My Decade on Broadway
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A doctor with a white goatee and spectacles eventually reached me; a former English teacher, he was a reserved and bookish man who always dressed in linen and earthy colors. I had started seeing him just after the turn of the millennium, and he worked on basic things: my breathing, going for walks, remaining honest. I thought he was nuts. 
“You are a blessed man underneath all that fat, medication, and sickness,” he said to me one day. 
“Blessed?” I said. “I’m forty, women are repelled by me, I’m obese, and I’m surrounded by nonlinear conversation at supper.” 
“Perhaps, but you have the power to correct your delusions,” he said, leaning forward. “Many people are unable to do that.” 
“Okay.” 
“I’m going to call you Duplicitous Dave for the deception you’ve practiced,” he said. “You’ve got to be aware of when you’re fooling others and when you fool yourself.” 
“Duplicitous Dave?” I said. 
“Watch how this works,” he said, standing. “You purchase the razors one week before you injure yourself, right?” 
“Sometimes,” I said. 
“In between that week and the self-harm, every time you see a staff member, every time you talk to family, every time you come see me, you’ve lied.” 
“Right,” I said.
“You must see this,” he said gently. “You don’t buy your razors in a fit of blinding rage. You buy them with a plan. Perhaps you get nuts while you’re cutting, but it’s preventable.” He stopped and sat back in his chair. “Your healing is doable if you can stay honest. Call me about it. Pull aside a staff person and get honest with yourself.” 
The last time was Halloween morning, 2005. I had gone to the Shell station several days before and purchased cigarettes. On the way to see my therapist, I stopped and sat on a bench outside of the Yale Law School. I quickly put two packs of Merits out on my forearm. As soon as the first cigarette touched my skin, I knew I was done. No relief or dreamy, stoned groove rolled in; just shame and embarrassment. Quickly, for the fuck of it, I mashed the rest of them onto my arm. 
Oddly nostalgic as I watched the blisters form, I studied the Yalies hustling to class. They looked determined, voluptuous, and vital. I wondered how many slip through the cracks. How many don’t make it? I got up and walked toward my appointment with my doctor, passing the Grove Street Cemetery. I looked up at the entrance and read the engraving: The dead shall be raised. A few senior citizens were walking through the cemetery, getting a tour. 
It felt as simple and complex as unlocking a sliding, plexiglass door that I’d been trying to slam my way through for many years. As I walked down Grove Street to make the tail end of my appointment, I felt very aware of how rapidly time flew. How much was stolen from me and how much of it I’d wasted. 
“You’ve lost another opportunity to right yourself,” my therapist said when he saw my arm. “You’ll have to wait until you’re out of the hospital to prove you mean business.” 
He called the ambulance and we waited together for the EMTs. When they arrived, they joked about the Red Sox, quickly dabbing some Bacitracin on me. We walked through the hallway. People stared, then glanced away, ducked back into their offices. I wanted to explain that I wasn’t really a mess, that this wasn’t the true me. But they’d turned back to their lives, and soon I climbed into the ambulance.