"I love you enough to let you go."

[likefatherlikeson]

Who: Justin Campbell, Mark Campbell, Gen Hart and Presley Monroe
What: Seeking purpose
Where: Presley's office
When: Monday morning

Justin still wasn't quite sure how he had gone from probably the best high of his life winning the Tony Award, to the low he had hit now. The shit with Will and Kolbie, and the whole fan issues, it had marred his happiness on his win and now the award was sitting on his bookshelf behind a pile of his schoolbooks. He couldn't be excited about it anymore. He didn't feel like he could be excited about anything. All he really wanted was to go to bed, pull the covers over his head, and shut the damn world out for awhile. Inside, he was aching and miserable. He felt like he had been hit by a bus. Which is exactly why this meeting was happening.

It wasn't scheduled initially. Presley had invited Justin to speak briefly at one of the New York events, and he had left the ball in Justin's court. That was one of the things Justin had been considering when the shit with Will hit the fan. When his dad had taken him to the beach - after he had finished bawling his eyes out over breaking up with Will - they chatted and Justin had told his dad he didn't want to do the speech for the Foundation. It had only boiled down to the fact he was exhausted and emotionally wrecked, so adding something else on top of it felt like it would be the straw that broke the camels back.

Instead of just letting him pull the plug, his dad offered to speak with Presley on his behalf about what ways Justin could help if he chose to be involved with the charity. In turn, Presley warmly welcomed Justin and his parents to come meet with him at his office where it would be an open conversation about any facet of the organisation and what it was involved in. Justin didn't have to make any choices, and he there was no pressure. So, here they were, waiting in Presley's office for the guy to arrive.

Justin knew a little about the Foundation. In fact, he had been offered support from it when he had been diagnosed with bipolar and had to quit school. Kalen had liaised on that front for him, but ultimately a personal tutor for homeschooling was agreed upon and Justin hadn't wanted to take help away from someone else who might need it when he was lucky to have plenty of financial security now his dad was taking care of him. He was sitting in between his parents, looking down at his lap with his shoulders slumped. It wasn't that he didn't want to be here, it was just that his mood had plummeted over the last couple of days and he felt stuck under a heavy weight he couldn't shift. He couldn't even go home to bed after this, because Caden wanted to meet with him to talk about something to do with PR... whatever the hell that could be.

Comments

[moneyfornothing]

Presley gave them a small smile and nodded. "Thank you. We appreciate any support, of course. But I don't want you to feel it's an obligation for Justin working with us. We wouldn't turn any donations away, however. The more we have, the more extensive support we can give our beneficiaries. Some just need a little help or encouragement, but others need much more to get them to a point they can start to achieve what they've hoped for. It's not easy, it's emotionally taxing, and a lot of hard work. Because of that, we don't like to measure our effectiveness on whether our beneficiaries have success or not. That's not what any of this is about. It's about trying to see if they can cope with it. Some thrive, others aren't ready and they might come back to us down the track to try again. Others may begin the process, but it exposes a need for support in different ways, and we have social workers who step in and liaise for them. Case work is another distinct part of our organisation. Basically, we respect that every young person with mental illness is different, and they're all fighting very unique battles to them. It's not like a cancer foundation where most funds go into research or developing facilities. We do a lot of outreach work, because the nature of the illnesses, they don't often know how to ask for help, know what helps is there, feel they're deserving of it, or are capable of having any sort of success. That's mostly where I would like Justin to be involved in the campaign. Reaching out to people like him before he got a leg up to success. That doesn't mean we will be sending him out there trying to counsel other kids with mental health, because we don't, at all, want it to be detrimental to his own health either. What I would like to look at is some baseline interviews with him we can include in our promotional literature, and just some very brief talks addressing our events so our beneficiaries can identify with him, and our financial backers can see how far a kid can come with support networks in place."

"And yes, of course, anything Justin is present at, there would be no questions that you would both be invited along. As I said, I'm not here to make his job or life harder. It is merely bringing him in onto our team as an Ambassador, because let's be real, his Tony's speech has gone viral and about the third return on a Google search of him is 'Justin Campbell bipolar' because people want to know more. They see this highly successful and talented young man, and can't quite believe he's a bipolar survivor. We don't want to objectify that, we just want him to be a figurehead of hope. Any even Justin books, if he needs to pull out, that's understandable. We recognise and understand completely that he has other more important commitments that come first and that his hours of work are restricted because of his age to begin with. Some appearances or events a couple of times a month, at the very most. That, and the pending fundraiser in Sydney next week," he added because he wasn't sure how much of any of this Justin was aware of. "It's soon, I understand, but your dad indicated, Justin, that it wasn't outwith the realms of possibility for it to be your first even with us, especially with you being half Australian."

[likefatherlikeson]

It was definitely a little overwhelming listening to Presley talk, but not because it was information overload. It was the simple fact that Presley wasn't talking shit. He was confident in what he was sharing, which meant he really did know this stuff inside and out. The organisation wouldn't have the success it did if he didn't, but there was more to it. There was an underlying compassion and understanding of how it was to live with mental illness. He frequently returned to reassuring Justin of the obligations, and indicating he understood the challenges. This stuff, you don't make up. Justin knew when someone was bullshitting him, or trying to tell him what he wanted to hear. In fact, that was the quickest way to have him shut down and put those defensive walls up. There wasn't any feeling like that had to happen here. He wasn't intimidated, and he was listening closely to every word Presley was saying.

He wet his lips as he contemplated how to respond here. "I have a lot of bad days," he admitted honestly and softly. "And I have a court case coming up, but it will probably be dismissed on account of the fact the guy I beat the shit out of tried to rape me and is a serial rapist from awhile back. I don't want you to think I'm some sort of psycho, but the truth is, they have added psychosis to my list of symptoms now that happened. I can't even really remember what I did because my brain just went haywire on me when I freaked out. There's been a lot of things in my life that got me here, and I pretty much wish every day that I had a way to turn the clock back and my mother give me to my dad to raise. If that happened, all the bad shit wouldn't have happened to me. But I do... have bad days, I mean. Some days it's like I've been smoking shit and I'm high, and other days, I can't even get out of bed. Mostly it's all controlled right now, and I'm getting a pile of therapy. I just wanted to be honest with you, so if you think I'm some sort of risk to the integrity of your project, you can withdraw the offer. I mean, Dad and Mom can tell you how I am when I'm sick. My memories of it are skewed and different to how everyone else sees it. That used to upset me too, but now I understand it. They see it, but I'm living it."

[aussielawyer]

Mark gave Justin's back a few soft reassuring pats, just to show him that he wasn't in this alone. Sure, being a parent in this situation was tough and Mark knew he had fucked up a lot along the way in the learning process. He fell off the wagon himself, and now it was a constant struggle to stay away from the bottle himself. But with everything he did in his life, he was a father above and beyond all else. His two kids needed parenting in very different ways, and Justin needed constant support and help to be able to simply live his life. It was a volatile life he had the ability to put an end to all-too-easily and they had to keep remembering that. "Justin's had a rough road with finding a medication regime that works for him. There's been times it seems to have been working, and then it bottoms-out again. He's on lithium, effexor and clozapine at the moment, which is a heavy regime, but his manic episodes have reduced significantly."

He was really proud of Justin for speaking openly with Presley. Presley knew his stuff. It was clear he had researched plenty to have an understanding of mental illness and how it affected people. There was also the first-hand experience with losing his mum, which had to have been one of the hardest things the poor lad had to ever experience. That wasn't something you could wish on anyone. "Justin's only had one psychotic episode that we're aware of. There may have been others in the past, but we don't want to assume anything. It's basically a forgone conclusion that his court case will be dismissed as it was an act of self-defence and the other guy has a long list of atrocious crimes he is going to be tried for. Justin's included. But he does also have recurring suicidal ideation, and there have been attempts. He also has a history of self-harm. He's working on calling for help if it happens, and everyone around him know the signs to be aware of so they can alert us if they're concerned. However, in all honesty, he's just a kid who has been through some horrific things that sometimes drags him down and makes him feel miserable. He doesn't always know how to cope with it, so we're all working on ways to work with him to help him."