To be, or not to be? (My Experience of Depression)

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Product:	My Experience of Depression
Date:	09/10/02 (8 review reads)
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Advantages: If you try hard enough, you will find something to hold on to

Disadvantages: It's hard

On Saturday, I decided to die. It was a tough call.

I agonised about that decision. I woke very early but I didn’t get out of bed. I didn’t open the curtains. I ate nothing and I spoke to no one. I lay under my covers in foetal position, my pain a hard knot in my belly. I wept and I fought an internal battle with myself for my sanity - and my life.

Once the initial storm of emotions was played out, I was actually very calm and rational about things. I drew up a mental list of pros and cons. To be, or not to be, that is the question. I decided, very calmly, not to be. I considered the various possible methods of disposing of myself. I selected that old favourite, pills and booze. I even remembered to make some ice for my drink.

I had a bath and washed my hair, and put fresh linens on the bed. I’d hate to die dirty. I found my will and made sure it was signed and witnessed and left it in a prominent place. And I made sure my daughter was staying with her grandma, and was safe and looked after. Finally, I wrote letters to my family and my daughter.

But why would someone take such a monumental decision? Why would someone prefer to die than to live? The answer is simple. Depression.

This soul-destroying illness came into my life six years ago, after the birth of my daughter. For years, I lived with the “sadness”, not realising what it was, and I have written about that in the “Post Natal Depression” category. I have been taking medication and I was getting better. Life seemed better. I found the strength to end my miserable seven-year marriage. It had been a bad marriage for a long time and I had been treated very poorly for years. I met a very special friend who made me think I was worth more, made me feel strong enough to change things. It was a relationship for which I had very high hopes. He was my knight in shining armour, who rode into my life and brou

ght laughter and love and colour where there had only been monochrome sadness. Things seemed a lot brighter.

But all at once, everything seemed to go wrong. My beloved friend went away. I struggled to understand it and cope with the loss. My divorce became very bitter indeed, marked by vicious, cruel e-mails arriving daily, calling me horrible names. The harsh realities of single parenthood, keeping a roof over our heads, paying the bills, crowded in. And the darkness returned. Depression came over me with a vengeance. I knew I needed to go back to work if I was to survive, but I was too crippled by depression, too lacking in confidence to even apply for a job in a supermarket. Before my daughter was born, I had been a journalist earning a very good living.

On Saturday, it all came to a head. I felt worthless. And so desperately lonely. I knew then that I was unlovable. No one wanted me. Not my friend, who I loved so very much. Not even my former husband who mistreated me for years and yet managed to find a new girlfriend within a couple of weeks of moving out of our home, and who now delights in taunting me with how happy he is without us. I finally came to terms with the fact that the man I thought I might have a future with didn’t want me. And the man I had a past with, for fifteen years in total, was not very nice, and a complete stranger to us. I never really knew him at all. Fifteen years of my life were down the toilet.

You would be forgiven at this point for thinking that I’m a bit of a weakling, an emotional wreck. And you’d be right. But that is what this illness does to you. It takes away your independence, your confidence. It leaches your spirit out of you until you feel like a dried up husk with nothing inside.

So, if I thought things out so carefully, and planned so meticulously, why am I here now, on Tuesday, writing this? The answer is the letter – the letter I wro
te
to my daughter saved my life. Through the fog of depression, the words I wrote to my little girl called to the little bit of the real me still trapped inside. Through my pain and my disappointment, I saw her face, smiling at me.

As I prepared to leave this place, it wasn’t my life that flashed before my eyes, it was hers. And I knew I couldn’t leave her. However lonely and miserable and black things get, I can’t give up the chance to see her grow into the lovely young woman I know she will be. Although my life is barren of romantic love and companionship, I need to be here to help her grow and one day, hopefully, to see her children grow too.

I tipped the drink down the sink, flushed every tablet I could find in the house down the toilet and posted that letter as an opinion so it would always be there to remind me of what I have. Because whatever I lose, I will always have her, and I want her to always have me.

I spent the rest of the day deleting e-mails I had kept to remind me of past relationships, writing to people and making peace with my sadness, learning to accept the way things have to be, even though I hate it. I even started dealing with the pile of letters and bills I have been afraid to open.

Yesterday, I spent the day at the Job Centre, meeting with a very nice man who is the “Single Parent Careers Advisor”. He was very supportive and said that there is a lot of help available to get me confident enough to go back to work. I spent some time talking to my Doctor about getting some more help. I did some writing. And I made an appointment with the Building Society, so I can beg them for help. Every single step I have taken since Saturday has been a battle of wills, me fighting against the depression, the black despair that sometimes overcomes me. Every telephone call I have to make is a trial. Every letter I open, an act of will.



While my little one
watched
a video tonight, I was overwhelmed by blackness again and I had to lock myself in the cupboard under the stairs until the crying went away so she wouldn’t see me. I don’t want her to see me this way.

So why am I letting ~you~ see me this way? Because I want people who are suffering in the same way to know that however bleak things are, there is always something to hold on to. For you it might be something different. But there is always something if you can find the strength to look for it. And I wanted to thank my few true friends who realised something was wrong recently and were kind enough to ask after me, or to talk things through with me. Knowing you cared helps too. You know who you are.

Still here. Just.

Allie xx

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