An Odenton Man's Journey into the Abyss—and Back

Jason Humm has written a book that he can’t bring himself to read. 

Its pages contain words of pain. Of hopelessness. Of emptiness. All true, and from the depths of his soul. 

The words inside the book, Dodged, are poems that convey a harsh struggle against the unyielding foes of depression and anxiety.

With one more step I could go away

And if I did would it really matter.

I don’t know if I want to go or stay

Stay here where it is so full of agony.

“I can’t read it,” Humm says, as he nestles into the corner of a sofa inside his Odenton home, fidgeting with a bottle of water. “It’s just too hard. I spent a lot of rough days in this house.”

And yet, on this day, he has invited a reporter to talk. It is time, he says, to recognize how far he has come since that difficult time, and to convey a message of hope to those who are fighting a similar battle. 

“If this helps a father take a look at what his son is going through, or one kid to talk to a counselor for help, I’ll consider it a worthwhile effort,” Humm says. 

There are more good days than bad days now. But about five years ago, Humm’s good days were few and far between.

“I saw no end,” he says. “And when you see no end ... well, you see the other kind of end."

Days like today make me wish 

Wish the end would come faster

Because my world’s a disaster

Don’t know what I’m living for

You wouldn’t recognize me anymore

For Humm, depression and anxiety weren’t triggered by any single event. But there were moments in his battle that he now views as turning points—either towards the abyss or away from it. 

There was the dissolution of his first marriage and the associated feelings of guilt. 

There was the day he handed a shotgun to his brother and said, “I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to have this in the house.”

There was the day he laid on the floor in a fetal position, thinking only of the sweet relief of death, when his pet cat, Cookies, curled up next to him, as if to say, “Don’t go.”

There was the day he chose to leave the house and meet an old friend for lunch. That friend later became his new wife. 

Humm talks openly about his path to recovery. He sees psychiatrists for anxiety and depression, and takes medication to manage both. He looks for small victories, like a successful trip to the grocery store. (He used to get his groceries delivered.) And he credits his wife, Laura, for looking beyond his struggles. The pair married last year, after catching up over an informal lunch.

“She was just unfazed by my issues,” he says. “She was so understanding ... I went have lunch just to reconnect with a friend, but we have not been apart since.”

Even through his darkest period, Humm remained employed as a writer for a government agency in Washington, DC. He recently left that position and is pursuing a graduate degree in technical writing—perhaps an indication that he is finally looking toward the future. (A man who is suicidal, Humm notes, does not apply to graduate school.)

It was recently that he compiled all of the poems he had written into a single volume, now for sale on Amazon.com.

“It does get better, and I have no shame in talking about what I went through,” he says. “I was not going to let the stigma associated with depression and suicide keep me from speaking out.”

"Dodged" is available as an e-book on Amazon.com. It is free to download on August 13.