My Battle with Mental Illness and Veblenian Entrepreneurship
I went back and forth a dozen times on whether to write this. I went back and forth a dozen more times on whether to share it. I worry about missing future opportunities if would-be employers discover this. I worry about how this might be received by people I know.
While anxiety and depression have become open topics in the workplace, many other mental health issues remain highly stigmatized. That is why most people who suffer from anything more severe than anxiety or depression do so alone. It seems the only way to change that is through candid conversations.
Veblenian Entrepreneurship
A friend recently shared a research paper with me titled Toward an Untrepreneurial Economy? The Entrepreneurship Industry and the Rise of the Veblenian Entrepreneur. It was published by a trio of professors from Copenhagen Business School, Stanford University, and the City University of London. They posit that a growing number of startups have a negative impact on the economy in the long run.
Veblenian is an homage to 20th Century Economist, Thorstein Veblen, who coined the term conspicuous consumption, defined as spending more money on goods than they are worth. As Veblen explained, social status is displayed by what an individual consumes rather than what they make. This type of consumption is driven by the most affluent leisure class, which lower social classes strive to emulate.
Hartmann, Krabbe, and Spicer suggest the Ideology of Entrepreneurialism has given rise to so-called Veblenian Entrepreneurship. As they state in the Abstract, “[Veblenian Entrepreneurship] is pursued as a form of conspicuous consumption… We argue that the rise of the Veblenian Entrepreneur has contributed to creating an increasingly Untrepreneurial Economy. That is an economy which superficially appears innovation-driven and dynamic but is actually rife with inefficiencies and unable to generate economically meaningful growth through innovation.”
Whereas innovative entrepreneurs cultivate expertise into solutions that address valuable problems, Veblenian Entrepreneurs’ skills are often limited to those necessary for raising early-stage capital to finance their conspicuous consumption. Chief among these is the skill of pitching investors. Half-ass products with sexy slide decks have secured many billions of dollars in angel and venture capital. Rather than being multiplied into domestic economic growth, many of those dollars were set on fire in digital advertising or offshore software development.
The High Cost of Veblenian Entrepreneurship
My journey as a Veblenian Entrepreneur was accidental. I did not realize the road I traveled until afterward. It spanned six years, four funded startups, two continents, and one terrorist attack. It was not entirely in vain. I contributed in material ways and acquired valuable skills in software engineering, product development, sales, marketing, and board management. Nonetheless, I deluded myself into believing I was motivated by anything other than a desire to avoid a corporate career. A vision did not pull me. Low self-esteem and anxiety about work pushed me; as it has so many contemporary “entrepreneurs”. The irony is that I worked much harder and suffered much more as a result.
My journey began when I walked into my university’s startup accelerator program in 2014. I partnered with a founder who had raised angel capital. A few months later, we were accepted into a top accelerator in Salt Lake City. But as a first-year computer science student, I was a woefully inadequate co-founder and CTO. Lack of efficacy and intense imposter syndrome drove me to leave.
That cycle repeated itself in one way or another over the next five years. I joined three funded startups and tried to launch two of my own. Inevitably, something deterred me, and I proceeded to the next. In two of the three funded startups, I left for greener pastures. I dissolved one of my own ventures after a strategic partnership broke down.
Changing jobs is inherently stressful. My stress was multiplied by especially long hours often combined with university coursework and reduced salaries in exchange for equity. I believed the lie I told myself that I was making temporary sacrifices that would be reconciled when I succeeded. It was not long before I discovered the wisdom of Warren Buffet’s statement: “Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken.”
When I started my first job in 2013, I weighed 190 pounds. I had a close group of friends, an active dating life, and an optimistic long-term outlook. By the time I joined my fourth funded startup in 2019, I weighed 315 pounds. I had a graveyard of ruined relationships, no dating life, and feared I would not live to see my 35th birthday. In 2016, I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and put on medication for hypertension. And yet, the worst was still to come.
Breaking Point
The last quarter of 2019 was long and stressful. I continued to push my limits after the new year. After seven years of neglecting my health and working 80+ hours most weeks, I finally broke down. I was no stranger to panic attacks. I continue to have them. I had one last week. But what I experienced that night in January was unlike anything else. The stress was so overwhelming that my mind could not handle it. I reached a breaking point and slipped into what people closest to me worried was psychosis.
I learned later that what I experienced was dissociation, not psychosis. Dissociative symptoms can look and feel like psychotic symptoms. An easy way to understand the difference is to juxtapose a schizophrenic with a war veteran that has PTSD. The schizophrenic experiences psychosis. The veteran experiences dissociation. Dissociation is a way people cope with trauma. It occurs during periods of high stress. When I dissociated, I felt uninhibited and relieved of my anxiety.
At the time, my GP and therapist expressed no concern that I was suffering from bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. I gained confidence in my cognition and lowered my inhibitions. Unfortunately, it permitted me to say and do things I never would have otherwise. I did irreparable damage to some of my most important relationships. I even told my dad I never wanted to talk to him again. We stopped talking.
Months passed. Though I did not believe I suffered from mental illness, I continued to dig into the literature. The picture became clearer when I looked past January and saw my patterns over time. I realized people around me had been right to worry. I apologized to my dad and asked him to accompany me to visit a psychiatrist.
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD)
After several evaluations, I was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD). People with BPD experience at least 5 of the following symptoms:
· Intense fear of abandonment
· A pattern of intense but unstable relationships that follow cycles of idealization and devaluation
· Rapid changes in self-identity that include shifting goals and values
· Periods of stress-related paranoid ideation or psychotic-like symptoms (i.e. dissociation)
· Impulsive and risky behavior such as binge eating, substance abuse, or sabotaging success by suddenly quitting a good job or ending a positive relationship
· Suicidal threats or behavior, often in response to separation or rejection
· Wide mood swings lasting from a few hours to a few days
· Chronic feelings of emptiness or worthlessness
· Inappropriate, intense anger
People with BPD often have neurological abnormalities in the amygdala, hippocampus, and orbitofrontal cortex. The neurological aspects of BPD may resemble those of temporal lobe epilepsy. I suffered from epilepsy throughout childhood and adolescence. I experienced four grand mal seizures in my pre-teen years but outgrew it by the end of high school. Panic attacks feel like the prodromal phase before a grand mal seizure. That explains why I dissociated so intensely in response to a severe panic attack.
BPD tends to develop in response to long-term abuse, stress, and/or instability in childhood. My parents divorced when I was five. My mom was diagnosed with melanoma when I was six and died when I was thirteen. Both parents were remarried by the time I was seven, and mixed family relationships were tense. My high school years were riddled with severe relational, financial, and emotional stress.
Women are diagnosed with BPD four times more often than men despite similar epidemiological rates between genders. Men are frequently underdiagnosed with [only] depression/anxiety or misdiagnosed with antisocial personality disorder or bipolar disorder. Depression, anxiety, PTSD, and bipolar can co-occur with BPD. My GAD diagnosis was incomplete, not incorrect.
Genetics are known to contribute to the development of BPD. My paternal grandfather has schizoaffective disorder. My maternal grandfather had antisocial personality disorder. My maternal grandmother also has BPD. After understanding the neurological, environmental, and genetic factors, as well as evaluating my behavioral pathology, it was obvious the shoe fit.
The Psychological Pain of BPD
The Wikipedia article on Psychological Pain states, “BPD has long been believed to be the one psychiatric disorder that produced the most intense emotional pain, agony, and distress in those who suffer from the condition.” Following is my attempt to depict the magnitude of this pain in a relatable way.
Think of your most devastating breakup. You likely felt sad or depressed. You likely felt hopeless about finding future relationships. You likely felt confused about your identity because you just lost a big part of what defined you. You likely felt empty by the hole that was left. You may have felt worthless; like you were so damaged that you no longer deserved love.
Rewind the clock a few days or weeks before the breakup. You likely felt anxious about the future of the relationship. You may have felt like the smallest mistake would cause the person to leave you. Antagonistic thoughts or behaviors may have led to fights that added stress. You may have felt trapped in an impossible situation; like you did not want to go on with the relationship but felt obligated to try.
Imagine feeling like that most days. Then, add unstable relationships with friends and family, difficulty keeping a job, and paranoid ideation that leads to panic attacks or dissociation. That sums up BPD. Unsurprisingly, suicide is a leading cause of death for people with BPD. Suicide rates among people with BPD are higher than either schizophrenia or bipolar and roughly 50 times higher than the general population.
The Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scales (DASS) are used to quantify the severity of a person’s depression, anxiety, and stress. Each trait is rated on a 42-point scale. Traits are considered Extremely Severe if they exceed the following thresholds: 28 for Depression, 20 for Anxiety, and 34 for Stress. As a benchmark, my most recent scores were 30, 22, and 38, respectively.
Looking Back
Words that best describe the last decade of my life might include “impulsive”, “unstable”, and “self-destructive”. After two internships in financial services and three years of coursework in accounting and finance, I changed my major to computer science. After three years of coursework in computer science, I dropped out a year short of earning my degree. There is only one job in which I spent more than a year without interruption. I have an impeccable record of fostering strong relationships only to ruin them through inexplicably antagonistic behavior.
My relationships with people, work, and school followed a pattern of splitting. That is “black and white” or “all or nothing” thinking that leads to predictable cycles of idealization and devaluation. In the idealization phase, I perceived only the positive qualities of the relationship. Over time, minor imperfections polluted my perception until I devalued the person or job completely. If the relationship continued, the cycle usually repeated.
My relationships with others reflected my relationship with myself. At the root was a persistent feeling of worthlessness. My internal narrative read something like, “My life has been excruciating and left me with nothing good to offer. If only I can accomplish an important feat, then I will right every wrong because I will have something to offer. Until then, I am worthless and nothing I do matters.”
Feeling worthless bread insecurity that manifested into defensive or antagonistic behavior. Coupled with splitting and narcissism that accompanies all Cluster B personality disorders, I became my own worst enemy. I trapped myself in a negative feedback loop.
Each failed endeavor left me feeling more worthless, empty, depressed, anxious and stressed. The worse I felt, the more desperate I became to rid myself of those feelings. The more desperate I became, the more defensive and antagonistic I became. The more defensive and antagonistic I became, the faster I split. I lacked the resolution necessary to break the loop because I was motivated by conspicuous consumption rather than an innovative vision.
Road to Redemption
There is a scene in the movie Wall Street that has stuck with me. As Bud Fox walks into the office before being arrested, his boss takes him aside and says, “A man stares into the abyss. There is nothing staring back at him. At that moment, the man finds his character. And that keeps him out of the abyss.”
I experienced many dark days. Much of the darkness was self-inflicted, like when I found myself broke, homeless, and depressed during one of the worst winters on record. Some of the darkness was out of my control, like when I found myself running for my life during a terrorist attack in Nice, France. It was not until January of this year that I truly stared into the abyss and nothing stared back. At that moment, I found my character. And that kept me out of the abyss.
I quit alcohol and other vices, cleaned up my diet, adopted a rigorous exercise routine, and lost over 100 pounds in the first six months of this year. I made amends with my dad. I have talked with my brother more this year than in the last seven years combined. I call my 92-year old grandmother every week. I made new friendships and rebuilt old ones. I returned to school and will graduate with my computer science degree in May. I opened my Bible for the first time in years and attend church every Sunday.
Looking Forward
I used to think vocational and financial success was the only way to make meaning of what I suffered in the early stages of my life. Worse, I felt entitled to succeed because of how I had been wronged. I felt I was owed something. I imagine that is a narrative shared by many eminent orphans.
This year brought a lesson in humility. It was humiliating but exactly what I needed. It finally made me understand that success will not alleviate pain or assign meaning to the past. Love will. The greatest victory anyone can hope to achieve after they are beaten to a pulp is to salvage the capacity to give and receive love. I lost that capacity years ago. By the grace of God, I rediscovered it when I stared into the abyss and found my character.
I have made progress but continue to struggle every day. I feel depressed when I think about past mistakes. I feel anxious when I project the past onto the future. I only find peace when I surrender those worries to God so I may try to operate from love in the present. I am not good at it. I still feel empty. I still feel worthless. I still give in to anger. I still defend and antagonize. Perhaps I always will. I hope not. I try to change it. I remind myself about Warren Buffet’s measure of success: “Do the people you care about love you back?” No. Maybe one day. There is still damage to repair.
I do not know if I will ever launch or join another startup. I do know I would only consider it if I was passionate about the problem and fully bought into the solution. The stress is not worth the expected value otherwise. For the time being, I enjoy school. I appreciate it now that I am not preoccupied with entrepreneurial fantasies. Maybe grad school is in my future. Who knows? I do not know where my journey will lead. I just take solace in trusting I am finally on the right path.
