your emotions, and therapy really has helped me at different points in my life. Sometimes when I was hurting, sometimes when I was angry, sometimes when I was lost, and going forward, I just want to be able to stay healthy, and that's why I'm gonna try my best to continue this journey. So if if you're listening and you're carrying something alone because you think that that's what men are supposed to do, maybe let this be your reminder that strength isn't pretending you're okay. Strength is being honest when you're not. Before I wrap up, I just want to mention a resource that has become increasingly important in conversations around mental health, and that is the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. Uh, it's available 24 hours a day by calling or texting 988. Um, despite the name, it's not only for people who are suicidal, it's also there for people experiencing emotional distress, mental health challenges, substance use concerns, or simply moments when life feels overwhelming and they don't know where to turn. Trained counselors are available to listen, provide support, and to help connect people with resources. So if you're struggling, if you're worried about someone you love, or if you just need someone to talk to, 988 is there. Reaching out for help isn't weakness. It's one of the strongest things a person can do. I just want to say thank you, listeners, truly, for joining me on this episode. I I promise that not every episode of Refill is going to be so heavy. I have some fun guests that I'm currently trying to get in on the show. Uh, so please keep tuning in and uh, you know, go back and listen to the first two episodes if you haven't already. But again, I I truly appreciate it. And uh I am Justin Tyler. Thank you so much for for being here and experiencing the Refill podcast. Happy Father's Day, and remember to take care of yourselves.