Gemma - Interview 34

Age at interview: 19

Brief Outline:

Gemma is 19 and works fulltime in health care. In her last year of 6th form she started developing depression. Her mum took her to the GP and she was diagnosed with severe depression, prescribed antidepressants and referred to counselling. She also found help from establishing a daily routine for herself. Gemma decided to take time off school and work which gave her a much needed break. Over a couple years, she's gotten through her depression and is planning a career in psychology.

Background:

See 'Brief outline'

More about me...

Gemma is 19 and works in health care with people with learning difficulties. In her last year of the 6^th form, Gemma starting developing depression. Her school work started to get on top of her, she lost interest in work and school, became “paranoid” and was crying a lot. For a while she tried to “persevere” and keep telling everyone she was OK which just made her feel worse. One day she told her sister how she was feeling and her mum made her an appointment with the GP straightaway.

 

Gemma was diagnosed with severe depression straightaway. She was also prescribed antidepressants and referred to counselling. She took time off work but tried to carry on with school. Gemma says that although the depression diagnosis was a relief, albeit a shocking one, afterwards she let depression “take over me”. Most days she couldn’t get out of bed and even the smallest tasks became a huge effort. After a few months’ wait she started her counselling which went on for 1.5 years. Gemma also decided to take a break from school and re-sit her final year.

 

Gradually, through the help from counselling and medication and support from her family and friends, Gemma started getting better. She started to experience the “occasional good day” and see “traces of her old self”. Establishing a daily routine was really important to her and she also found comfort in sewing. Gemma’s mum was very supportive of her throughout the whole process. She found out information about depression and also contacted a professional helpline to get advice and support for Gemma but also for herself.

 

Gemma is “on the road to recovery”. She’s gained self-respect and belief in that she can do whatever she wants to. She has turned her experiences into a positive and says the “pain I had to go through has made me who I am now”. She says going through depression have driven her to be “the best I can” in the future. Her experiences with depression have given her “a strong desire” to help others with mental health problems and eventually she wants to study to become a psychologist.

After Gemma was given the depression diagnosis, she let depression 'take over' her.

Unfortunately once I had been diagnosed, I stopped struggling with my depression and just let it take me over. I struggled to get out of bed most days, sometimes not leaving my bed for a week. The smallest things that seem so simple like having a bath or a shower, became mountains for me. One of my lowest points was sobbing as my mum washed my hair as I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

When Gemma went to her GP about depression, she was instantly prescribed antidepressants and...

The next morning my mum’s thoughts were confirmed. I had severe depression. In a way I always knew, but knowing for definite still shocked me. In one way it comforted me, knowing that I wasn't like everyone else, that there was a reason i was behaving this way. The doctor was very supportive and didn’t judge me for not coming forward sooner. She told me the fact that I was here showed that I was going to get better. She then got straight to the point. She asked me how did I want to get through this? What would I be willing to try? "Anything," I said. She then talked me through the two main options." Counselling is one we strongly recommend for everyone as it will help you to understand how you became vulnerable to depression and you can express how you feel to a person who has no emotional involvement with you and a professional view. The second is anti depressants, they aren’t a quick fix to make you better, but they help you to cope better with what your going through."

 

"I just want to stop feeling like this" I said, "I want to try both". I came out of the doctors with the promise of being contacted by the NHS about my counselling shortly and with a packet of Fluoxetine capsules.

Gemma explains how depression made her realise her friends are forever.

Looking back depression made my true friends shine out. A lot of people didn’t understand it, and couldn’t manage seeing me anymore. My best friend was so upset every time she saw me, in the end she couldn’t bring herself to see me. When I started to get better, she was there and still is to this day. At first I resented her for leaving me in the lurch, I used to think my own best friend can’t even be here for me when I need her the most. Now I understand, she loved me so much and seeing me not being able to do anything to make my pain go away was too much. I was fortunate enough to have friends that were with me all through, and now I'm coming out the other side, I have never been so close to them, and I know that we will be friends forever. The depression didn’t make them treat me any differently, they were the little normality I had in my life. To them I wasn’t a victim I was just Gemma and that made me realise that too.

Battle with depression can feel like one you'll never win. Gemma says that her experiences give...

Depression is a battle, one that at the time you never feel like you’re going to win. But I can promise you that you do. And you become such a stronger person for it, now that I'm on the road to recovery - in a strange way I don’t mind that I had to go through all that pain because it's made me the person I am now and I have the rest of my life ahead of me, and without the battle I wouldn’t have the drive to be the best I can be now. I had times that I wanted to end my life, I used to do horrible things to my body because I thought it deserved it, but you owe it to yourself not to. Your body didn’t cause you this heartache; depression did, it doesn’t deserve being attacked. You don’t deserve inflicting pain on yourself because it is NOT your fault.

Depression makes your life 'distorted', says Gemma.

Can’t work, can’t sleep, sometimes can’t eat and just feel everything is pointless. I know I felt like everyone wanted to hurt me, to pick on me. With depression even good things you might have experienced seem to become twisted in your mind and appear bad. The world becomes distorted and appears as if against you. It’s a very tiring thing to go through and completely destroys any motivation, confidence, and self-esteem you may have had.  

Sewing can comfort and give a sense of achievement to Gemma.

I found reading a bit of challenge at the beginning and I found sewing really comforting. Focusing on something that wasn’t my problems and finishing a task in peace and quiet I found really rewarding and it gave myself a sense of achievement as well as really relaxing me. My mum bought me some 'sew by numbers' to do. Routine was something the doctor had told me was really important for me to establish and so to start with I did one thing each day and every time I managed to do it I'd put 20p in a pot. It started with making sure I got up each morning at 9am and from then I built it up. The days I didn't manage were really degrading and I felt useless, but I had to realise that I was starting over, small things for other people to do were going to be harder for me and I shouldn't feel bad about that.

Gemma decided to re-start her last year and all the teachers were very supportive of her decision.

Eventually I came to the decision to leave school in March and re-start my last year in September, giving me 6 months to focus on getting better, and it felt like a fresh start. All my teachers were lovely, especially my PE teacher who told me about her sister who'd had depression for 6 months and told me that if I ever needed to talk that she would always have the time for me. Having that support from school and work that I wasn't expecting was a great help, and I think I wouldn’t have even gone back to 6th form six months later if it hadn’t been for that support.

Gemma thought she was having a nervous breakdown. Sleep was her only relief.

My January re-sits were when I started to realise that something was wrong. Instead of revising, I would just sit on my bedroom floor staring into space because I couldn’t bring myself to work because I knew I would give up and cry. I thought I was having a nervous breakdown. I felt trapped in school, in my part time job and after my re-sits my attendance in both fell greatly. The more I didn’t go, the more I punished myself telling myself I was a failure, saying to myself 'how come everyone else can and you cant?'. I just wanted to escape and I found that escape through sleeping. It was the only time my body could relax and my thoughts wouldn't be on how I could get through the next day.

Gemma's mum found out a lot of information about depression and got regular support from a...

My mum read a lot of books from the library on depression to try and get a better understanding of what I was going through, and even though there are so many causes and different types of depression, it did help. Not only was depression hard on me it was hard on my family and friends. My mum got in touch with a helpline and every 2 weeks they would ring her to see how she was coping and helped her and gave suggestions on what she could do for me, my mum found it probably the biggest help. Speaking to a professional once a fortnight, having someone to talk to gave her an outlet on how she was feeling.