Depression Diagnosis

I couldn't sleep, I was crying all the time, my headaches became excruciating and I couldn't care for my family like I wanted. I felt as though I was headed for a nervous breakdown. It felt like I was in a deep pit where the walls were closing in and the blackness was suffocating. It was a darkness that sucked out all light, joy, desire and will.

As I attempted to cope, I went to the doctor to get some help from the headache pain and he asked me if I could be suffering from depression. I hated that word! He had me fill out a questionnaire to determine if I was suffering from depression. I remember there being only about 10 questions. It took me more than an hour to complete the test and the nurse kept coming in to see if I was finished. I told her I had answered all the questions except for one. The one question I couldn't answer was if I had trouble making decisions!!!! I felt pretty stupid but I was done. The doctor came in and and told me he believed I was suffering from depression and he prescribed some medication. He also told me that anti-depressants would take 6 to 8 weeks for me to notice any difference and that I needed to be patient.

I was so angry! I was angry at my mother for having the genes she passed to me. It was her fault. Things felt hopeless and my only survival instinct was to close my doors to the world and hold onto my family with everything I had. I grew up with a mother that lived behind closed doors and I wasn't going to shut my children out of my life so if that was the ONLY thing I could do, then so be it. My children also deserved to know what was going on with me. I didn't want a shroud of secrecy in our home. If I failed them, nothing else mattered. My eight children were the most important part of my existence.

Here I sit for another day, not leaving my house and having little motivation to do anything. I wasn't supposed to have depression. It wasn't fair. I was a happy, outgoing person and now my life is usually spent inside my house and a lot is spent in my darkened bedroom. Depression is bad enough but I also suffer from migraine headaches 24/7 and am extremely light sensitive so I have room darkening drapes in my bedroom, towels along the bottom of the doors to keep even that slight light out. I even have post-its covering the lights on the television because they are too bright. Sunshine and light are supposed to be helpful when you suffer from depression and yet I have to keep the light out.

I know the stigma surrounding depression is better than it was fifty years ago and yet I feel as though it is still the silent illness no one wants to talk about much less admit to having. I grew up in a home with a mother that was secluded much of the time because of depression but we never knew that. Neither of my parents talked about it. I was 33 years old when my parents told me that my mother had suffered from a life-long battle with depression and that it was hereditary. That was it, nothing more. I didn't get to ask questions. They did their duty because it might run in families.

When I was first diagnosed with depression I knew I had to approach my depression openly. I wanted my children to know what was wrong with me. I didn't want them to wonder why I spent so many days in darkness. I also knew I needed to talk about depression and bring it out in the open.