Story of my depression - Can you offer any suggestions?

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chewbacca89
Posts: 1
Joined: Sat May 06, 2017 9:05 pm

Story of my depression - Can you offer any suggestions?

Postby chewbacca89 » Sat May 06, 2017 9:09 pm

Hi. My name is Nicole and I'm 27 years old. I'd like to tell my story and possibly get feedback from you... My maternal grandmother committed suicide when I was 10 years old. Nowadays, my doctors believe the trauma of losing my grandmother may have sort of jump started my depression. She was the first person close to me that I had ever lost and I didn't understand depression and suicide at the time. I've always felt guilty about my grandma's death, like maybe I could have done something to save her. I know logically that I didn't do anything wrong and my grandma knew I loved her, but it doesn't prevent me from feeling this way. At the age of 14, I attempted suicide for the first time. I didn't understand why I was in so much pain and hated my life so much and depression never crossed my mind. My mom found me and I was rushed to the hospital. I survived and was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. The doctors started me on medication and I started going to therapy. It was around the age of 16 that I was diagnosed with anorexia and exercise bulimia after I went to the doctor because I hadn't had a period in over 6 months. I was obsessed with being skinny and I've always had a distorted view of my appearance. Not long after being diagnosed, my eating seemed to return to a more normal state. About a year later, my mom caught me before I could attempt suicide again and I was taken to the hospital. At about this time, my eating patterns had flipped and I was diagnosed with binge eating disorder. I gained around 40 pounds my senior year of high school. My high school didn't want to allow me to graduate because I had missed 2/3 of the school year in absences, but my parents managed to change their mind. During all my school years, it was readily apparent that I was a perfectionist. I was incredibly smart and I was in all advanced placement courses. I was also obsessed with being perfect, so I was never skinny enough, never smart enough, never good enough in general. For example, I scored a 34 (out of 36) on my ACTs and I was so upset with myself. I had convinced myself that a perfect score may not be reasonable, so I decided I would be satisfied with a 35. I've also set very high goals and standards for myself, which I believe tend to backfire. After high school, I wanted to go to college so badly and I thought that everything would change once I did, but I was wrong. I didn't even make it three months into the school year before I had to withdraw and return home. About 3 or 4 years ago, I was in a emotionally and physically abusive relationship that has really impacted me. About two years ago, I attempted suicide again. My dad found me and again, I was rushed to the hospital and I survived. During these past 17 years, I've tried what feels like every medication possible. I've gone through numerous therapists and I have now been seeing the same one for the past two years on a weekly basis. I've also tried acupuncture. I've gone through eating disorder treatment. I was in a DBT group. I tried ECT (Electroconvulsive therapy) and it seemed to work at first. However, after several months of treatments, I no longer noticed any positive results and I had suffered significant memory loss, so my doctors decided I should stop treatment. Presently, I am suffering from major treatment-resistant depression, anxiety, and binge eating disorder. I'm also on medical leave from my job. I have gained about 100 pounds over a period of 7 months and just last week, started therapy at an eating disorder facility, where I will also see a dietician on a weekly basis. There is a binge eating group coming up June at the eating disorder facility and I'm pretty sure I'm going to do that. The memory loss from ECT has greatly effected my condition. My long term memory feels like its been wiped clean and I struggle with my short term memory. My mom is just about the only support system that I have (although my brothers and dad would be there for me if I asked them or if I needed them) besides my doctors because I've really isolated myself from what few friends I have lately. I'm in such a dark place, but I've been managing to keep going. My two main goals in life were to have my grandpa walk me down the aisle for my wedding and to have a baby girl, which I would name after my grandpa and grandma, and she would be able to meet my grandpa. I wanted to be able to show her a picture of them together when she got older while I tell her stories about him and what a great man he was. When I was in town for my grandma's funeral, my grandpa had taken me for a walk outside his apartment. My cousin was getting married a month later and had been asking my parents if they would be back for the wedding. While on the walk, I asked my grandpa if he would be at my wedding and he promised me he would. I asked him if he'd walk me down the aisle and he said yes. Ever since then, that had been my dream. I've actually been dreaming a lot about my wedding lately and the only clear part of my dreams was my dad pushing my grandpa in his wheelchair down the aisle while I held his hand. It really helped me believe that I could get through this and it gave me something to work for. I knew my grandpa was getting older, but I had convinced myself he would hang on until he walked me down the aisle like he promised. My grandpa died yesterday. I've already recognized that my high school dreams of going to college and becoming extremely successful in a legal or psychological field among many other dreams are, perhaps, not realistic at this time. I feel okay about it, but yesterday, my remaining dreams and goals were crushed. My grandpa was such an important part of my life and I loved him so much. He was also the main reason I hadn't attempted suicide - I didn't want him to have to go to my funeral. I'm so lost and hurt right now. Lately, I've been considering TMS (Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation) and Ketamine infusion, but I'm still in the research phase. My weekly therapy appointments haven't been helping as much lately and I've started eating disorder treatment because my therapist doesn't feel equipped enough to handle my eating and body image issues. My psychiatrist has been weaning off my medication one at a time because she thinks I'm suffering from Serotonin Induced Apathy and she plans on starting completely new on medication after she takes me off all the ones I'm taking now (I'm at maximum dosages of all my medications). My grandpa's death is a major blow to my state of mind right now. I want to pull through, I want to get better, I want to have a normal, healthy life and be happy, but I'm so confused as to how to get there and right now, I'm in so, so, so much pain. I feel like I've tried just about all of the possible treatments and medications and I'm still so depressed. I was wondering if anyone knows of any other treatments that have been successful for them or others? Any really helpful tools or suggestions? I'm really desperate at this point.

MickD
Posts: 31
Joined: Tue Apr 18, 2017 12:57 pm

Re: Story of my depression - Can you offer any suggestions?

Postby MickD » Sun May 07, 2017 3:03 pm

Ive personally only just reached out for help again and currently take fluoxatine.

I certainly dont know how i to make myself feel better, sometimes music works, sometimes being with friends works sometimes being alone works it changes all the time.

I think the most important thing to realise though is things arent your fault, i blame myself for everything that happens, how should i reacted how should i of done this, should i of avoided that ect....... but its not our faults, we arent to blame.


im sorry im not much of a help but i thought i would reply to you, youre not alone.

JLM1980
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue May 02, 2017 10:12 pm

Re: Story of my depression - Can you offer any suggestions?

Postby JLM1980 » Mon May 08, 2017 9:09 pm

Hey Hun! I'm am so sorry that you are going through all of this with depression and loss. I truly feel for you. In many ways our stories are similar. Can I share mine with you?
I grew up with an alcoholic father who was verbally and emotionally abusive as well as other things have been suspected due to dreams, etc. I first started getting depressed at 10 years old. I was first medicated at 14. By 17, my hours were reversed and sleep was irratic so I too missed a lot of school and barely graduated despite my being smart. At 17, my mom had my still-borne sister at nearly full term. I up to this point had been an only child, so even with the age difference, I was greatly looking forward to having a sibling. I was in the delivery room when she delivered my sister and I still remember her limp body with torn skin and the cord wrapped around her neck with her tongue sticking out. Some may say that I got PTSD from that moment. After my sister's death I swore that I would live for not only myself but her as well. Little did I know...
Shortly after I started going to church with a friend from school. Despite my severe depression and loss, I began to have hope and joy. I did great until college the following year. There, after the first semester, I fell away from God and got into partying as a self medication. By the end of the year I was severely depressed. I moved back home with my parents. I spent the next eight years on just about every medication out there for depression. I went to regular counseling and saw psychiatrists. Nothing helped. I kept getting more and more depressed. It was to the point where I would start a job and lose it quickly because I couldn't pick myself up to go. I'd have to withdraw mid-semester because I was too depressed to get to class and do homework. I was so depressed that I would barely get out of bed, shower or eat. There were times when I would psych myself up to shower, just to go out with friend and get drunk and high...self medicate. It was terrible. I then got into several unhealthy abusive relationships that just added layer upon layer to the hurt inside. So much so that I wrote letters to all of my family and friends saying goodbye, sent a few texts and had a plan to kill myself. A few friends and my mom met the need and took me to the hospital for hospitalization. It was there that they diagnosed me as Bipolar. I started meds for that. I began to see small changes shortly after. I also had stopped going out with friends, drinking and getting high. A few months later I visited my aunt and there was a Bible in her guest room. I read it and God reached me. I asked God to have control of my life again. Within two months after that of reading my Bible nightly, I was showering daily, eating, holding a job and in school. The next two years I spent without friends because I gave up my old ones so I wasn't tempted into the old lifestyle, and I did not date. I just spent the time with God healing, working and going to school. During that time, God showed me what I truly desired in a future husband from His perspective of what was best for me. Within the next few years I began to date again. I met my husband, got married, got my Bachelor's degree in Social Work, began working in my field and began having children. A few years into the marriage, God asked me to take the next step in His total healing.
I had to totally and completely submit to following God with all of my heart, mind and soul. Up to this point, I was still smoking cigarettes for the most part. I had tried to quit but always went back. God told me that the smoking gave me a 'divided' heart and that I used it for coping rather than relying on Him. So I worked on quitting smoking for good. Once I did, God's Holy Spirit filled me even more. I had always wondered why changing and healing was so difficult up to that point. God told me that it was because I was trying to rely on the world and it's ways of healing and not Him. When the Holy Spirit came on full force with my "undivided" heart, The Holy Spirit began to be my strength, guide and teacher using the word of God to overcome my depression and ultimately the Bipolar diagnosis. He asked me to go off of the meds completely. I must admit that this was a bit scary for me because all of the times I had attempted this in the past meant almost instantly getting suicidal. But I knew that I had heard God loud and clear. Through the next several months, God taught me about putting on the armor of God, how to use His word as a weapon when spoken, how to renew my mind and reprogram my thoughts by studying the Bible daily. He showed me how powerful singing praise and worship is, that it almost instantly lifts the spirit of heaviness. All in all, He taught me how to live...free and with joy. Out of the last Nine months I have been medicated about one-two of those months. The only reason that I went back on the meds was because I took my eyes off of God and what He had been teaching me and showing me and tried to take control of my life back from Him.
Here are some scriptures that helped me a lot in the beginning: 2 Timothy 1:7. Jeremiah 29:11. I stood on those two scriptures for a long time and still go back to them regularly. Since then, I learned more about who God is and who HE says I am, not what the world says. Identity in Christ is key to everything else. A good book to read is "The Search for Significance" by Robert McGee. Reprogramming the mind is huge as well. A good book to help get started with that, besides reading the Bible regularly is "Battlefield of the Mind" by Joyce Meyer. Also, learning how to repent of sins regularly throughout the day was a big thing. Some of the big "sins" that held me back from healing were: Unforgiveness, Taking Offense, Bitterness, Pride, Fear and using mean language towards others. Others came up as I continually spoke with God in prayer and yours may be different. All I know is that as things came up, I had to give them to God and ask Him to help me not do them anymore.
If you want to read another success story of faith healing depression, there is a book titled "Hope Prevails" by Dr. Michelle Bengston.

Sorry my story was so long but I truly hope that it inspired you and gave you some hope.

Helloraspberries1
Posts: 260
Joined: Wed May 25, 2016 2:11 pm

Re: Story of my depression - Can you offer any suggestions?

Postby Helloraspberries1 » Tue May 09, 2017 3:52 pm

Hi there, sorry to hear what you been through.

I see you gone through alot in your life. Sounds like things didn't improve at all and then other experiences you had to deal with came back again. I don't know how you survived it.

You got two good examples here for which you should be proud of. You said you got good grades in school and b you kept going when things worth tough.

It's good to know you did try everything you could possibly do to help yourself get better. It's good that you knew where to turn and what support would help you. Not many people would be able to do that. At the moment what support you getting? Are you still seeing activity getting support from doctor, therapy and family? Have you tried going back to any of the other methods you tried or is that not a possibility.

I know you wished alot in your life to happen. Life can be cruel and unfair. Sounds like your grandad was a crucial part of your life. If he would of been here and seen you get married it would be the best wish ever. Is your nan still around? I can't imagine how she maybe be coping.

I don't know if some sort of bereavement group will help with how you feel but I would maybe try that. Also any other emotional well being groups you could attend. Talk to others and get advice who are also suffering. Does any of those help? Do you like reading? Self help books are good to invest in.

I hope things start getting better for you. I'm sure it will. You are very brave and please don't stop dreaming for your goals. Keep aiming high unroll you get there. Don't give up.

Hugs and kisses

Helloraspberries


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