It’s been 7 years since I received the diagnosis. I can’t believe it’s been that long already?

 

Before the diagnosis, I remember feeling very afraid, thinking I had Alzheimer’s disease. It’s what my mom died from when she was 88-years-old. I don’t know how to explain it. I would try to psych myself up and try to talk myself out of it, to feel better and less afraid. I would ask myself why I felt so down because I had everything going for me.

I still don’t know what sets me off and makes the downward spiral happen.

I don’t remember when I first starting feeling depressed. I think it snuck up on me, a little at a time. All the things I loved to do–and looked forward to doing–didn’t matter. I started to lose interest in them. I would start to cry when I was driving in my car. I’d be driving and crying and asking myself, ”What the hell? This is so embarrassing!”

It would happen a lot when I was driving home from my office. Anything – small things, even a billboard where an infant’s hand was reaching out to an adult – would send me to tears. On the way to the office I’d sit in the parking lot trying to psych myself up to go in. I had never experienced that before and had no idea what was going on.

Some days I’d go to bed and it just didn’t matter if I got up in the morning. I never thought of taking my life, but nothing seemed to matter. This was during the time when I was wondering what the hell was going on. I couldn’t put my finger on what was wrong.

I didn’t feel like I could tell anyone either.

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