Sharing depression stories sometimes helps me to restore perspective on what I have done since my bad times, and it helps others to know that it is possible to survive despite some serious obstacles.
My depression came on when I had to face being my mother's sole care-giver after my father died. Mom had already started down the spiral descent into Alzheimer's, and I had no one to help me. I had no brothers or sisters and my mother's family was two states away. My father's closest family was the other side of Louisiana, near the Texas border, and they had an ailing parent to consider as well. So it was "you and me against the world" with my mother. That situation degraded until I had to put her into a nursing home, but it got worse after that as her mental acuity declined.
Long after the fact, I realized through research that Mom had started in a classic progression. She was already at stage one of Alzheimer's while she was at home. As things progressed, it became clear that she was a danger to herself when home alone, but my job did not allow for telecommuting because back then, hardly anyone ever did that. We talked about a nursing home, but she was reluctant - then suddenly she wasn't (probably due to mental decline) and I pounced on the moment. In retrospect, I had cut the timing way too close because she was probably already in stage two of Alzheimer's, not that there is a sharp line between the phases. But two weeks into her stay, she attacked one of the nurses. They expected such irrationally combative behavior, but it was still a surprise to me. Her spiral lasted several years, maybe as many as ten, but only about three years of it was in a nursing facility. Dad had recognized the behavioral changes and tried to talk to me about it, but back then there was no public awareness of Alzheimer's Disease and neither of us knew what to do. Then Dad died and I had to face the problem alone.
The depression grew as the stress factors grew. I was depressed because I watched my mother go through a mental decline from a happy person with a great sense of humor down to a living but unresponsive body in fetal position, one of the two possible manifestations of Alzheimer's 4th stage. A few factors in this situation compounded my misery included things like:
1. Being a really lousy date - because I could not concentrate on my partner for the evening. After having to say goodbye to a really beautiful woman who wanted attention that I couldn't give, I stopped dating entirely because at that time, I was focused on Mom and no woman would be able to come between us at that moment.
2. Watching Mom slip away a little at the time, including that terrible day when I walked into her room and she was afraid of me because she no longer knew me. My own mother forgot me! That is when I learned to put on the "mask" and smile while my heart was breaking. When I went home late that night, all I could do was cry for an hour or two and try to get some sleep. And that was six days a week. (Friday was my "go to therapist" afternoon.)
3. Having to turn down a promotion (to corporate vice-president) at work because I spent hours with Mom, reading to her while she was still semi-lucid and just talking to her when she had become unable to follow stories any more. I didn't have time for an immersive job as long as I was still Mom's sole care-giver. And in some nursing homes, you HAVE to visit frequently because otherwise terrible things happen. Like Mom's bed-sores larger than my opened palm, which got corrected AFTER I confronted the head of the home about having the attendants do the right things to correct that situation. I didn't have time for that job but I cried just a little bit harder at night for two days after that moment.
4. Having to turn down a head-hunter recruiting for a job that fit me to the 95% level (as headhunters rate it) because Mom wasn't in any condition to be moved and I wasn't about to leave her alone. It would have been a lab directorship in a place that used computers directly connected to many sensors in a agricultural research lab in the USA Midwest - but I couldn't go.
5. During this time, my employer got bought out and the new owners wanted everyone to relocate to Maryland, but I couldn't leave. I had to take a hardship exception and accept being laid off. So in the midst of all of this I had to change jobs. But then, what was one more layer of stress among us chickens? The job I took was lower in pay but it left me in a stable position to care for Mom and I was still able to pay bills, so that particular stress abated.
6. Having to move Mom from a level 1 to a level 2 nursing home after her kidneys failed the first time, because the level 1 nursing home did not have round-the-clock skilled nursing care and could not take her back. Not to mention that the stress factors were mounting as her health was physically declining.
7. Having to make the decision that allowed her to die, when her kidneys failed for the second time. After a long talk with her attending physician at the level 2 nursing home, I had to say NO to surgery to prepare her for dialysis. I told him to use any pharmacuetical means possible to stabilize that situation, but there would be no surgical procedures, no transplants, no drastic measures - but there WOULD be a DNR order. At that point she was already at stage 4, in a persistent vegetative state, and I had to realize that to put her through full-anaesthesia surgery to implant shunts would represent selfishness on my part. I realized that sometimes the more generous action was to let go. Three weeks later, it was over. On a Saturday, I visited her and saw her lying in the bed, unresponsive. But on that day, for some reason, I gave her permission to "go" if she wanted to, and told her I would be OK. At 2 AM Sunday, the home called me to notify me that she had passed.
8. Taking her to her home in Alabama for burial and coming home on the plane alone, it was the strangest feeling of relief in the midst of loss.
During this time, I was seeing a therapist and eventually broke out of the depressed funk that I was in. But it was during this deep depression that I lost what faith I might have had. This is partly covered in another thread, so I'll summarize: I had plenty of time to read but there was no comfort to be found anywhere in the Bible. The more I read, the more I realized I was on my own, alone and isolated - because there was no help to be found, no words of wisdom, no glimmer of hope. And THAT loss of faith coupled with my mother's situation resulted in a near-suicidal depression. But my therapist and I worked through that pain enough for me to analyze the pain and know it for what it was.
After Mom died, it took me maybe six or seven months to resurface, but what broke me out of the funk was that I finally COULD take a job offer - that ironically kept me in New Orleans. The Navy sent me to a convention and I came home with the perspective that life was still going on. I still had issues, but they worked their way out as well. Eventually I met my dearest Linda and we "hooked up" as the saying goes. This November will be 24 years of marriage to my loving, caring partner. I can look back and say, "I survived it." But to be honest, in retrospect it was a close call.
