In Part one of this series we heard from My Depression Connection members Izzy and LyraStorm on what it is like to be a young adult and cope with depression. In this post we will explore what may happen in later years (forties and beyond) as to how one deals with depression. Does it get any easier? Is it possible to gain wisdom from having had more experience with battling depression over many years? We will find out the answer to these questions and more with my interview with members Fifi (who is in her forties) and Judy (who just turned 60 this year).
How long have you been suffering from depression? At what age did this begin for you?
Fifi: I first noticed that I was depressed when I had a tumor at the age of twenty two and was trying to look after my daughter who was two at the time.
Judy: I think I've been depressed most of my life, but the first major episode I remember was when I was 12. I spent several months in bed with rheumatic fever - I could only leave to use the bathroom or to go to the doctor. After I was ambulatory again, I went through horrible insomnia until one night I just broke down crying, thinking about stuff like my parents dying some day, etc. Actually, there was constant arguing and yelling in our house, my parents fought all the time and my dad would scream at whomever was ticking him off at the time, so loudly the neighbors could hear it even when the windows were closed. For those three months, I had no life outside that room, other than to escape in books. But I always remember being afraid to feel joy or anything close to it and I think the depression usually took the form of numbness. I would lay in bed and listened to the yelling.
Do you feel that there are unique life stressors and circumstances one faces in their forties and beyond which may cause one to feel depressed?
Fifi: There have been a lot of stressors for me now that I'm in my forties, daughter leaving home, daughter getting married and also having my husband home after retiring from work at the age of thirty five and being pensioned off. Just being forty was a big deal for me I started to think that about mortality a lot.
Judy:
There definitely are a lot of positives when you get in your fifties, but some unique stressors, as well. On the job, I saw myself gradually getting more and more shoved into the background; one day I realized that now I was one of the "old-timers" and saw how the younger people think you're uninterested in learning anything new, or that you're too slow or too whatever once you get to be over 50. You see people that you trained becoming your boss.
You also start thinking more about the transitory nature of life as friends and other people you know who are your age start dying from various illnesses. I always read the obituaries because there is often a name or two I recognize in there, even if it's the parents of someone I went to school with. I'm one of the few my age who has both parents still living, but my mother wasn't even 20 when I was born.
