A Tale of Two Game Mats
A Post for Mental Health Awareness Month
In case you’re not aware, in addition to my TTRPG shenanigans (professional and otherwise), I’m a great lover of tabletop miniatures wargames. I should perhaps write a post at some point talking about that end of my hobby spectrum, but today I’d like to use it as a pivot to talk about a different kind of spectrum.
(How’s that for a segue?)
Last April, by which I mean 13-months-ago April, I placed an order for a teddybear-fur terrain mat. (If you know, you know.) April 2022 was a particularly heinous month on multiple fronts for me personally, so I immediately forgot about the order. I can say this with confidence because seven months later, I ordered a similar teddybear-fur terrain mat from the same company for the same objective. (In case you’re wondering, the objective is to cut up and use the “fur” as scatter terrain to represent pastures and meadows.)
A couple weeks later I fell extravagantly ill, and thus forgot about this order as well.
Last week, I received a shipment notification from the company telling me the mats were at last on their way. (Yes, that’s quite a delay. There’s a notice on their website about backlogs, but…wow.) Ironically, I had recently been mulling over the question of whether I should order some teddybear fur terrain mats to use as meadows-and-pasture scatter terrain…
Now, things have been hard for all of us for some time now. And, speaking for myself in the immortal words of Maggie Gyllenhaal, 2022 can go suck a fuck. But I’d be lying if I said this was all down to stress, or that this was the first time…or the second time…or the twentieth time that something like this happened to me over the course of my life. Buying the same thing two or three times because I keep forgetting I already bought it? World champion, right here.
A couple years ago, motivated by the fallout from Global Events, I started going to therapy for the first time in my life. And it didn’t take long for me to receive a diagnosis of mild ADHD and anxiety. I’m currently on medication for both, and am doing better than I ever have in my life, all told. But the struggle is real, and it never totally goes away.
Last year left me something of a nervous wreck by the end, and this year so far has been a really interesting journey towards integrating, well…everything. I turned 45 this year, and it’s not uncommon to go through a period of self-reflection and re-evaluation at this time (midlife crisis? It’s more likely than you think.), but the pandemic and all the other events of the past, oh, seven years have really taken a toll, I am finding.
I decided to write about this today because I recently found out May is Mental Health Awareness Month. ADHD has a month of its own (October, apparently), but being on the neurodivergent spectrum in general has a powerful impact on one’s mental health, as I’ve come to appreciate.
Not too long ago, a study made the rounds claiming mental health impacts from the pandemic were “minimal.” Well, I may be spending my time in a skewed circle of friends and colleagues (and it must be said, I think the percentage of neurodivergent and just plain emotionally sensitive folks in the tabletop gaming hobby/industry seems higher than the general average), but pretty much everyone I know has found themselves struggling with mental health issues brought on over the past three years. I’m not the only person who started going to therapy for the first time, or who were diagnosed with ADHD later in life and during the pandemic! And I think it’s important, especially in response to studies like that one—which can potentially leave people feeling like isolated freaks—to talk openly about what we’re dealing with. And not just in relation to pandemic-induced mental trauma, but mental health in general.
The stigma is powerful, but if you’ve found yourself really struggling lately just know you are hardly alone, and there are a ton of resources out there to help you. I found therapy and meds to be an effective combination; I’m also lucky enough to have a doctor who believes in the importance of integrative medicine and the mind-body connection. I’d just encourage folks who are going through it at the moment, and feeling alone or hopeless, to look for resources that work for them, and to not be shy talking about their experiences with friends and family, or even strangers on the internet. (Hello!) It’s remarkable how many supportive voices you find when you look for them.
Some links I’ve found helpful in my journey: