PLUS ME Spotlight: Aidan Murphy

Born in a rural town in Ohio, I had an amazing childhood. There were trips to Disney World and I was involved in every sport and art activity under the sun, including my favorite activity Irish Dance. I was afforded all the best opportunities. I was always a sensitive kid, I’m a Cancer Sun what can I say? I was spirited and always did well in school - everything started to shift in 5th grade though. I started having difficulties remaining focused in class; everything felt so boring. My parents started to worry so they brought me to see a psychologist and psychiatrist. That was back in the heyday of diagnosing everything as ADHD, which I was promptly diagnosed with (along with anxiety and depression) and given meds. Unfortunately, the meds made my depression worse, but I was still high-functioning and doing well enough in school to slip by without too much concern. I was still participating in all kinds of activities, adding high school marching band to my resume in only 8th grade. Being around high schoolers and included in the ritual of football - I always said there are only 3 things you need to know about Ohio: Corn, Jesus, and football -  made me feel like there was a lot to look forward to in my coming high school years.

I spent a lot of my adulthood looking back and wishing I could stop the events in my life that were about to unfold. Of course, most of us have the wish in our lives that we could change something, however even with the foresight of what was to come, there were events even I doubt I could have changed - I’m talking about the 2008 housing crash. Pretty much everyone at the time was affected in one way or another by the housing crash. A lot of people lost their homes, which we thankfully did not, but my dad did leave his job due to a merger and had to start looking for a new one. At the time he was the CFO of a regional hospital and C-level executive jobs weren’t exactly the easiest to come by in 2007/2008. Now my dad was the best dad - I know practically everyone says this about their parents but he stuck by my side and believed in me when no one else did. He gave me an incredible work ethic, which is how I’m able to sit in front of you today and share my story - we’ll get back to that.  It’s worth noting that my dad moved heaven and earth to find a new job and somehow landed us all in Flint, Michigan of all places. I had to pack up my life that I’d known in rural Ohio for 15 years and move to, at the time, what was the murder capital of the country. 

The rivalry between Michigan and Ohio runs deep - it actually started with a war in the 1800s over the land that is now Toledo. Why do I know this? Everyone at my new high school hated me, simply because I was from Ohio. I had a horrible time making friends, I actually didn’t make any until my Junior year and, frankly, they weren’t that great of friends. Mental health was kind of a taboo topic in the mid 2000s. Discussions on depression and anxiety and a widespread understanding of these conditions was years away however I was living with these issues on a daily basis. I felt so alone. I was separated from everything I knew in Ohio and hated at school for something I had no control over: where I was born. I thought I was the only person dealing with anxiety and depression because no one talked about it. To make things more challenging, my mom had been diagnosed with stage 3 colon cancer during my junior year of High School. I pulled away from her because I was afraid of losing her. I had already lost so much in my young life - it was too much to handle.

For all the changes I was going through I never thought that signing up for the powder puff team would change the course of my life. In October of 2008 we were practicing like any other day. We were juniors and the seniors always won so we wanted to make sure that we had a solid strategy so that there was no way the seniors could beat us. Our coach, one of our classmates, handed out our jerseys with nicknames people picked out for us. Mine was
“Murf-Murf,” something that I got not-so-lovingly called since my last name was Murphy. I rolled my eyes and was waving goodbye to our coach who had to leave early when I witnessed something that would haunt me forever. A city bus crashed into the truck in front of my coach while they were turning out of the school. I can still remember the screeching of the brakes and how time stood still as the truck spun out what felt like 20 times before crashing into a pole. We ran over - but there was nothing we could do. My classmate Alexa was brain dead on the scene. They had to get her out with the jaws of life. The other classmate driving the car was charged with negligence because they had been high while driving. Something changed in me that day, and my depression only worsened when my so-called friends started rumors that I hadn’t even been there or seen the accident. It got so bad I was sent to the school counselor who, instead of realizing I was a child in crisis that needed help, sent me home. That was the first time I really wanted to end my life and I ended up in and out of hospitals for the remainder of my high school career. 

By some miracle I passed and was admitted to the University of Michigan. I decided to stay close to my family and attended the Flint satellite campus. I really wish I could tell you that things changed as soon as I entered college - but I still had a long road of recovery ahead of me. I stopped going to class. No one was forcing me and I really didn’t want to. I started drinking pretty heavily to try and deal with the way I was feeling which only made things worse. I ended up for the final time in the hospital in 2011. I was a sophomore in college with nothing going for me - really I was on my way to becoming an alcoholic. Then the best thing in my life happened: I was kicked out of college. I know what you’re thinking, “How could that be the best thing that ever happened to you?” And, honestly, at the time I was devastated but it was the kick in the teeth I needed to start making real changes in my life. I went to a community college and graduated with honors and got accepted into my dream school in Florida. My parents were so proud. I couldn’t wait to get away from where all these terrible things had happened and make a fresh start.

I realized on my 20th birthday what I wanted to do with my life. After a pretty amazing trip to Walt Disney World, I decided I wanted to do the Disney College Program, so I applied to the Spring 2014 program and I was accepted! My mom was hesitant because I had just started at my new school, but my dad really encouraged me to live my dream. I’m so thankful I got to tell him I accepted my place at the program - two weeks later I received the worst news of my life. My biggest supporter, my best friend, my dad had passed away from an undiagnosed heart condition in his sleep. I couldn’t even process what happened. I had just started getting my life on track. I was so angry, how could he leave me now when I was 1500 miles away from my family in a brand new school. I was so tempted to stop going to class and start down my old path, but this time I knew nothing would come out of it and I had to live up to my Dad’s legacy. I toughed it out for the semester and started at Disney in January 2014. I worked harder than anyone I knew in the program, silently dedicating the entire program to my dad. When I “graduated” from the program in August I had made real, true friends for life and found where I belonged. I had an amazing run at Eckerd College. I was in student government, I was co-captain at cheerleading and I graduated with a respectable overall GPA of 3.3 after failing my entire freshman year. I went on to work at Disneyland in California and met the love of my life in 2015. I then went back to Florida and completed the prestigious Disney Management Internship program in 2017. I even attended Harvard for a Graduate Certification Program and I’ve just graduated from Pepperdine University with my Masters in Business Administration which was the most difficult task I’ve ever undertaken. School in a pandemic? I’m sure you all know how hard that is. I’ve even been fortunate enough to start giving back as an ambassador for the American Heart Association so that no one has to experience the loss I did. 

One thing that has always stuck with me was a quote - honestly I found it on pinterest but it’s one the truest pieces of advice I’ve ever read: “Grief doesn’t change you, it only exposes who you really are.” We’ve all lost a lot these last few years. We’ve lost precious time and some have lost precious people. What I can leave with you today is that there will be challenges in your lives, there will be many more challenges ahead of us all as we look to an uncertain future. When you are having a hard time I want you to think about how you want to be exposed to the world. Do you want the world to know that you can come back from anything and make a difference? Mental health and loss do not define you - only you can define yourself. Thank you.