Depression
Courtney’s story

Do you know anyone who has been depressed? People often feel depressed after tragedy occurs. Read Courtney’s story to see how professional counseling and medication helped her enjoy life again.

I’ve been fighting depression for six years. I’ve learned that I will never beat the evils of depression but now have a game plan to keep me emotionally well.

At the age of sixteen, I experienced the loss of my eighteen-year-old brother Tim one week before Christmas. In our dining room, in my father’s arms, he died of blood clots. I was upstairs getting ready for a high school basketball game. I will never forget the cries of my mother when they pronounced Tim dead, or having to break the news to my oldest brother Greg when he arrived home from college that night. I cradled my 10 year old brother Eric, knowing he had been robbed of his innocence.

This would either make or break our family. My mother and father were emotionally destroyed. Greg was going back to college, and Eric needed guidance. I took it upon myself to become the backbone of my family. It didn’t catch up with me until my freshman year of college.

For the first time since Tim’s death, I was vulnerable. At a time when I needed to bond with new people, I was not sociable. I felt like an outsider as friendships formed in my dorm. I cried on the phone to anyone who would listen. My parents worried about me. After much pleading, they convinced me to go on an anti-depressant. After a few weeks, I made a few friends.

But I knew something was lacking. It was as if the medicine put a band-aid over a wound. I struggled for a year and half at college feeling like I never quite fit in. I couldn’t shake the feeling of emptiness. I convinced myself that it was the college that was making me unhappy and decided to transfer.

For the next two years, I decided to self-medicate and went on and off taking my anti-depressants. When I was feeling good, I would stop taking medication. But then I’d slip back into feelings of worthlessness. When my parents asked if I had stopped my pills, I would lie. I wanted to believe I was better and stronger than the medicine. I didn’t see how taking a pill would fill the void in my life.

When I was unable to get out of bed spring break of my junior year, I was ready to accept help. At my parents’ urging, I went to see a psychiatrist. I had really resisted this. For the first time, I let my emotions out.

On my first visit the doctor explained the importance of staying on my anti-depressants. He said that depression is an illness that should not be battled alone. I wish that I had seen a psychiatrist my freshman year, before I fell apart.

One year out of college, now in the working world, I am still on anti-depressants. I’m able to express my emotions rather than deny myself the right to feel. Although I’m not always in a state of happiness, I’m in a balanced emotional state that allows me to deal with disappointments. I’m so fortunate that my parents supported me and wanted me to get better. When their own grief was insurmountable, they fought until they brought back the old me. For that, I can’t thank them enough.