I haven't written anything since my last blog entry because every time I thought about it I looked at the last one and thought - no, that's good enough. 

 

I guess I should have warned you somewhere on here that this is my personal website - I don't casually delete things, I don't allow comments, I don't care if I get a billion hits a day, and I don't plan on monetizing my traffic. 

I hope we can still be friends now that you know I'm mostly just writing to myself. 

 

I've been through a lot in my life - I'm sure you have too - and you know what? I just like writing out my thoughts sometimes. Sometimes I do it with purpose and vision, other times it's a little more careless. 

I'm told I should be quiet, edit myself more, stop sharing everything...

I've been told to shut up since puberty, and you know what? I'm not shutting up as long as I have a means of communication - so let's just get that out of the way. 

 

I'd like to say to those I am a burden to - do you have any idea what it's like to be in the hospital with a suicide note at home? Do you know the depths of depression that would lead someone to literally try to take their own life multiple times? 

Can you ever understand that life isn't a rose-coloured candy-cane forest to some people? 

 

I really have had some angels in my life you know, for real. Not even joking a little. 

I have this family that I'm related to by birth that doesn't talk to me or each other - it's really something. Like divorce plagued the ones who weren't even married in the first place. 

And all these years I tried and tried to put the shards together - and you try and try and realize - wow, this is a lot of one-way trying going on here. 

I felt like that crazy relative at the family picnic making sure everyone gets more punch and smiles in the group photos. 

 

 

I've told the story a few times, but maybe it needs to be said again...

I left my parents house when I was 17 and moved out on my own. I had started working from a young age - realizing I wasn't ever going to get any money from them. While working my job I met the man who would later take me under his wing and adopt me as his son. 

Here we are almost 20 years later and he and I are still joined together by fate. Still working and eating together, still saying crazy Father-Son things to each other, and still driving everyone crazy who has no idea that a Pakistani man is able to adopt a Western kid. 

You, you're his dad - he's your son? ... how does that work? 

 

Anyway - to those who think they know me, it's time to take a little trip down Reality Road at Adamsville...

 

When I tried to kill myself I was 16 years old. I hated my life. I tried multiple times to end it. I didn't jump off a bridge because I didn't want anyone to have to clean my dead body off the road, and I didn't want to injure anyone else in my attempt to die. 

 

 

Each time was a little different, but I was mainly trying to off myself with massive overdoses of Big Pharma prescription medications - mine and other peoples'. The "pussies" way out, I was told later. 

I didn't just hate my life, but I saw literally no reason to live. I thought it would be better for me personally to die and move on with whatever the afterlife is, than to stay here suffering inside this head with these memories and depression. 

I used to write poems back then, and I wasn't a goth kid but I can assure you they were pretty dark. I can't even bring myself to write them out here - even though I remember some. 

 

I just need to make it clear to you, I tried to off myself while living with my real dad. I had no respect for him, lost it all when I was younger - in an unrelated story for some other time maybe. My dad has his own bag of personal issues now and is still in a hospital in Ottawa. Life goes on, people have to move on and adapt. 

I was involved in church groups back then, I remember how I felt even more isolated after I got out of the hospital. I remember the looks and whispers. Yes you assholes - I tried to kill myself, stare as long as you want - I'm not going anywhere. 

This brutal, in-your-face honesty I am able to deliver is something I have noticed is rare these days. Maybe a result of my experiences, maybe just too unique in this day and age. 

 

 

Suffice it to say, when I met my adopted dad I was a wreck. A complete and total wreck. We met literally one year after I got out of the hospital. 

I want it to be utterly and perfectly clear to you - I would be a dead man today if it wasn't for Aziz. I would be a drug addict, homeless, in a psychiatric hospital, in a ditch with a needle in my arm, or worse. 

I have no words to describe to you the vast difference in culture between our Canadian drinking, partying, doing drugs, cheating on our wives, watching hockey and idolizing celebrities - as compared to a well-educated Pakistani Muslim's culture. 

 

Did I deserve someone to take me under their wing and treat me like my real dad could never have imagined treating me? Absolutely not. 

Have I said and done things to Aziz over the years that I regret? Absolutely. 

Does having a strict Muslim for an adopted Dad make me a Muslim? Absolutely not. 

Do I have my own opinions about religion and life after death? You guys KNOW I do. Come on. 

 

 

But I really want it to sink in for you, most of you reading this - sad to say - may never know what it's like to know for certain that one person changed your life forever. I wish that you could have someone like my adopted dad in your life. I don't deserve it, and I wish sometimes he would have listened to me and just let me go my own way. But he never did.

He's the coolest person I know. 

 

He saw my life story, my so-called parents and family, and told me, "I won't do that to you Adam, whatever is mine is yours, anything you want of mine - you can have. I don't lie to you, everything I have you know."

 

How do you repay someone for that? I still ask myself that question. I put his kids under my life insurance plan, I do whatever he asks whenever he asks - I don't know what else I can do - he doesn't need me or anything I do, it's always been the other way around. 

 

Anyway, I don't deserve the things I have. I know that. 

I came from a divorced family riddled with addiction and mental health issues. 

 

And today I stand a changed man - I am whatever I am, and I am thankful. 

 

 

 

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