Let’s Talk: with Erika McCoy
Let’s Talk: I have depression, anxiety, and ADHD, and Mobile Escape has taught me coping mechanisms I didn’t know I needed.
I started working with Mobile Escape when I absolutely needed it most. When I applied for the job listing, I was excited to join a new team and a new company and do something new because I was overwhelmed *and* underwhelmed in my life. All my professional life, I had bounced around careers that didn’t fit right, and because I kept trying to shapeshift into something (or someone) else, my mental health had taken a nose dive. I needed a change to save myself.
The relief of settling in to Mobile Escape was unbelievable. I was excited to do my job and go to work and be present in the world, which was something I hadn’t realized I was missing. Field trips and road trips and residencies were exactly the thing I needed to help me get back to feeling human. Getting to work with my hands and be creative and fix things and break things (and not get in trouble for breaking them, but instead be encouraged to learn from my mistake and the repair) was a kick in the butt.
Working my first residency made me see something I hadn't before – the high paced environment of the residency made my brain operate in a different way. I felt like an air traffic controller and a project manager: sending different thoughts in different directions, managing crowds, encouraging new ideas, creating new sub-teams, all in a high stress and high volume environment. I could feel a shift in the way my brain was processing, and it was unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. At the end of the week, one student came up to me to say thank you for the experience. I thanked them back and reminded them how much I appreciated their patience, because I had been nervous about the experience. The student said something to me that has stuck with me ever since:
“You, like, knitted this together! Like we were yarn, but you helped make us a shape, you know?”
It made me think about knitting (and yarn, specifically). When I was younger, I would loom knit all the time, especially during class when teachers were talking. I would listen and look up occasionally but still absorb all the information I needed. It drove my teachers mad, and I got in trouble all the time, but my grades never faltered. Then as a young adult, I slowly stopped. My brain got a little harder to function in, but I chalked it up to a side effect of growing up. In university, I burnt out completely. My brain couldn’t hold on to thoughts, and it felt like every single thing I thought – even the good thoughts – were kind of like annoying mosquitoes that wouldn’t leave me alone, but also wouldn’t get close enough that I could catch them to do something about it. I would either do 10 things poorly, or 1 thing with such intense dedication that it was weird. I would sit on the floor of my bedroom and, even though I had stopped knitting years ago, I would untangle piles of yarn, picking through endless loops and knots and switching it around and pulling on different threads and making tight, neat balls.
When I described this hobby (that I still occasionally do today almost 4 years later) to a doctor this past summer, he asked me if I’d ever been tested to ADHD. After a series of tests, it turns out that I am riddled with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. My brain exploded. It explained so much of what I had struggled with and I was so glad to have language to explain my life. But most importantly, I realized what Mobile Escape gave me that nothing else had ever given me, which was a loose schedule with freedom. They gave me a list of ten things that needed to be completed and didn’t mind that I jumped from number 5 to number 2 to number 9. They encouraged me think outside of the box and approach tasks in ways that make them efficient and effective for me, which wasn’t something I’d ever had in a workplace. The creative problem solving that Mobile Escape encourages in students is absolutely echoed for their staff, and it has helped me understand myself and the way I think.
Mobile Escape has been an incredible force and ally in my life. They have helped me in ways I can’t begin to express. I am so proud to be a part of this team, and so happy to have an environment that fosters my growth professionally and mentally by zigging when I zig, and grooving when I groove. Mobile Escape and the team behind it have taught me what I need to cope: flexibility, creativity, curiosity, and communication.
I have depression, anxiety, and ADHD, and Mobile Escape helped awaken the wonder in me.