Six years ago, my year group sat down to do their Junior Cert mock exams. At the same time, I sat down in front of a psychiatrist in St John of God’s psychiatric hospital. At the age of 14 and a half, I expected to be in school, complaining about homework and willing the bell to ring so I could walk home with my friends. Instead, I was at home, complaining about nothing because I was too numb, barely walking out of my room. Some days, I hoped the bell would ring to bring my life to an end.
I was diagnosed with depression in early February of 2010, and while I had previously attended counselling, I found it hadn’t helped. I still saw images of razors when I closed my eyes. I refused to eat anything more than one or two bowls of Special K a day. Anorexic thoughts continuously occupied my head. I realise now that I wanted to control something in my life and food seemed like the easiest choice.
And I know that I said visiting a counselor wasn’t helpful, but that was my own personal experience. When it comes to dealing with mental health issues, everyone finds a way to deal with it that works for them, and for me, it was medication.
After a long conversation with my new doctor and my mother and father, it was suggested that I begin to take medication to try to improve my mood. A tiny white pill was to be taken every morning for this improvement to come about. It became increasingly clear that I was not just a moody teenager like I had thought. I was ill. It was predicted that nine months of taking this miniscule white intruder was all it would take for me not to relapse.
It has been six years and yet I know that if I had not embraced this medication, these are six years I may never have had.
I am now in my third year of college. I turn 21 in May and still every morning there is a rustle and a strip of white pills appear. It has been six years and yet I know that if I had not embraced this medication, these are six years I may never have had. Of course medication is not the right course of action for everyone, especially in milder cases, but I believe that for me it was a genuine lifesaver.
I was told in my first appointment that it would take 10 days for the medication to begin to work. It was explained why, but I was still unimpressed. Why couldn’t I feel better now? Isn’t that what antidepressants do? The day after my appointment I dragged my mum to the bookshop and bought Psychology for Dummies. If I was going to be taking these things then I wanted to know what they would do and how they would help. I was prescribed Citalopram, an SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors). After reading the side effects – a terrifying list of all the types of organ failure the medication could cause – I was slightly wary. In people under the age of 18, it can increase suicidal thoughts. How could this possibly help? But nothing else had, so it was worth a shot, right?
In the first few weeks of being medicated, I felt drowsy and my dosage was changed. Originally I was given quite a high dose, as SSRIs are designed to block a receptor in your brain that reabsorbs the neurotransmitter serotonin – often described as the “happy chemical” of the brain. The practical description of these drugs made me come to terms with my condition in a more detached way. It was the chemicals in my brain. It was not my fault. I was not to blame, and no one else was either.
Three years later, I started my Leaving Certificate and it changed again. My dosage was increased. It did not feel like a setback though. Instead it was encouraging, an extra boost. September came and I had been accepted into Trinity on reduced points through DARE. I made an active decision to take myself off my medication without medical or parental consultation, as I no longer wanted it to define me as I felt it had through my final years in secondary school. I spent my first term miserable and alone. I hated college. The bus journeys were grey, the classrooms were too, and the people I met were all blurs. My mother noticed the change in my mood, but I insisted I was still taking my medication. Without it, I had to focus so much of my energy on everyday tasks, becoming an empty shell in every other aspect of my life. By December of first year, I decided to find the silver strip and continue taking my pills. I have not looked back since.
One in four people in Ireland will suffer from depression in their lifetime and in 2012 over 500,000 people were taking antidepressants.
Although I have gotten used to my local medical practice, psychiatric hospital, and crying incessantly into a pillow for days on end, these experiences certainly are not exceptional. One in four people in Ireland will suffer from depression in their lifetime and in 2012 over 500,000 people were taking antidepressants. Mental health is often stigmatised and the use of medication even more so. Who wants the people on the bus to see what dose you’re taking or someone to say, “Have you taken your meds today?”
More often than not, the counter-argument for taking medication comes from a compassionate place. Medication can be seen as a crutch, which may be the biggest deterrent. If you allow it to become your identifier, this is when people can use your illness against you. As a child I was easily provoked and my peers often used this against me. Medication could have become another confirmation of their social diagnosis of me.
After I had been to counselling for a few months, I returned to my GP asking for her advice as I felt counselling was not helping. She suggested that my depression was primarily biological so a psychiatrist was likely to be of more help as they could medicate in conjunction with counselling. Medication, in my case, was important in order to be able to begin to talk about events that had happened in the early stages of my teenage years. He believed that, with an SSRI, I would be able to stabilise my mood and then work through whatever issues I had. Events that occurred post-diagnosis meant that my mood continued to fluctuate, so continuing to medicate past the initial nine months was necessary.
I know eventually that I will have to come off my medication. In psychiatry, medication is not a permanent solution to what is usually a long-term issue. For me it is no longer a security blanket but rather a means for managing my mental health. It is something that makes opening my eyes every morning a lot easier. My life, like any other, has its ups and downs. And although the downs are difficult they never reach as low as they did before I was medicated. For two years now, the need for me to come off my medication has been discussed but it never seems to be the right time. Someday it will be the right time. But for now, taking antidepressants has the same routine feel as any activity, as simple to do as putting on my shoes. No matter what they think of you, nobody would ever want you to walk barefoot.
