Where do I begin... I grew up in a very supportive, very affectionate family. My parents are great and have always been there for me 100%. I come from a big Jewish family, with lots of cousins, second cousins, great aunts and great uncles. Both my grandmothers died before I was born. When I was very young, my grandfather moved in with us while he was sick with a combination of cancer and liquid in the brain. He died of pneumonia when I was 4 years old. My parents married and had kids late for Baby Boomers, so I've always been surrounded by elderly people and have been used to the concept of death and mourning from a very young age.
I was bullied horribly in school as a kid. I was the typical fat nerdy girl, with frizzy hair and glasses. I was obsessed with cats (and still love them), which gave my bullies lots of fodder for teasing. I also have a family history of depression and anxiety, and was diagnosed with a combination of those around age 9. This coincided with the peak of my bullying. I've blocked most of the memories, but I do know that it was terrible. The first time I thought about suicide, I was in 4th grade. I remember cutting something up with scissors and thinking, "I could stab these into my chest and just end it."
I sunk into a deep depression in 5th grade where I would sob in the middle of class for no reason and refused to play with the other kids at recess. One day, I got into a fight with a friend and said, "things like this is what makes me want to kill myself." She told the teacher who told the principal of my elementary school who brought me into a formal meeting with all the administrators. This was 1999, just a few years after Columbine, so everyone was on high alert about depression. I mentioned that I was suicidal (no point in hiding it), and principal asked, "do you know what that means?" which I found condescending. I told them about the bullying, and they promised to stop it, but nothing ever happened.
My anxiety works in a strange way. I'm severely emetophobic (afraid of vomiting), and that tends to cause my panic attacks. In other words, if I feel nauseous (or think I MIGHT feel nauseous in the near future), I will have a panic attack. Before I was able to control this with a combination of breathing techniques and medicine, my reaction was to stop eating (because food = having something to throw up). I was never formally diagnosed with an eating disorder, but I consider that to have been borderline anorexia. I was living on 1000 calories a day at most, and I was extremely skinny (although I was still being bullied for being fat).
I stopped being bullied around 8th grade, which was also when I finally started getting my chemistry worked out with medicine. I've been seeing psychiatrists regularly since I was diagnosed with depression, and have been on medication (Nortripteline [sp?], Celexa, Klonopin, and now Wellbutrin) the entire time. I go through waves of depression and anxiety, but rarely have them at the same time. High school wasn't terrible, although it wasn't great. I made good friends, most of whom I still see regularly. College was okay, too. I transferred after two years, when the market crashed in 2009 and my parents couldn't afford to send me to an out-of-state school anymore. I graduated almost exactly a year ago.
Right now, I'm in a depression. I've had suicidal tendencies off and on for the past few months, and seriously thought about committing myself to an institution a few times. I've been working a stressful job in a toxic environment since I graduated, and I'm getting laid off in two weeks with no job lined up. It's upsetting, and I feel like I've failed, or like I haven't done enough with my life. Most of my friends are in grad school, and I think sometimes that they look down on me for only having a Bachelor's degree or for not having a solid career path yet. I'm only 23, but I feel like I'm at least 40 inside. I have a constant fear of being judged, being looked down on, and disappointing people. I'm definitely a perfectionist, and I feel both guilty and angry when I make even the smallest mistakes. I'm very lucky in that I have people who care for me. My parents have promised to help me find work, and to help me pay rent if unemployment won't cover everything. I've been seeing a therapist every week for the past few months to help me work through my issues. I've made big strides, but I still have a long way to go before I'll be okay. It doesn't sound terrible on paper, but it's been one of my worst bouts of depression. I've been exhausted, crying almost every night, and barely able to function in day-to-day life. Things have been better since I went on Wellbutrin, but I'm not out of the hole yet.
That's my story! Thank you for trudging through all that.
