Depression
Childhood & life before depression
Most of the people we interviewed tried to explain why they had become depressed. Many believed their depression was the result of chemical imbalances in their bodies, but even these people entertained other possible reasons. One woman thought that her depression might have started at the age of 13, triggered by the start of her periods. But around this time her parents had also divorced, she lost a best friend and she had troubles at school, and she thought these might also have contributed.
Many people said that when they were children they had been very sensitive to upheavals such as moving to another area or changing schools, or had felt hurt because they felt different from other children or were bullied. Others felt they were to blame for events that were really out of their control. Some people were bright as children and did not fit in at school, feeling different, bruised or traumatised by their lack of acknowledgement and support.
Was worried and sickly as a child, and then when he went into secondary school he was bullied and called names, which really hurt him.
Was worried and sickly as a child, and then when he went into secondary school he was bullied and called names, which really hurt him.
When I was say perhaps about four or five, six I used to feel quite... well I can just vaguely... hazily sort of record, quite sort of being worried. I mean I remember the first day I went to primary school, I remember I burst out into tears and so on. And but I'm sure I think I soon got over it. And that was that. But whilst you're in primary school I had quite a lot of colds, and used to have to be off school quite a bit which of course did not help.... like didn't help.
And then sor... that was like from the age of five through til eleven. And then [sighs] the real problem came when I was aged eleven and then sort of twelve, I can't... it's when I went to secondary school. And, it was not a very... well it was sort of as far as schools go, it was alright, but I mean it was in my home area near [name of area], where I still live today. I mean I've lived here all my life, and sort of, as I still do, you see, but school, or the secondary school I went to wasn't a particularly pleasant place, it was full of sort of, bullies and well, I don't like to say thugs, but some of the other children I say were at that time.
I've been thinking quite a lot about this of late, were quite unpleasant people. They were quite you know, it was all sorts of names under the sun and I used to be called queer and gay for no particular reason. And or bender and all sorts of, you know, hurtful things like that. And for no particular reason and you know, and it really hurt.
When she was a child she thought she was going into a children's home as a punishment because she was born with cancer and was too much trouble.
When she was a child she thought she was going into a children's home as a punishment because she was born with cancer and was too much trouble.
Because of my problem... Because my Mum had had such a bad time having to run me.... I mean from now, knowing how far [the Hospital] was from where I lived, it must have been an awful trek for a woman during the war years to have to take a child that small with another one in tow twice a week to... for radiotherapy or radio treatment, whatever it was. It was cancer I had. And I now believe that it was a heck of a trek. Then, I used to think, "Why doesn't she love me? Is it because I'm sick? Is it because I'm causing too much trouble?
There was no other reason for it. It's just I was a normal child. In my own little mind I was a normal child. I played with my toys, I tried to play with the neighbours children. I loved my sister, and my brother was only a tiny baby, but I mean I still loved him and then as I say, suddenly Dad came in one day and he said, "Ah, pack your cases you're going to Nanny's", which was his mother, "and then tomorrow you will be collected".
You know at that age you daren't say, 'Well where am I going? Who's going to collect me?' And my uncle, my Dad's youngest brother who was'. he's about ten, fifteen years older than me. He and his father and my Nan took me to the railway station.
And I was collected by a nun who, on the train journey to [town]...to the convent told me that my younger sister would be following us, but not quite so soon. They wanted me settled in first. And all this was because my mother was sick. But [sigh] I never, [pause] whether it's because they didn't talk to us about how sick she was, why she was sick, what it was that was making her sick, I don't know. I assumed it was me. I'd been pulled away from the family and put in this horrible place. It wasn't horrible but it... a child of seven going into this big stone building with a nun and a big empty hallway. I mean, you can imagine what children's homes were like years ago, nothing like they are now. And I thought this is my punishment, and all because I was born with something wrong with me.
Not all reported difficulties in their families when they were young, yet such problems were common among the people we talked to. Some had dealt with unpredictable and violent parents; felt misunderstood by parents; had rigid upbringings; experienced a lack of parental understanding that their problems were not laziness; felt parents did not approve of them or their lifestyle; had to cope with a parent with mental health problems; had parental pressure to 'succeed'; experienced emotional neglect and in some cases physical and sexual abuse. One woman felt her parents were 'too supportive', not allowing her to learn about life. Most depressed people seek an explanation for their illness in the events of their lives, particularly their childhood, but this should not be taken to mean that such events inevitably lead to depression. Many children come through a disturbed childhood without getting depression in later life, though for others it may be a powerful contributory factor.
She links her current day anxiety to the unpredictability of her parents arguments and father's violent temper, and her resulting 'fear of what might happen.'
She links her current day anxiety to the unpredictability of her parents arguments and father's violent temper, and her resulting 'fear of what might happen.'
The anxiety is' was' for me it goes back to my parents and arguments and I guess living in fear of my father because he had a violent temper. I won't go too much into it because I've done all that, and it is quite upsetting so I won't do that, but I lived in a home, a household that you [phew] I could recognise when, when there was going to be' I guess like a volcano. I visualise it as a volcano becoming to, beginning to erupt and you, you know that it's building up.
And I could see that happening between Mum and my Dad and it was like, I would be sort of saying to myself, 'Please, you know Mum please be quiet don't, don't', because she used to egg him on you see, and the more she egged him on, the more he got more angry and more angry. And I was sort of thinking no, no don't.
And sometimes it would subside, sometimes it would subside and it would be ok and blow over, and other times it would just erupt. And, and so every time that there were raised voices, if I went to bed at night and was lying in bed, you would start hearing the voices, and you would be lying there thinking are they going to get louder, and louder and louder. And me being in that sort of state of not knowing because there is a fear of what might happen, you know, and I think that's got a lot to do with my anxiety now because anxiety is about sort of [forward thinking]' about sort of anticipating the worst.
Gets angry with people who complain about relatively minor problems with their families because of the physical abuse she suffered.
Gets angry with people who complain about relatively minor problems with their families because of the physical abuse she suffered.
And it's very difficult to sort of not get uptight with somebody that is, as far as I'm concerned, moaning about their life, moaning about their experiences or moaning about their family. 'Oh I hate my mum she does this, I hate my mum she does that, I hate my dad he does this.' And you think, "What are you talking about? You haven't got a clue."
It's like, I don't profess that I've had the worst childhood in the world, I know there are people out there who have had a really bad, upbringing. But I've had a bad childhood. And then when I hear people saying that they've had a bad childhood, and you know, why? 'Cos I got smacked.' Really? Do you know what it's like to be beaten black and blue? You know, it makes me quite uptight with them because, they don't, in a sense as far as I'm concerned they don't realise how lucky they actually are.
How bad things could be for them. And it does make me quite uptight but it doesn't make me jealous, it just makes me sort of wanna shake them and say, 'Look, you know, this is the real world, you're living in it, you've got nothing to complain about. You've got all the support networks you could ask for, you've got all the security you could ask for, you've got all the love and affection you could ask for, what more is there that you need in order to try and get the best out of your life?'
It was very common for people to have had a loss or trauma, or a 'life event' that affected them very deeply. People said they were not always aware of their grief or trauma at the time. Indeed some found it difficult to understand that they could be so affected by things that happened decades ago. One man said 'While I was depressed, I couldn't see that my mum's death at aged 8 was such a big factor, and now I can.' A number of people were unsure about the role of events in the past. For instance, one man witnessed people dying in the Second World War. But he believed his depression was more likely to be due to a chemical imbalance. Clearly though, current day situations could trigger grief reactions that were buried deep in the distant past. Some people suffered losses (e.g. relationship breakdowns) as adults that contributed to depression.
His grandmother died and he became anxious his mother would also die. When his father later died, he tried to become the man of the house at the age of 8.
His grandmother died and he became anxious his mother would also die. When his father later died, he tried to become the man of the house at the age of 8.
I think I can remember being a very happy little child, and then something happened when I was about 5 which changed things. So if I can tell you that story....
When I was about 5 my grandmother lived in our house and evidently she died one night and my mother, then the next day when I asked where she was my mother told me she had gone away on holiday and [pauses] that's all she told me. And it was around the time I was starting school. So what happened when I went to school was that when my mother left me, I became very anxious, and every morning I used to throw up in the playground and this seemed to be like a daily event. And I ended up being taken, I can remember being taken to see this man. My mother told me afterwards it was a child psychologist and he interviewed me and then he saw my mother and apparently he said to her, "His grandmother's died hasn't she?" And she said, "Yes, but we've kept it from him." And he said, "well, he knows and now he's anxious that you're going to, going to disappear".
So I think that's probably the beginning of it and I think I was quite an anxious child looking back. When I was 8 my father died.... He died at home too and my mother, obviously had known from the previous experience, she told me the next morning that he had died in the night, although I knew he was dying. He was dying of cancer so it was obvious to me. Although nobody told me he was dying, I knew he was dying, so it wasn't a surprise to me. And then I felt that I had to be very responsible, I had to be very brave, very strong. I was the only child and I think half of me was trying to be mummy's little man. You know, I can remember trying to cut the grass with the hand mower and it was nearly as big as me, and I was trying to push this mower and I was trying to do everything I could to support her and... But at other times, I had terrible bouts of crying, I just cried and cried and cried.
Witnessed bombing and the shooting of people during WWII, and wondered if this had affected him.
Witnessed bombing and the shooting of people during WWII, and wondered if this had affected him.
A German one?
German Junkers yeah, then he had the cheek to fly down the runway about four feet off the ground, the full length of the runway. So those kind of things you don't know whether they affect you later on. I never ought to be alive according to the mischief we had, because we had a Lancaster bomber crashed, and we had whole belts of ammunition off it [laughs].
A number of women became depressed after the birth of their children. One woman felt that there was almost a conspiracy not to tell women how having a baby can turn their worlds upside down. Before her severe depression she had lost her mother-in-law, had a difficult labour and been traumatised when her son did not breathe at first. Her depression made it difficult for her to bond with her son.
Some people had multiple issues that they were struggling with that just seemed to overwhelm their coping skills. One man who had never had depression before suffered a severe episode after considerable disruptions, including two deaths in the family and workplace changes.
Life events do not always lead to depression. Some people who had had depression in the past (and who had been treated) were pleasantly surprised that they could cope well with life events, even severe difficulties.
See also our Young people & depression section.
Last reviewed September 2017.
Last updated October 2012.
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