Depression- Stigma, and Thoughts of Suicide
When I’m doing well, I am naturally an upbeat, positive, and outgoing person. My depression is described as “refractory”, which means difficult to treat. I have bipolar depression (a chemical imbalance), and “chronic” depression. (lasting at least 2 years). There’s still way too much stigma towards mental illness, including depression. Even one of my best friends of over 40 years has stigma towards my depression.
After going through 10 years of hell, mostly with depression, I was finally put on the right combination of psychiatric medications (including antidepressants). Then, I was doing quite well for the next 20 years. In 2022, the “thief” came back. I’m talking about depression. I call it the thief because it robs me of several things. The thief robs me of my motivation, inspiration, and confidence. This makes promoting my book, and doing many other things very difficult. It seems like the antidepressant medications I was taking for all those years, and helped me so much, had lost their effect. Over 2 years later, I’m still battling depression. I’ve tried several different antidepressant meds, but so far, none of them have improved my mood. This is extremely frustrating.
For 2 years, I’ve been sugar coating my depression. I hide it well. I just want to be as positive as possible. When someone asks me how I’m doing, l say “I’m O.K. A little on the low side, a little depressed, but not nearly as bad as it used to be”. This is true, but what I don’t say is that I still think about suicide every day. Only my wife and psychiatrist knew this. In the past, I thought about suicide constantly, at least 8 hours a day. Now, it’s more on and off. Maybe a total of about 30 minutes a day. It’s still difficult, but much better.
Even One Of My Best Friends Has Stigma
I’m lucky to have several good friends. One day, I told one of my best friends that I was still getting thoughts of suicide. He had no compassion at all. He actually said “I think people who commit suicide are selfish”. This same friend (of over 40 years), has also been very adamant about me working a normal job. He told me “Get a job! Earn some income!” He also said that “Work is the best medicine”. (I have always heard that “laughter “ was the best medicine!).
I’ve tried my very best to stay employed over the years, but I simply couldn’t do this because of severe bipolar disorder. Several times while I was working as a golf pro, I had full blown manic episodes, lost my job, and ended up in the psych ward. My subsequent severe depressed episodes usually lasted for about 8 months.
My friend is a smart guy. He’s been very successful in business. I would estimate that his net worth is at least $15-$20 million. He’s been fortunate in many ways, including having good mental and physical health his whole life. But, his attitude towards my depression, and dictating to me that I should be working, is both arrogant and ignorant. He has stigma towards depression, and doesn’t understand how debilitating it can be. My other friends, and family members understand my situation a lot better. Most importantly, my wife knows me much better than anyone else. She keeps telling me that writing is my job. One time, someone close to me told me to “Snap out of it!” when I was depressed. This was ignorant (stigma) too.
I’m a numbers guy. I’m always crunching numbers. I have calculated that I’ve spent well over 60,000 hours thinking about suicide. That’s why I think it’s still so “close to the surface” of my mind. These thoughts just pop into my head “automatically”. It’s like muscle memory. They are intrusive thoughts. It’s still very difficult, and I’ve had to be incredibly strong dealing with this for so many years. I haven’t even had one suicide attempt, however, I did come extremely close to killing myself one time. This story is in my book.
Obviously, hearing that someone is having thoughts of suicide will probably raise a red flag. But, for me, I have no intention to act on these thoughts. No plans for this. For one thing, I could never do this to my wife. It would totally break her heart. Because I have no intention, my psychiatrist isn’t overly concerned about it. People who are close to me, if they read this, might be quite surprised, or even a bit shocked that I’ve been getting thoughts of suicide for the last couple of years. I just mostly kept this to myself, because I didn’t want others to worry about me. Especially, when I don’t have any plans to end my life.
My depression is equal parts mental, physical, and emotional. All systems down. No energy. It’s a terrible feeling. It often takes everything I have just to have a shower. For me, the best thing I can do to avoid dwelling on how bad I’m feeling with my depression, is to distract my mind by thinking about other things. Keeping my mind busy by writing, typing, doing emails, and googling information helps me a lot.
I do encourage anyone who’s having thoughts of suicide to talk with others about this. This is a very difficult conversation to have for most people, but an extremely important one. I don’t condone suicide, and my heart goes out to anyone who’s lost a loved one to suicide. And, I have compassion for those who are in a depressed state of mind. I understand both sides. For those who are depressed, hang in there. It may not seem like it in the moment, but things will get better !
