(upbeat music)
- Happy birthday.
- Thanks, Kyle.
- How old are you?
- I am 39 years old.
- You almost got the big one.
- I know.
- I know, maybe next year.
- One year to go, maybe next year.
- Today's a really significant day
because it is your birthday,
but maybe not for the reason that most people
say is significant when they're having a birthday.
You were sharing before we started filming,
you were reflecting on some time of when you were a child
and on your original birthday
what circumstances you were born into,
and where you are today.
Do you wanna share some of that?
- Yeah, so I think it's,
birthdays have always been weird for me 'cause it's such,
I think a juxtaposition from where I am today
to where I started.
And to think back on those circumstances,
it brings up a lot of emotion for me.
My mom, she was 19 when she got pregnant with me.
My parents weren't married.
My father was someone who,
as a result of childhood abuse and neglect,
lived with mental health issues
that were never fully treated.
- He never knew that he was even living
with mental health issues.
- No, and he self-medicated through alcohol,
through marijuana,
and as much as he could, coped and got by.
But he was always in survival mode,
and that meant doing whatever he could to get by,
to get by for the family.
So, he would find things in alleyways
and cobble them together and sell them at swap meets.
He would steal things.
Ended up in jail several times.
But despite that, was a very loving man.
But those demons that really were such a theme in his life
really bled into our lives as well.
It really dictated how everything worked.
My father was so addicted to alcohol
that my mom had to buy beer before she could buy groceries,
and he would drink a case of beer a day.
So, this idea of survival, I think, has been a theme.
And that's really how I came into the world.
I came into the world in this fight or flight mode.
They say that you can experience trauma in the womb,
and I feel like that really set the tone for my life,
for my personality,
the way that I interacted with the world.
And like I said,
my father was in and out of jail,
so there wasn't a lot of stability.
We were very poor in an impoverished part of Phoenix,
and it just really led to
this state of just always being in a heightened,
in a heightened state.
And I really developed that sort of anxious personality
at a very young age.
- What was your first memory?
What is your first memory?
- Well, like I mentioned,
my father was someone who just,
he was very resourceful
and he found all these different bike parts
that he had found in alleys and got from different places,
and put together this bicycle for me.
And it was,
I remember it had a green banana seat
and I would put ball cards in the spokes.
- Yeah, of course.
- But I remember when he gave me that bike,
and that was such a beautiful memory.
- How old were you?
- Gosh, I must have been four or five.
- Was it for your birthday or just for fun?
- I don't know, I think it must have been for a birthday.
But I also remember a time with him where
there was a tray that always sat
on the living room coffee table or under the coffee table
that had his joints on it.
I remember the smell of marijuana from a very young age.
When I first smelled it when I was older,
it was so nostalgic.
It brought me back to those times when I was so young.
But I don't remember him being around a lot,
in and out of jail.
So, when things got really bad,
he would leave for days or weeks at a time
and we wouldn't see him.
- And you guys didn't know where he went.
- I mean, I think a lot of times
were times when he was in jail.
But there were other times when he would be
trying to do something,
trying to figure out some way to make a buck or two,
do a job or something.
It was just this lifestyle was this very,
like everything was transient.
Everything was always in this state of upheaval.
And it got to the point where my mom really,
I think gathered the strength,
despite her love for him
and despite everything that he tried,
as much as he tried overcome that,
she eventually left and said,
"We have to go and live our own lives
"and leave him to his own devices."
- How old were you?
- I was six years old.
- You were six when you and your mom left.
- Me, my little sister, and my little brother.
So, it was the three of us.
She was 26 years old,
and she was really the anchor for him.
Without her,
things spiraled out of control for him very quickly.
- What mental health diagnosis do you have?
- I've had-
- And by the way, that's the only,
this is the only place where I would ask that
and it wouldn't be weird.
It's like, "Hey, tell me about
"your mental health diagnosis!"
- No, and I already,
I also told you that I'm a totally open book.
- And we're, everybody on MedCircle is.
That's why we do these things, to break the stigma.
- Yeah.
Yeah, so I have had several over the years.
I have been diagnosed with everything from ADD,
seasonal affective disorder,
depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder.
You name it, I've been diagnosed,
and I've taken the meds for all of it.
- You say that in a way that makes me feel
like you don't believe you have all those diagnoses.
- That's funny.
I like that you picked up on that.
So, fast-forward to today.
I don't really identify with any particular diagnosis.
I think that I experienced a lot of trauma as a young person
and that created,
and certainly I had a genetic predisposition for things,
but I think that created an environment
where I was really susceptible to mental health issues.
I also grew up in an environment
where there were a lot of stigmas about mental health.
There wasn't support in the way
that we have access to it today,
and the understanding that we have of trauma
and mental health diagnosis.
I think that a lot of what I experienced was circumstantial,
and now that I have, over the last decade or so,
done an incredible amount of work,
certainly I still live with things,
but I no longer identify as depressed or anxious
or a specific diagnosis.
- How do you identify?
- I identify as well.
- As well.
The moment at the age of six when you, your mother,
and your siblings all left,
talk us through what happened
shortly thereafter with your father.
- He, without the support systems that he had,
he really got mixed up in some pretty bad things,
in some hardcore drugs.
He got arrested,
went to visit his mom, my grandmother in Detroit.
She and her husband were also addicted to alcohol.
They just had a very dysfunctional relationship,
and it was very shortly after that
that he took up in this really dank, seedy apartment,
motel, transient place.
And then very shortly after that, he killed himself.
- [Kyle] And how did you find out about that?
- I actually found out right away.
It was something that I think is pretty rare.
I remember the night that he died,
when they had found him, when they told us.
My grandparents were in the living room
of our single-wide trailer.
We were all standing there,
and my grandfather told us that he had died by suicide.
And I think, like,
for a long time, I used to,
I really had some anger to my,
I had a lot of anger,
but at my grandfather for telling us
and for knowing right away.
But in hindsight, really, I think it was a gift.
'Cause the more of this work that I do,
the more that I talk to people
and I hear stories about people
who found out so long afterward
that someone actually died by suicide.
It was hidden from them because of shame,
because of stigmas.
And they almost are retraumatized.
You experience a death and that's traumatic,
but then to later find out how someone died
or find out that you were lied to.
So, I think ultimately it was really a blessing
to know from the beginning.
And even though I had, again, a lot of anger,
I felt a lot of,
I blamed him.
I felt that he was weak.
I couldn't understand how he could leave us like that.
How, why we weren't good enough.
And this was something that translated to me
as this feeling of, what did I do wrong?
How, 'cause I was a kid who was like,
I had a lot of hyperactivity and I was,
I didn't do well in school.
I was always getting into trouble.
At a very young age, I was dubbed a bad kid from teachers.
And so, I had this feeling of,
what could I have done better?
If I were a better kid, if I,
what would have been different?
And then that translated to this, very quickly,
this feeling of like,
well, now I'm the oldest,
and I have to be,
I have this responsibility for my family,
for my little sister and my little brother.
And so, I was constantly
worried and anxious about everybody, about everything.
- At six years old, you felt that way?
- Constantly.
I had this, just,
like every time my mom left the house
or every time my grandparents would leave,
I would be worried that they would get into a car accident
or something would happen.
Someone else would leave.
I was just in this fight or flight panic state all the time.
- When your grandfather first shared the news with you,
how did you feel in that moment?
Do you remember?
- I don't.
I just, I remember the scene.
It was late, it was dark, and we were in the living room.
I just remember this, like, flash in my head.
It's weird because, in hindsight,
I don't think any of us were surprised.
I think just given his, who he was and what, you know?
And it's always hard with memories from being a kid
to distinguish what's yours
and what was told to you and what,
but that's what lives inside of me
is just this feeling of,
I just don't think any of us were really surprised.
- Yeah.
It's just amazing to me,
the insight you have as a six-year-old.
I couldn't even tell you what I did
at any point when I was six years old.
- Well, what's interesting is that after that,
I have a lot of gaps in memory,
a lot of gaps in memory.
I often say that I feel like I time traveled
through most of my childhood
because I wasn't mentally present for a lot of it.
But there are a few very,
just visceral memories that stand out
that are just very clear.
- How do you think your life would be different
if your dad had not died by suicide?
- That's funny, I was thinking about that this morning.
I was thinking about, after my meditation this morning,
would I want my life to be different?
And the answer to that and the answer to your question is
no.
I can't imagine what my life would be like.
I don't know anything else,
and I don't know if that's just my limited mental capacity
to not imagine a different path.
But despite all of the pain,
despite all of the hardship that I've experienced,
I wouldn't change it.
- Well, you know,
I don't know if there's a right answer to that question.
But if there is, I think it's that,
because this is the path you're on.
So, to live in any other state other than,
"This is, I wouldn't change it.
"This is what I have,"
is, I don't wanna say silly,
but there's a silliness component to it
because you don't get to choose that path.
- And the thing is,
is that this path has also had incredible joy and beauty,
and the work that I get to do because of this
is so fulfilling and so rewarding that,
like, I wouldn't have this insight.
I wouldn't have this knowledge.
I wouldn't be able to connect and share my story.
None of this would be possible
if I hadn't had those experiences.
So, I've come to a point where I'm very grateful
for the life that I've had.
And yeah, it's a shame, and there are,
we all have those what-ifs.
What if, at a young age,
someone had recognized my behaviors
as the result of trauma,
as opposed to the result of a learning disability
or of being a bad kid,
or he's just a poor kid, so that's just the way he is.
How would my education have been different?
I had to go back and relearn basic arithmetic,
spelling, grammar, because I just was not present.
And in some cases physically not present
because I was sent out into the hallway.
I was sent to the principal's office all the time.
And so, I just,
I wasn't in school to be able to learn these things.
I almost didn't graduate high school
because of the gaps in my education
and because of my mental health issues.
- What do you want people to get
from listening to you in this series?
- I think, especially related to kids
who are experiencing trauma
or kids who are living with some type
of mental health issue,
do not dismiss them.
Do not dismiss anybody as just being mentally ill
or just being bad or just being dumb.
Look at them as a human being.
Look at at who they are and what's going on in their life.
What's the reason they're acting
the way that they're acting?
Where did that come from?
You know, I've been doing some work
in the prison systems lately,
and I've been doing some work,
most recently I spoke at a convalescent hospital,
which is a long-term stay hospital
for people with severe mental illness.
During my time there,
I connected with some very brilliant people,
incredibly intelligent people who have rich stories
and have had successes in their lives,
but didn't have early intervention, early detection,
and treatment of mental health issues,
and have now landed in a place like that,
which is a sad place for them to be.
And it's so easy to dismiss them.
It's so easy to see someone who's homeless
or to see someone who's been previously incarcerated
and just dismiss them.
But I would encourage people to look at them in the eyes,
see them as a human being, recognize their value.
It's amazing what you'll find, you know?
- Well, Jake Moore certainly
lived a very eventful first six years of his life,
but the events kept coming.
In our next session,
we will talk more to Jake Moore and what came next
after his tragic father's death by suicide.
(upbeat music)