About Me — Caleb Ahrens
My story of healing and redemption
For much of my life, I struggled to describe myself to others. I wasn’t interested in many hobbies — or people, to be honest.
I saw no future for myself.
Mentally, I was lost: deeply depressed and destructively impulsive.
Having a hidden diagnosis of bipolar that was ravaging my life and everyone around me without regard. Mental breakdown after mental breakdown. All my relationships were toxic, even with family. Anyone who knew me knew I couldn’t keep a job.
Many of my friends, loved ones, and partners have also faced their diagnoses, addictions, or life challenges.
Dealing with my mother’s major bouts of depression throughout my childhood was my first intimate experience with mental illness before I started suspecting that I, too, may have developed the “crazy gene”.
Even she was painfully aware of how destructive having me around would be, even at arm’s length.
I wasn’t formally diagnosed until 2021 when I was 21 years old.
I wish I could say I just woke up one day and had everything figured out, but we know that’s not how it happened. And honestly, I doubt it works that way for most of us.
For me, it got worse before it got better.
So much worse that I found myself sitting in a jail cell.
(Yes, I’ll revisit that in another post.)
It was in that cell that I came to a life-changing realization — I am the sole benefactor of my choices, actions, and their consequences.
My life is my responsibility.
After my release from Niagara County Correctional Facility in October 2022, I was homeless at the Niagara Gospel Mission for the better part of three years. During that time, and my time in jail as previously mentioned, I developed an intimate understanding of what some refer to as the derelicts of society. I befriended many people — each with a story that has impacted how I view the world today.
I even fell in love with one of these people.
Many of these individuals are battling addiction or mental illness. Some are stuck in their circumstances, convinced they could never reintegrate into “normal” society. Others have simply given up and didn’t want to be bothered by the society that had cast them out in the first place.
I began seeking out therapy once more.
And the process was brutal.
I had to accept a lot of ugly truths about myself, and the road to recovery wasn’t pretty. I was still having episodes, I was still flipping out on people, and I still couldn’t keep a job, when I was alone, I abused marijuana to cope and pornography to distract myself.
It took me years to learn to ask for help.
I was stubborn and convinced no one would want to help me. And even if they did, how would that make me look? I feared being labeled a “bum,” “crazy,” or “deplorable”.
I’d learned a lot of interpersonal skills and coping mechanisms at this point, though my symptoms were still very severe.
So severe that I didn’t realize how bad they were until I started feeling better.
I ended up needing medication to assist in my mental health recovery.
I am very grateful to have lithium carbonate available to me as treatment, as I wholeheartedly believe it has saved me from my symptoms.
Gone were the days of constantly being stuck in episodes of cyclical thinking, only being able to escape through some unhealthy coping mechanism.
No more chaotic bouts of impulsivity brought on by my manic highs that all but drained my bank account and maxed my credit cards. Or landed me in some obligation I no longer wanted to follow through with, like taking on a job I knew I had no availability for. Or making promises to friends I knew I wouldn’t keep and then ghosting them when it was time to fulfill them.
Don’t even get me started on the rage-inducing irritability or those days where I’d rather just sleep all day instead of showing up to work.
Worst of all, though, was the self-denial. I couldn’t have been crazy, only crazy people need therapy and medicine. I told myself for so long that other people were the problem, that I’d started believing it. Until I had no one left.
After I began recovering and discovering a true sense of balance and emotional regulation I’m not sure I’d ever felt before, I was left to pick up the pieces. Old friends wanted nothing to do with me, and current ones were very cautious when interacting with me.
After lashing out at close friends, family, and even professors so many times, how does one exactly turn around and come back to apologize? It wasn’t just another manic episode now, but a total change of heart. But they didn’t and couldn’t know that. Most wanted to get off the rollercoaster that I was and get as far away from me as possible, and I had to accept that.
A fight with my ex-boyfriend whom I met at the Niagara Gospel Mission ultimately led to me being asked to leave the premises, and I was out of a safe place to stay.
Well, physically safe. I wasn't ever truly free of the judgments cast on me once people knew that I am a man who likes other men, in a Christian environment where cisgender men are the primary demographic.
At any rate, I was out of a place to stay with no further prospects on where I could go next. All the shelters in this county and the next were filled up and had waiting lists. My options were sleeping outside through the cold November nights, or booking the cheapest possible hotel/motel in the area.
I had no idea what to do next, I was scared for my safety and stability, and at the end of the semester when finals were coming up, my brain was overloaded 24/7. I needed a lucky break to help pull me out of a situation that did not look very good.
I just needed a loving nudge in the proper direction of what to do next.
About a week later that same month, a friend suggested I post in a local Reddit forum.
To my surprise, a ton of people I’d never even met reached out with resources, donations, and housing referrals.
I almost immediately found a roommate shortly after the post!
I was left in shocking awe that this many people would donate and reach out to a person they’d never even met!
And they all believed in me!
It was at this moment I realized two invaluable lessons:
Vulnerability is key to both personal success and human survival.
Had I never reached out and shared some information surrounding my situation, I almost certainly would have never received the help and unyielding support I got. Vulnerability is scary, yes, I am not disputing that. However, it also empowers and encourages us to take that leap of faith that others will be there to support us when we need it most. When being vulnerable in our lives is successful, it then becomes a driving force.
We CAN do hard things! We CAN do scary things!
Doing things for the first time is scary.
Writing this About Me blog is scary.
Compassion is the understanding of other people’s pain.
This is how people had the desire to help me even though they’d never met me; compassion teaches us to meet others (or ourselves) where they are and just love them anyway.
As it turns out, how well we know each other matters very little. If we are being honest with ourselves and others, we will come to know the truth soon enough.
So many people took a risk to help me. They trusted I would use the money and resources responsibly (which I have!).
They believed in me that I could make it through this ordeal, and come out on the other side stronger than ever.
Even when I wasn’t quite sure if I could make it through myself.
This is why I am here, writing my first-ever blog post on the internet.
I believe it is my turn, now, to take a risk in the pursuit of helping others.
Just like so many people have done for me.
My name is Caleb Ahrens.
I’m 25 years old at the time of writing this— an age when I’m told, the brain is fully developed and adulthood truly begins.
I live in Buffalo, New York. I have attended Erie Community College since Fall 2023. I’m a Fine Art student, set to graduate this spring, and I’ll transfer to Buffalo State University next semester to pursue a bachelor’s in Graphic Design.
I find it important to note that when I first started at community college, I didn’t consider myself an artist. I didn’t create much, if at all, and I certainly didn’t believe myself to be good at that type of thing.
I could not have been any further from the truth.
I wanted people to believe in me again because, despite all this, I still didn’t believe in myself. If anything, I found myself thinking I was finally recovering just a tad too late. Maybe if I started therapy a bit sooner, I wouldn’t have done all these terrible things. I started questioning if my becoming mentally healthy would really even change anything, or if the effort had always been trivial to begin with.
I realized that being inactive, letting life happen to me, meant I was surrendering all my power to the world around me. I had no control over what was happening in my immediate life, and I didn’t care to have much self-control, either. Allowing life to happen to me also meant I was losing precious moments of opportunity to bring my dreams to fruition.
Dreams of becoming an artist, starting that blog, creating meaningful content that brings light to other people’s lives and inspires them to do the things they’d always wanted to do. For the ones who secretly beat themselves down and talked their way out of doing the thing they’d love to do before they ever even got a chance to attempt it.
Instead, I began to tell myself that I could be good at something.
Maybe even many things.
My skills are developing by the day and art has become now a focal point of keeping myself mentally and spiritually well. My art professors have taught me much in the way of self-expression. However, they also indirectly taught me a lot of life lessons that have been pivotal in my self-recovery and discovery.
Professing my love for art and indulging myself in the creative process has taught me much in the way of mindfulness, gratitude, radical acceptance, and so much more!
Now, I make it a daily ritual to create. And when I am not creating, I am studying and learning how to advance my creations much further.
Learning to embrace the challenge of learning and growing every day I am alive is what brings me great joy and satisfaction now!
After university, I plan to move to California to tap into the art and design network there, and I’m determined to learn how to market and sell my work.
I enjoy many things — video games, reading, drawing, painting, and music are just the beginning of an ever-growing list of creative pastimes.
I’m currently in training to become a Certified Recovery Peer Advocate, specializing in both addiction and mental health recovery.
Helping others overcome their struggles and relating my experiences to theirs has given me a unique perspective — and an understanding that we all face battles, roadblocks, and obstacles.
We all can overcome them if we truly desire to.
I hope my story can inspire others going through difficult times.
I want people to know that growth and healing are possible!
“There is a beautiful calm after even the fiercest storm.”
Now, I want my work to reflect a newfound sense of peace and higher creativity and show that a fulfilling life is within reach for anyone willing to try to attain it.
Through this blog I’ll share stories from my mental health recovery, the lessons I’ve learned, and the people who’ve inspired me. I’ll write about what has kept me going when all hope seemed lost, and what I’ve been doing to better take care of my wellbeing.
I’m an avid reader, so I’ll also post book reviews when they tie into the blog’s themes. And as a passionate artist, I’m considering writing pieces focused on art therapy.
Ultimately, I’m the writer — and you, my friend, are the reader. My goal is to forge real, meaningful connections that will serve us both for a lifetime.
If you ever have any meaningful thoughts or suggestions for how I can improve or what I should write about next, please leave a comment!
Your voice matters, and I’d love for you to be part of the next chapter in my journey toward self-discovery and recovery.
