If you’ve been following me long enough, you know that I’m not exactly Mr Superhealthy. That I called my mixes a few years ago “The Stiff Neck, Sore Back Sessions”, might be a good hint about what is wrong with me. At least physically. Mentally I also have some problems, but let’s start with the physical shit.

I don’t remember if my back was already fucked up before I went to school or if it happened during it, but school definitely didn’t make it any better. When I was a kid, nothing was ergonomically! Our schoolbags where just heavy and uncomfortable bricks and our chairs were old enough that most likely our parents already sat on them when they were kids. That I came home with a headache plus back- and/or neckpain on an almost daily basis, was pretty normal. Of course when you are a kid, everybody will just ignore you and your problems, so nobody did anything against that until I was a teenager. By then it was too late. My neck and back were permantely damaged. And sadly even when you are an adult, our society really doesn’t care alot about back problems in general. All the jobs I had either invoved sitting a lot on bad chairs, standing all day or lifting heavy things. Sometimes looking down all day too. Are there even back friendly jobs availble? So it’s not like my health got better.

Basically I’m in pain almost 24/7. Most of the time it’s “just” annoying pain that I’ve learned to ignore, but sometimes it gets so bad that I can barely move anymore. Even here I learned to just power through, because let’s be honest: “Man up” or “Others have it worse” are usually the reponses I get. The thing is, I need surgery. I have two cervical vertebrae that are not really where they should be and keep pushing against my neck muscles and nerves. But since I’m actually able to go through my every day life without spending all day laying on the floor and screaming in pain, my doctors advice me to wait. Neck surgery is even today a dangerous and difficult thing and despite my pain, I’m too scared to actually tell my doctors: “No, I need that, cut me open and fix dat shit!” (But even if I would, it’s obvious that hospital beds are reserved for life threatening emergencies right now.)

That brings me to DJing. One of my favourite things in the world. And sadly something that involves standing for hours or looking down at your equipment. Usually, especially when I’m home, I DJ sitting down, which might look weird (And according to random internet assholes also makes me a fake DJ!?!), but gets the job done. Of course there is still the strain ony my neck. Even if one of the advantages of digital DJing is that I can pick my tracks by looking at an adjustable laptop screen, I still have to look down on my mixer and controller. It’s near impossible to put your equipment on eye level. I can put it higher, especially the laptop, but it will never be high enough for me to keep my neck straight. And that, to put it mildly, sucks.

I have the privilege of not being a huge in-demand DJ (#GlassIsHalfFull). I don’t even have a residency and honestly, I don’t try to get booked right now, as long as Covid is still a thing, so I don’t have to be out every weekend (or even every day!) and play a long set. I livestream once per week, but since nobody is paying me for that and I don’t need to fit my set into a schedule around other sets, it allows me to just cut them short or don’t even play one at all, if I feel I should rather lay down. But of course that’s not the best thing to do when you try to get your name out there and also love what you are doing. Honestly, I feel the time will come when my neck will be so bad, that I might have to quit DJing. At least until I find a way to DJ laying down, with the equipment floating above me. Or finally get surgery. But who knows if the doctors keep telling me to avoid the DJ booth afterwards? (Disclaimer: I am not a doctor and don’t know what you can and can’t do after neck surgery, so I  just make up a worst case scenario here.)

Another big problem, maybe the bigger one, that I have, are my depressions. I blame school again for this, among other things. But school definitely ruined my mental health permanently. Being surrounded by bullies and teachers, who won’t accept an “I simply can’t do what you ask me to” for an answer, is no fun. Keep in mind, depressions, burn out and such, only stopped being taboo topics around 15 years ago. And even today, society keeps forgetting children and teenagers. I didn’t even know that I suffer from depressions, until I had my first job. I just thought I was sad. (Y’know, like how most people will tell you to stop being sad when you tell them that you have depressions.) And despite what I said about it not being a taboo topic anymore, it’s still incredible difficult to get help. Especially professional one. I am on the waiting list for three different therapists for way too long.

And yes, nothing makes DJing harder than my brain running on bad chemicals. As I said, I learned to live with my physical pain. And most of all, I know that I might feel better tomorrow. But depressions hit different. For no apparent reason, you just don’t wanna do shit anymore. Never again. You just say: “Fuck all that” and quit what you do. You unquit when the depressive phase becomes less severe, but it’’s not something that might happen over night. It can take days, weeks, months, who knows?

Again, my status as not-exactly-in-demand-DJ saved my ass here from a professional POV. I had the luck of never having a bad enough depressive phase to just walk out of the DJ booth in the middle of an actual gig. I did that several times during livestreams, but in a real club with a full dancefloor, it only caused me to kinda half-ass my set and then quickly go home or back into my hotel once I was done. I did walk out twice at normal jobs. My co-workers found it pretty amusing that I was “rage quitting”, but of course it wasn’t that funny to me. Those were and still are pretty dark spots in my life.

Well, the thing is, when I started writing this, I thought I could give some deep insight into my health struggles and how they influence my DJing. Maybe even say something helpful, but to be honest, there is nothing really I could say or do. Well, at some point I hopefully will get neck surgery and it’s not like depressions are incurable either, but shit, it just made me realize how helpless I am when it comes to this. The best advice I can give is: “Take care of yourself.” It’s a good advice, I think. Try to not burn yourself out. Take a rest whenever you can. Say no to a gig if you aren’t up to it. That’s all I got. It won’t solve any of your (or my) problems, but might prevent further ones.

Have a great day!

PF