Post-Expedition Depression

Originally shared by Inspiration Adventure Blog

Post-Expedition Depression

 

For many adventurers, the most difficult leg of the journey is the return home.  The transition between heroics and mundane mediocrity can be crippling, especially when planning for the transition has not been considered.  As a young man being overly concerned with the details of the experience, I had failed to consider the challenges of how to deal with it when it came to an end.

 

Halfway through the first semester of my sophomore year in college, I chose to quit school and backpack Alaska.  It was a plan my best friend and I developed and although it was a tough slog, it was one of the best decisions of my life.  Being a self-driven dreamer, I didn’t have a problem with achieving the goals of the project.  However, I never considered the repercussions of riding such a great wave.

 

It was about nine months of sporting unique experiences that brought me to the crest of that wave.  Being in need of cash, I signed on as a soundman and official van driver for a solo-musician.  This alone was worth the price of quitting school as we traveled all over the eastern United States.  I continued my fund-raising by working at a summer camp for three months after the tour had completed.  At that point, I had to stretch what I had earned and drive cross country on an epic backpacking tour of the great north. 

 

Although this stretch of awesome experiences was intensely rewarding and personally meaningful, it wasn’t easy.  Touring as a sound man for a neurotic musician had its pitfalls.  One show would be energetic and spectacular with throngs of vibrant people and the next I’d be staving off glitchy equipment as the musician struggled to engage the audience.  At one point I developed touring amnesia by completely blanking out and I wasn’t able to recall what state I was in or where I was driving to.  Living that lifestyle  was psychologically taxing and I was happy to see it come to an end.  Working as a camp counselor was also demanding as I had to manage the behaviors of rambunctious middle school boys through the entire summer.  The epic backpacking expedition across the northern tier of North America was obviously the most challenging endeavor as I fought off mosquitos, hypothermia, equipment failures and wild animals. 

 

Even through the challenges and setbacks, these nine months in their entirety were truly life-changing.  Throughout the soundman gig, I met hundreds of unique and fascinating people from all walks of life and somehow in making these connections I took a bit of them with me.  The same can be said for being a camp counselor, except I was flooded with pure social camaraderie and cohesiveness.  Working with those boys was great.  While driving  cross country and backpacking with my best friend, I can honestly say that I have never felt such a sense of total freedom and empowerment as I had then. 

 

I returned back home to the small farm town of Worthington Pennsylvania just after Thanksgiving.   And although I had missed being home, was exhausted and desperately needed to recover, I felt entirely and completely out of place.  It was as if I had walked with God and communed with giant mountains as their equal and now, having flown too close to the sun, fell back to earth as a mere mortal again.  Having ventured deep into the wilderness and surviving on simplicity, I was now unable to relate to things I didn’t have to work for such as central heat, prepared foods and flush toilets.  My world was prepared for me and I was now confronted with having to disregard the meaning of being directly responsible for my basic needs such as warmth, food, water and just staying alive.  And it was this being alive without intention that made me feel so dead inside. 

 

To make matters worse, Worthington was an unchanged town and the very culture itself expected mediocrity.  If you try to better yourself, then you’re judged as trying to be better than everyone else.  Who do you think you are for being different, for being educated, for being more than just mundane?  So having been exposed to masses of diverse and interesting people, I was now confronted with a culture that rejected culture. 

 

So it was the return home that became the most difficult and challenging leg of the journey.  I was lonely in a crowded room.  My friends and family couldn’t grasp  –  or even care  –  about what I experienced and how I changed.  The rolling farm land numbed my senses and being unemployed without a plan to transition back to reality was a bone-crushing depression that I could barely take.  My backpacking equipment was hanging in the basement like a dead animal.  As if mourning for the person I once was, I would frequently break down in tears.  I was truly depressed which I suppose was the natural consequence for riding so high for so long.  The crest of the wave I rode had passed and now I was barely treading water in the trough. 

 

I took my confounding mental state as I had the mountains  –  one step at a time, completing one task before the next and narrowing my vision to what was directly at hand.  I remember making lists at the end of each day for tasks I would complete the next.  Although I was struggling with my low performance, the routine kept me going.  It took a few months before I shook the worst part of it and by then I was planning to return to school in the fall.  I eventually found some employment and by the time summer rolled around, my funk was gone as I returned for another summer as a camp counselor. 

 

I wish I could say I had done things differently and had successfully avoided post-expedition depression.  But as with many of my stories, my failures and oversights have become a source of learning.  So here are my suggestions for riding the wave the whole way to dry land to avoid being trapped in a deep low.  First, recognize that transitioning back to reality will not be easy and that despite your mental resilience, you are likely to fall victim to it if unprepared.  As with logistics-planning for the trip, take time to secure a source of employment or volunteer work after.  If traveling with a group, arrange a way to stay in touch to share experiences after the journey had ended.  It’s also a good idea to share your experiences and photos with a related online community; this will give you a much needed outlet for sharing experiences with a group of people that not only have interest, but understand it.  Lastly, take time to take day trips and get out to satisfy your adventure fix.  It can be especially helpful to join a club of folks with similar interests.

 

Not all people experience this, but there’s no way of telling if you will or won’t.  So, it’s better to be prepared.

 

© Bryan McFarland 2015

 

  #depression   #expedition   #trip  

  #travel   #psychology