David

My name is David Haines. I was originally born in Calgary and was raised by 2 caring parents and have a wonderful sister, Samantha. At the age of 4 our family moved to Richmond where I grew up.

I had a great childhood, did well in school at Richmond High and was involved in a lot of sports. A highlight was playing football, where we won the Western Canadian championships.

After graduating from high school, I decided to spend a year in Australia. I wanted to learn about the people and the culture, but most importantly learn how to surf. During that year I travelled around the entire continent. I took a car from Sydney to Cairns, then a bus from Cairns to Darwin, then hitchhiked from Darwin to Perth and took the train from Perth to Sydney. All at the age of 18. Fun stuff. I managed to get in some Skydiving and bungee jumping as well.

Upon my return to Richmond, I got my business degree at Kwantlen College and got a job at BMO Bank of Montreal. This was also the time that I met my loving wife, Rie, while studying at the Vancouver public library. She was from Japan and was studying English and our karma just clicked.

After 6 months of working at the bank, we decided to move to Japan. During our 3 ½ years there, Rie worked for an airline company and I taught English. This was an exciting time for us as I eventually became a corporate trainer, teaching other teachers how to teach English. This also gave me the opportunity to travel around the entire country. I went to Okinawa the southern islands like Hawaii and then the northern island Hokkaido similar to Canada.

In 2007, we decided to move back to Richmond as I missed my family and friends and we wanted to start a new life. I was able to return to the Bank of Montreal as a Financial Services Manager for the affluent Kerrisdale branch. I was soon promoted to Investment Sales Representative working with the Top Financial Planner for all of Canada. Our book of business was 150 million dollars. Lots of pressure.

In 2008, that’s when my life changed. When the market crashed, so did I. People who invested through with BMO had lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. I was being blamed for their losses and took it personally. I had a leaky condo and had to come up with $32,000 immediately. My Grandma, the leader of our family and who I spoke to everyday, passed away as well at this time. God I really miss her. With all of this, anxiety hit me hard. I was having stomach pains and my thoughts were not stable. I had a hard time holding things together, and lost my job.

I continued to plummet and paranoia set in. I thought I was getting death threats on the phone. It was fight or flight so decided flight and ran away back to Japan. I was able to get my old job back as a corporate trainer but that did not help. My mind put me on a crazy adventure. I thought my wife was a spy, and that the world was out to get me. I truly believed that there were subliminal messages on the tv, a video camera was hidden in the air conditioner at my wifes apartment, and the Russian mafia was after me. My psychosis escalated as I thought that my fellow teachers were Russian agents. I walked over 55 km down a river, swam across the river, but could not get away because I was being tracked by satellite. I finally determined that the only way to get away was to come back to Richmond, which we did in July 2010. Now some people pay a lot of money to experience something like this.

Upon arriving home, my step father knew I was not well and was able to get me into the Richmond psychiatric unit. I was diagnosed with schizophrenia. I was in the hospital for a month until I felt settled. Although I was still ill, I was able to present well. I got my job back at the Bank of Montreal but only lasted 6 months due to the stress and my anxiety. I have held 5 other jobs in construction, landscaping, warehousing, and a national sales rep for a Japanese food company. I could get the job, but I just couldn’t keep them. And throughout these 2 years I have been in and out of hospital.

In April, 2012, I was staying at Bridge House which is a respite facility. I had isolated myself in my room, and just wanted to be left alone, but there was a knock at my door. I ignored it, but the knock continued until I answered it. There was a kind lady, whose name is Beryl, and she said she was also staying at Bridge House. She said that she was a member of Pathways Clubhouse and had a brochure for me to take. She said this was a place that I needed to check out. Although I still wanted to be left alone, I also felt nothing was working to make me feel better. I decided that I would check it out as it was my last resort.

Pathways is simply a great place for people who experience mental illness. My first day at orientation they had me cleaning toilets, preparing lunch, and putting together a powerpoint presentation for Mental Health Week. No just hanging around. I was really impressed with all the staff and it reminded of the show Cheers. Everyone was saying hello to me and remembered my name. At Pathways they really get to know your strengths. In having a conversation with the executive director, Dave MacDonald, and telling him about my business background he put me straight to work helping with this fundraising dinner. In having no purpose to life and now being able to help do something meaningful again really helped with my illness.

My goal now is to find affordable housing, land a part time job and volunteer my time at Pathways. Pathways is key to this success. Pathways helps you find a clean place to live, helps you with employment and volunteering, and provides an affordable meal every day of the year.

There continues to be misconceptions about mental illness. It is as if there is a stigma about mental illness that nobody wants to talk about. So if there is one message that I want to share is that mental illness can affect anyone at anytime. It can affect anyone at anytime. I know. It did me.