I was diagnosed with Clinical Depression, or Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), when I was seventeen. As I have tracked pivotal events in my life via journals and blogs I have discovered an alarming recurrence. Every five years I suffer a Major Depressive Episode. It attacks without motive, and it has lasted between three and six months each time. Toward the peak of the past two episodes I tried to end my life just to get rid of the pain. I love my life and want to live it without fear of hurting myself or others, so I have outlined these traumatic events hoping to find a way to avoid another episode:
The experiences of my young childhood are mostly positive. My parents described me as precocious, insightful, and perceptive. I loved to explore the outdoors and imagine secret, magical lands and play games with friends. When it came to sports, computer games, or other competitive activities I preferred to spectate. I loved reading the dictionary, encyclopedias, and almanacs that clustered throughout our bookshelves. I loved to dance and sing.
Seven
The only age I ever acted out on several occasions was as a seven year old. I can't remember most of the circumstances, but I recall the isolated emotions, sitting in a corner in the dark, feeling alone. No traumatic events accounted for the loneliness, yet it pervaded and flooded every thought. One time as a seven year old I remember feeling particular anguish. The actual memory is vague, but I recall my mother and I standing at the top of the stairs. She scolded me for doing something wrong, and I completely lost it. I took a large mirror and threw it at the ground, shattering it into pieces. I don't know what possessed me to act out so brashly. The uncontrollable crazed misery I felt that day was irrepressible.
Twelve
The 6th grade started out promising enough. All of my core classes were either GT or Honors level, and I felt proud to be in the ranks of the intellectual elite. My peers were witty, creative, and I loved my teachers. I joined the Community Problem Solvers club and had so many ideas to help. I don’t recall any kind of catalyst that would have turned it all upside down, but not too long after my twelfth birthday my ability to concentrate on my assignments became labored. I failed my favorite classes, because I couldn’t grasp the will to rise above the deadening fog that suffocated me.
I tried to turn a new leaf the next semester, but the drive to learn and explore that had always motivated me just wasn’t there. A hopelessness and despair I didn’t understand continued to overshadow every aspect of my life. Toward the end of the long enduring months of severe depression I had seemingly psychotic moments of clarity. I wrote a paper for my English class on how to commit suicide. Several days later I got suspended for bringing a pocket knife and fake drugs to school. I didn't know why I did it, except that I could hardly control my crazed thoughts. Within a few weeks I was back to my normal, quirky, motivated self again.
Seventeen
My junior year in high school started well. I was seventeen and felt empowered to make a difference. It was around the end of November that bizarre, impulsive thoughts started to creep up on me out of nowhere. Minor depression worsened beyond my comprehension to the point where all I could do was lay sprawled on the floor while the screaming in my head paralyzed my body. Everything positive I had committed to accomplish dwindled as my mind fell into tunneled, imprisoning lifelessness.
I stood in the bathroom one day while I looked in the mirror with my whole body screaming to fix the pain. I spotted a pair of scissors and began cutting my hair. I cut and hacked until my beautiful locks scattered the bathroom floor, and the lengths that still cropped my head ranged from half an inch to one inch. I could breathe again just long enough to realize that I had ruined my lovely, light brown tresses, and I cried for my loss.
It didn’t take long before I slipped into my hopeless stupor once again. There were days when I would feel like I was drowning in the air around me, and the screaming would get so loud in my head that I could only focus in spurts. My body craved and outlet for the insanity. I found it first by listening to loud, pulsating music. I could feel it all the way to my soul. But it wasn’t enough. I began to cut my wrists to relieve emotional tension, I would bang my head against a wall to clear my head, and I contemplated suicide in the occasional eerie, serene quiet. I had misplaced my wristband one day, but I felt so sure that no one would notice a skin colored band-aid. My older brother came to visit and did notice, in front of everyone while we all played a board game. Although my mother took immediate action and began taking me to a psychologist and psychiatrist, it took several weeks to emerge from the haze of depression and really “wake up.” I was put on Lexapro to treat general depression, and it kind of helped. Because I was now diagnosed with depression and on medication I thought that I wouldn’t have to worry any more. All this happened in the course of a few months.
Twenty-Two
At age twenty-two I felt happy and complete. I had a loving husband of two years and a beautiful nine month old girl. I was attending college full time and feeling great. I felt the depression coming on for a month before the suffocating walls closed in over me. I should have paid better attention. I should have known that it wasn’t over. The same crazed feeling and inability to focus in class or on homework lasted a few weeks. In a fit of hysteria one day I returned from school shaking and crying for no reason. I promptly withdrew from all my classes and applied for a leave of absence for “health reasons”.
I don't know what came over me the next few months, but there were times when my husband would get home from school, and I would be hiding under a desk in the dark. I was freaking out crying on the floor of the bathroom one night when I just lost my mind. I needed to get rid of the crazed pain that was smothering me. This psychotic calm came over me, and I resolved to get a knife to just get rid of the pain somehow. Meanwhile, my husband felt the prompting in his mind to go sit in the kitchen for some reason. I thought he was in bed, and I crept out of the bathroom toward the kitchen in the dark. I knew exactly how far I needed to step to reach the kitchen knives. Suddenly I tripped over my husband who had fallen asleep on the kitchen floor. I started bawling and asked him how he knew, and he just said he felt like he should be there. This actually happened two times within a couple of months. I wholly believe that Divine intervention took place during those occasions.
Reflecting on the Past
I know of a surety that the last three of these occurrences were due to what is called a major depressive episode. They can last from a few weeks to several months and usually occur in people who already suffer from depression. When I took adolescent psychology I studied that major depressive episodes can be recurring, often in similar intervals. After I emerged from those terrifying few months as a twenty-two year old I made the connection that this was happening to me every five years, and each time it happened it was worse than the time before.
I honestly think the timing of the events as a seven year old are a coincidence, but sometimes in my deepest moments of worthlessness I actually felt like my seven-year old self, and I believe those events as a seven-year old are significant somehow to what happened later. I suspect I have had Major Depressive Disorder since I hit puberty as a twelve-year old.
I would like to note that there have been minor depressive episodes in between these five-year periods, but they have never been as severe or long lasting as the times I have elaborated on here.
What now?
So what do I do now? I am twenty-five. I’ve been happily married for over five years and have two beautiful children. My depression seems to have faded completely for the past year and a half, and I now battle problems with adrenal fatigue and anxiety. Do I just cross my fingers and hope that history doesn't repeat itself? The past occurrences came with little warning and no catalyst or traumatic experience.
I also don't want this to be a case of self-fulfilling prophecy. Maybe it could be over, since my symptoms of depression have nearly all disappeared. On the other hand I want to be prepared. I feel as though my general depression may just be a symptom of another problem. I've been trying to find out things about my body and family's history. My family has a history of hypothyroidism, social anxiety, depression, low progesterone levels, ADD, and I had Sleep Apnea as a child (maybe I still do). I think that's it, but I'm not sure what to do about it. I'm planning on taking progesterone, but I have to be careful about it. Isocort and Corvalen are also supplements I've recently used with pretty good results in terms of energy levels and/or handling stress.
This blog is hopefully going to be an outlet for me to track any changes to my life and receive advice about what I can do if another Major Depressive Episode strikes.
