Time To Get Personal
Pulling back the curtain on what has been a really tough period for me on a personal level over the last little while...
Good Afternoon, TSSB Patrons!
Okay, this is going to be a very personal post.
I will get back to writing about baseball - and sports in general - as soon as possible. I promise.
However, I’ve always pledged to be open and honest with you all from day one and I’m not going to back down from that anytime soon.
After all, you give up your valuable time and some of your hard-earned wages to help support the continued growth of this website. The very least I owe you is openness and transparency, especially when I’m inactive and not delivering on what I promised each and every one of you.
So, here goes…
As many of you will be aware, I’ve been dealing with some physical health stuff since the start of the year. What started out as an infection has now turned into a full-blown investigation into just what exactly is ailing my body.
With very little white blood cells and heavy inflammation on my bowel and colon, I was required to undergo a procedure a few weeks ago, and I’m still waiting on the biopsy results to come back.
Waiting is the hardest part, as Tom Petty once beautifully sang.
Now, there is a school of thought out there that suggests the longer the wait, the better the news will be.
I do normally subscribe to that theory, for sure, but given the state of healthcare and the still insurmountable backlog caused by the COVID-19 Pandemic, I’m not entirely comfortable fully buying into that positive outlook just yet. I want to be prepared for all possibilities.
Just in case.
From a physical standpoint, I’ve largely felt okay. I do suffer with a dose of aches and pains every day, and I haven’t been able to run nearly as much as I would like. To be honest, I’ve attempted one run in the middle of all of this and it took it out of me for days. But, maybe both of those things have more to do with just getting a little bit older. Maybe.
It has been my mental health that has really suffered, however. And that’s why I’m writing this today.
If I’m being as brutally honest as I can be, my mental health has plummeted throughout this whole health scare episode.
Not being able to run and sweat out my emotions and feelings has contributed to the downward spiral, for sure. The biggest driver, though, has been the complete and utter sense of failure I’ve felt as it pertains to not being as nearly active on the site as I wanted to be.
I can only describe it as a never-ending vicious cycle. Plagued by worries about what could be going on with me physically - yes, my mind has wondered to the very dark depths of potential outcomes and I’ve spent way too much time on WebMD - I’ve then not had the energy or the mental capacity to be able to pour my heart and sole into the website. I’ve found it a daily struggle and a constant grind to just open up the laptop because, as soon as I do, my brain just fails me. As a result of that, I’ve been incredibly hard on myself, beating myself to a figurative pulp and creating a boatload of more pressure in the process.
There’s few things worst than suddenly not being able to do what had previously come so easily.
Before I could even really comprehend what was exactly unfolding, the walls were caving in on me and I soon realized I was imploding in on myself day by day, without ever having so much as a flimsy grip on the entire situation.
Nothing has really felt normal at all.
And the fact that both my mind and my body have made an annoying and depressing habit of letting me down on the daily has been the final nail in the proverbial coffin.
I have felt like a shadow of my former self for the longest time now, and I’ve been wracked with guilt to add on top of everything else. I feel as if I’ve let everyone down. I’ve not been a good family member, I’ve not been a good friend and I’ve certainly stunk at being a sports writer.
I’m at my most happiest when I’m at my desk or at an event, laptop open, large mug of hot, delicious coffee next to me and sports in front of me, primed and ready to write. Writing and sports are my two favorite things on the planet, and they are at the very core of who I am as a person.
Without writing, without sports I am nothing but an empty, hollow, lifeless shell with no purpose. Not being able to do what I love more than anything has only added to the pit of misery and despair I’ve been embroiled in. I lost all confidence, drive and passion on the work front and, worst yet, I lost my identity. As a sports writer, I felt like a complete and utter fraud.
And there just didn’t seem to be any way out.
It also didn’t help that I kept all of this to myself for the longest time. As I’ve learned the hard way before, shutting yourself away and allowing the demons to consume you is never the answer.
I had allowed the walls to firmly slam shut on me. I had allowed my demons and my fears to swallow me whole and spit me back out in shattered fragments. I had fallen and I didn’t know how to pick myself back up again.
However, as I’ve found throughout my life, the strength never leaves you and somehow, someway I was able to summon the courage to admit last week that I wasn’t doing okay. I was able to admit to myself that this health scare had taken a bigger toll on me than I had first realized. I was able to take the first meaningful steps towards breaking out of my slump and reclaiming the old Andrew.
I was able to start feeling human again.
Now, granted, there could still be a long way to go. As I mentioned up top, I am still waiting on my biopsy results and, as of right now, I feel like the old woman from the Titanic meme. Come on, you all know the one…
Yes, that one.
As a result, I’m fully prepared to slump again here and there over the coming days and weeks until those biopsy results arrive. Once they do, hopefully that puts an end to this entire episode in a positive way.
But, overall, I’ve started to get back to some sense of normality over the last week or so. If normal even exists, that is.
I’ve had to rebuild myself piece by piece, block by block, shattered fragment by shattered fragment and I truly believe I needed this adversity, this test of the mind, body and spirit to act as a jolt to the system. I needed to be reminded of what is important, of why I’m doing all of this and why I should be proud of everything I’ve achieved so far. I also needed reminding that I am truly capable of achieving anything I want, as long as I’m prepared to give it my all.
I’ve entered June with a boatload of motivation and I am hungrier than ever before when it comes to the future of this site. Sometimes we need to be aware of when to take a step back, take a breather and do ourselves a kindness. As frustrated as I’ve been with how things have gone the last few months, especially with my inability to be as consistent as I’ve wanted to be here, I am now better for the entire experience and I will be a million miles better for it moving forward.
I truly believe that you are going to get the best possible version of me now.
No matter what the biopsy results say, I am full of excitement, motivation and passion for what’s ahead for The Steele Sports Bar.
We really are on the cusp of something special, and the back-half of 2024 is going to be one hell of a ride. I’m so pumped you’ve all decided to join me for the journey.
All that is left to be said is thank you. Thank you for listening, thank you for being patient and thank you for continuing to support me and the site through thick and thin.
I appreciate it more than you will ever know.
Here’s to getting back into a groove. Here’s to getting back to talking about sports every single day. And here’s to a monster June.
Let’s do it.
Thank you.
Andrew Steele