My Experience Of Depression - Light At The End Of The Tunnel (My Experience of Depression)

Member Name: misssaxyness

Product:	My Experience of Depression
Date:	15/01/09 (148 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Inner strenth, support, community

Disadvantages: Practially everything at the time

Since returning to Dooyoo recently after a nice hiatus over the festive period, I've been looking into the lifestyle and experience categories of the site more. It was something I didn't really get into when I first joined, but I have been overwhelmed with various people's accounts of actual life experiences rather than just product reviews. I find these pieces of writing extremely supporting, interesting, insightful and very personal, which is why I wanted to share my experiences with depression. I hope I can offer some insight into this invisible illness or at least help people know that they are not alone. Sometimes that can be a huge support in itself.

I didn't have the best childhood and had to grow up a lot faster than I would have wished. Although I was always an anxious little girl, I didn't have any real backlash from those experiences until my early teenage years, which was when I started to realise I had some kind of problem. Even now, 14 years after my struggle began, I still find it hard to find the words to describe what I was going through. Quite a lot of youngsters have mood swings and incomprehensible emotions around the puberty stages of life but during my early teens I felt as though I had no control over any of my emotions or the way my life was heading. I felt raw and cold, I used to describe in my diary I felt as if I had no skin on my body, and every little thing hurt me a thousand times more than it should do.

It was at this stage that I started self harming. I really can't pin point a time that it started, or what triggered me to take a safety pin to myself and scratch at my skin, but at the time it was the only way I felt I could gain control of my pain and make things more real. As time went on, I started getting bullied in school due to my introverted personality which only lead me to self harm more to gain the control I was losing in my social life. I carried on this way, unnoticed by those around me until one night my mum offered to wash my hair (she's a hairdresser and used to love using new products on me to 'cheer me up'). I mistakenly forgot about hiding my arms and took off my jumper, my mum instantly saw the scars and scratches and gently questioned me. I freaked out for want of a better word and ran upstairs, embarrassed, locking myself away even though I knew that it was somewhat of a relief that my parents would finally know how bad I was feeling. The days after that point are a bit of a blur, but I had lots of long talks with my parents about depression, self harming and how I felt emotionally - which for about a year really helped me cope with things without having the need to hurt myself.

Things eventually slid downhill again and I was back to feeling anxious, depressed and out of control. I met a guy during this time and got swept up in a typical 'teenage romance' which I supposed I used as another escape route to how I was really feeling. I made the wrong move however as the guy was very controlling and not a very nice person. I ended up being pressured into marriage at 18 and hit an extremely low point in my life. I was being beaten down verbally and my depression was at its highest. The marks I were inflicting on myself were deeper and harder, and I began to suffer from Agoraphobia, sometimes not leaving my house in upwards of 3 weeks. My parents were trying to help me, but at this stage I was too far gone and pushing everyone that really cared about me as far away as possible. In a desperate moment after having a really scary panic attack at home (where I really thought I was going to die of a heart attack) I decided to leave the house and go to my doctor for help. His advice? Stop wearing black, lose weight and go swimming. I was at a complete loss. I decided to bite the bullet and run to my parents to clear up my mess. Looking back and being a parent myself now, I feel so guilty for everything I put my parents through back then. I know I would fall to pieces if my own son were going through these awful life experiences as a lot of the time there seems like there's nothing anyone can do to make it go away.

I left the abusive relationship thanks to my parents and finally got divorced aged 20. I started to gain in strength both physically and mentally and the self harming dissipated gradually over time. Around the same time, I met a man and although I shouldn't have, we entered into a relationship. Looking back now I realise I was feeling better in myself but was by no means ready for a full blown adult relationship again. I fell pregnant and by 21 I had my little boy. Unfortunately the guy although not abusive in any way, was very unsupportive emotionally and not really into being a father at all. I practically became a single parent overnight and my worst thoughts were confirmed when I found out he'd been cheating on me since I was about 8 months pregnant. This sent me straight back into the spiralling black hole of depression, only this time, I had a small baby to care for. Times were very hard for me being a working single parent with very low income but somehow I seemed stronger than I had been before and I realised it was because of my son. I had to be ok for him, I was his only carer and if I wasn't coping then he would be suffering - which was my worst nightmare.

For my son, I decided to change doctors and seek help once more. I was back to self harming regularly, this time on my thighs and at night time so my son wouldn't be able to see any evidence of it, even so, I knew it had to stop. My new doctor blew me away with his understanding of mental illness and with his compassion for my situation. I must have been in his office for a good hour explaining everything that had happened through sobs and silence. After an assessment and check up, he decided to put me on the drug Citalopram which is used to treat major depression, social anxiety disorder and panic disorder. He explained to me that depression was a silent illness and still very much hidden in taboo within this country. It is far more widespread than most people realise, it's just that people are often too scared or not strong enough to seek help for it.

We talked about how various things can trigger those hurtful emotions and dark times which bring on various coping mechanisms or 'crutches' to lean on such as self harm, restrictive eating or compulsive checking. We also discussed the fact that although depression and anxiety disorders are an invisible illness, it's often because of an imbalance of Serotonin levels within the brain. The medication I was on targeted this which acted as a kind of emotional block. It was such a relief to hear that there was possibly something wrong with me physically as well as my troubled past as to why I was finding it so difficult to cope with every day life.

After three days of my course I started to notice that my deep intense feelings had begun to level out. The manic episodes of either elation or severe depression had begun to balance and after a fortnight on the medication I began to feel almost numb to anything. This is scary in itself to go through as I hadn't ever felt an emotional void in my life, but with weekly trips to see my GP, it did enable me to start working through what was triggering my intense feelings and to be able to deal with them without being pushed over the edge or losing it. I was on Citalopram for just over a year in total, and I feel it helped me a lot. Of course I still have occasional down days but I'm proud to say I haven't self harmed in nearly three and a half years now.

What I would say to anyone suffering from depression is get all the help you can. It is a big scary step to move away from your comfort zone and trust in others when in the midst of depression, but people will understand your situation and there is help out there for all different types of sufferers. It will be hard to confide in family and friends so perhaps if you don't feel comfortable confiding in somebody close, it might be easier to seek help from someone out of your emotional equation as it was for me. I chose to take medication as I felt I'd tried everything else with no success. I understand a lot of people out there are wary of chemical treatments but there are other things such as support groups which can be found with your GP's help and herbal treatments such as St.Johns Wort.

Most importantly I just wanted to say to people that there is hope when you suffer from a mental illness and I hope anyone reading this now who perhaps hasn't had the strength to approach someone and ask for help, please do so. You can get better and lead a normal life if you take the steps to let people in. Also, a big thank you to everyone else that has written a piece on this subject, I have enjoyed reading the different experiences of everybody on here, it just goes to show that we can all be immensely strong in the face of hardship.

Summary: My personal experiences...