What The Show Means To Me

Black Feather Blog

What The Show Means To Me

Spencer Borup

Feb 27, 2020

Spencer's Thoughts On The Podcast

When I first started doing this Podcast, I had no way of knowing what was in store for me.

When I started doing this, I had the loftiest of goals when I first started doing this, goals like: “I want to make this my full time job!” “I want to get invited to conventions!” “I want to turn this into some kind of money raising charity shenanigan”. As a person, I do things like this waaaay to often. I have these high expectations for myself, and if things don't pan out the way I hope they will, I tend to beat myself up.

I was diagnosed with Bipolar II Disorder back in 2015, after struggling with it for years, all through middle and high school. With this, comes symptoms of Hypo-mania, the highs, and Depressive Episodes, the lows. For me personally, my depressive episodes hit harder and last much longer than the Hypo-manic experiences I have had. Both are troubling, but I find I have a MUCH more difficult time managing my depression. I have tried taking so many different types of medication for it, but nothing really works. The side effects of the medications are too much for me, and I have chosen many times to just not take them, and try to manage things without them. I am constantly battling my inner thoughts of inadequacy and self loathing when my brain decides to take a stroll into a “bad neighborhood”.

As I said before, the depression I feel is always much more difficult for me to manage. I always feel extremely irritable, very inadequate, and have very low energy. I constantly tell myself, “You don't have it that bad, your life could be so much worse than it is. You're being ridiculous right now Spencer. You don't have a right to feel this way.” I feel bad for feeling that way, which in turn, makes me feel worse, and then I feel bad for feeling worse, and these thoughts turn into this downward spiral, that if I'm not careful, will just consume me. This is in NO WAY supposed to make you feel sorry for me. That's not my intention. I always feel very weird talking about this because I'm not always super comfortable with it myself. But to fully understand what this show means to me, you have to understand this part of my life.

This show has not always been easy. I loath editing. I get very frustrated with the Social Media aspect of things. We have had multiple cast changes. I've never been very good at keeping things consistent. And there have been MULTIPLE times I just think about quitting, throwing in the towel. When life gets me down, and I begin to think about what a failure I am because I don't have the numbers, or nobody is listening to the show, and I begin to think “Why am I even doing this?”, I have to remind myself of the core of the show. What makes the show special to me, why I do continue doing it.

I use the podcast as a coping mechanism. I use the time spent with my family, my support group, to help me through the times I become my own worst enemy. Doing the show allows me to step away from everything, if only for a little bit. I get to be different people. I get to spend regular time with a majority of my family. I get to create this story that I think is so incredible, with the help of the people playing in the game, and express my creativity in a bunch of different ways. As morbid as this might sound, I also think about the time in the future when my mother will be gone, and just knowing I have hours and hours of her recorded, is something that keeps me going. If I ever have kids, I think it will be so cool when they're finally old enough to listen to the show themselves, and see what a HUGE NERD their dad was. This is so much more to me than just a podcast, and so much more than just a game. It is an opportunity to make memories with the people I love the most in this world, that one day I will be able to look back on and say, “I did that. I'm really proud of what I did.”

Although this adventure has not always been easy, and it has had many ups and downs, just like life, these thoughts constantly play through my head, and I just keep going, keep pushing forward, so that I can continue to grow, and continue to have these special moments in my life.

If you made it through to the end, thanks for reading this, thanks for being here. I know it all is very sappy, but hopefully this will allow you to see the show for what it is to me. And the next time you hear me cry on the show, you'll be able to understand why the water works turned on. Thanks so much!

< Older Post Newer Post >