Part 1: My experience
It has seemed that suicide has been in the news a little more than normal. There was the coverage of high-profile people like designer Alexander McQueen, Growing Pains star Andrew Koenig, and Marie Osmond's son, Michael Blosil. All three dealt with depression for years before ending their lives. There has also been reporting of college students - first at Cornell and then at Yale - who have killed themselves. When I first head about these recent occurrences, I thought, how can we as a society lessen the stigma of suicide and depression? A few moments later I thought, how about you do your part? One way to change the perception of depression is for those of us who deal with it to share our experiences.
So I'll share. This will be a three-part piece. The first deals with my experience with depression. The second offers some ways to challenge depression and combat the stigma. The third deals with the issue of suicide.
I struggle with depression. I have for years. I'm not sure when it started, although there was a time in elementary school when I'd cry almost every day when I'd get home. I didn't "have a reason". I did well in school, was popular, and had a lot of opportunities, but still, by the time I got home, I finally allowed myself to feel the uncomfortable feelings and cried over sadness that I'd pushed away all day. A few times my mom asked me what was wrong and I'd tell her I didn't know. When she suggested taking me to a doctor, I said, "No," and from then on made an effort to not let her see me cry.
When I developed an eating disorder, my depression seemed to take a secondary role. Nonetheless, I was first diagnosed with depression when I was 15 and began taking medicine when I was almost 17. The depression I dealt with in high school, though, was nothing like what I faced in college. I think that because by that time my eating disorder had improved, the underlying depression began to play a larger role. I'd deal with depression throughout the year, but it was particularly debilitating each year around October and April. I haven't been able to find anything of significance that has happened during those two months that it would it be so much worse during those times. Nonetheless, the months of April and October have been a challenge during a number of college and post-college years.
My depression primarily manifests itself in two ways: one is emotionally; the other is by debilitating inaction. My depression default seems to be inaction. That is, I don't do what would normally be the most basic of tasks - I don't open my drapes, take a shower, get dressed, talk to people, go outside, and so on. It's not that I'd necessarily sit around and think, life sucks; rather, my emotions are dull and try as I might, I can't make, threaten, coerce, or bribe myself to do the simplest tasks.
My worst bout of depression occurred during college. I struggled emotionally my whole junior year but during the spring, my cyclical depression, along with some upsetting circumstances, manifested into a deeply debilitating depression. I'll spare you all the details, but suffice it to say, I didn't go to my classes, avoided people if at all possible, and eventually withdrew from that semester.
Because I often find inaction isn't a viable option (for instance, when in high school, even if I didn't feel like doing anything, my parents weren't going to let me stay home for that reason), it manifests in sad emotions.
I've felt a lot of shame about my depression. While it's gotten better, it's more intense than my feelings of shame surrounding my eating disorder. The thing is, like my eating disorder, I have internalized messages that I may have picked up somewhere but that I greatly exacerbated with my own misconceptions. The ones that have hit the core are: "You have nothing to be depressed about; your life is great." "You're just lazy." "You're self-absorbed and that's why you feel upset." "All you have to do is stop making excuses and make yourself do it. You're pitying yourself. Buck up and do what needs to be done." And for good measure, "Your ancestors who were slaves didn't have the option to be depressed. Even if they were, they had no choice but to work. They couldn't stay in their cabin and cry. If they could do it, you can too." (Nothing like throwing the guilt of slavery onto an already searing wound.)
There are two main reasons why I have difficulty discussing my depression. One is because I still deal with it. It's easier to discuss my eating disorder when I have freedom from it because I can say, "Well, I had an eating disorder, but now I don't." Because depression is still there to varying degrees, I can't say the same thing about it.
The other reason I find it difficult to discuss is because I'll start to believe my depression is an excuse. I'll feel that if I just worked a little harder, I could push past the depression. I'll think that I use depression to shield myself from putting in the extra effort. I still struggle with this belief although, like other areas, it's not as bad as it used to be.
I think that many people who struggle with sharing their experiences with depression might have similar beliefs, which is that it's a weakness and that, in our take-charge society, if they just work harder, they can push past their depression.
As I've said, I feel that I'm further down the path of acceptance regarding my eating disorder than I am with my depression. Nonetheless, there are tools that I've used to deal with my depression and that I will discuss in the next piece.
