Meet Fred Logenecker

Hi, I’m Fred. I enjoy life! And I love to meet new people! Today I am a mental health coach and a trained chaplain. I have always been a very creative, optimistic, and outgoing person. Being creative is my life.

An Unexpected Crisis

But a few years ago at age 52, anxiety and fear overtook me when I lost my longstanding job in marketing due to corporate downsizing. I entered the darkest time of my life and wouldn’t emerge from it for eight months. My creativity disappeared and a crisis replaced it—where would I find my next job? How would we pay our mortgage? Where did my friends go? My fear literally doubled when I realized I had been ignoring my need for a career change but had no idea which career to pursue next.

Soon, I was unable to sleep as my mind raced in circles trying to think of a way out. After 10 nights in a row of no sleep, for the first time in my life I became severely depressed. And my crisis didn’t go away. Instead, it got worse. I became suicidal and was hospitalized. For a long while, I was in and out of the hospital for major depression and suicide risk.

How in the world did this happen? I would need to write a book to give a full explanation, but one big factor was my unprocessed sadness. I remember the hope and relief I felt when a therapist explained to me that depression often comes from unexpressed sadness and grief.

Trusting Myself and Helping Others

If you are trying to help someone with depression, I encourage you to listen without judgment, pray, and stay in touch. Many people who struggle with depression really don’t honestly understand how they themselves got there – so it isn’t their fault, and they can easily feel helpless, misunderstood, and alone. The slow healing process is typically brought on by several “layers” of grief and unprocessed emotions, so it takes time to work through these feelings and thoughts and to rebuild new protective layers.

Part of the recovery is also learning to trust oneself again, even before learning to trust others or God. The self is so important. Finding one’s inner strength I think begins with first finding a calm place inside the self, in silence. One way to make this happen is to spend time alone. In my case, my doctors required me to spend 30 minutes alone in silence each day, and this had an enormously positive impact.

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Looking Back

HOPE. That word can seem so far from someone’s sight when they feel hopeless and helpless, especially as a teenager. When you feel your world is crumbling, well-meaning adults minimize your feelings and say, “You’re just a kid. Those feelings will pass.” Looking back to my 15-year-old self, I couldn’t see the light, the hope. I only saw darkness and despair.

When I was 15 years old, I made the decision, after years of feeling lost to take my life. My life at the time seemed so complicated and I couldn’t handle the pain I was feeling. I felt alone. No one to talk to. In those days you didn’t talk about depression. That was a taboo. I put my happy face mask on and portrayed the happy girl. My life seemed like a Merry Go Round … and not in a fun way. I am sure most of us have been on one. The up and down, in a circle motion. I felt like the ride would not stop. I couldn’t get off … it kept going around, the pain. Every day I woke up telling myself, “OK, Lara! One more day. If it doesn’t get better that’s it!” Then I started telling God. “OK, God. If it doesn’t get better tomorrow, that’s it! I’m DONE!”

It got to the point, one cold day in February, that I’d had enough. I was sitting in health class. Our teacher gave us an assignment. Write your own obituary. I can’t remember what I wrote. I know it was short and to the point. I guess I thought that it was my goodbye letter. I felt such a sense of relief to know that I had finally decided.

Helping Others

Fast forward to the present. My journey has been a rollercoaster. I’ve had a lot of therapy that provided me tools to navigate life. I ended up going into the mental health field for a little while to help others. I hope that I’ve provided a lighted path for people. I gave my clients my heart and soul. As I write, I think of the word HOPE and the focus I want to strive for as I continue this opportunity God has given me…(H) Helping, (O) Others, (P) Plan, (E) Existence. We are here for a reason, to walk beside our brothers and sisters. I want to share the HOPE, that there is HOPE in the darkness. One of the things I remember that day in the hospital is the “Footprints” poem. God carried me that day and the days that followed. I will be that person to walk alongside, lean on, and in some cases, I will carry. Until my last breath I will use this life to shine the light of HOPE.

Lara Perry

Philippians 3:14 NIV
“I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus is calling us.”

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Then in April of 2020, when he could no longer stand the pain of depression, he put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger.  Here’s where the miraculous part of his story begins. Drew not only survived but woke up 20 hours later and realized he wanted to live.

Even though he now has a prosthetic eye in his right socket and has lost parts of his sense of taste and smell, he managed to hit his first home run almost a year after his suicide attempt.

Since that time, Drew has become an advocate for mental health by sharing his story with others and being authentic about his battle with depression. The video tells more about Drew’s amazing story of overcoming against all odds.

Sources / Credits:

Photo by Luke Zhang on Unsplash

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