The Beginning of My Treatment at Children’s

If you or someone close to you has ever experienced depression, you probably know that its course can wax and wane on its own, sometimes with no obvious explanation. For me, the years between ages twelve and seventeen were difficult, but I managed to pull myself through each day and even to sometimes have fun. Looking back, I think my feelings of disgust with my body eased a bit during this period as other kids also began to physically develop. But soon after the beginning of my senior year in high school, that old monster that I knew so well as a preteen came back for a visit, and this time, it planned to stay a while. The idea of graduating from high school and going out into the adult world of college terrified me. I knew I didn’t have the tools to handle it.

I began seeing a psychiatrist at Children’s Hospital and was hospitalized a month and a half later for severe depression and a trial of antidepressant medication. I was placed in a cardiac unit for monitoring because I have a minor heart arrhythmia and my doctors wanted to be certain that the antidepressant medication didn’t affect my heart rhythm. Although I felt safe and cared for in the hospital, I was also embarrassed and ashamed of being in a cardiac unit with kids who were truly sick with major heart ailments while I was “only” depressed. The doctors and nurses never made me feel as though I didn’t have a legitimate illness, but I kept the primary reason for my hospitalization secret from everyone but my immediate family. Both my parents and I knew that my relatives would not accept a psychiatric hospitalization for me; in their eyes, I was a smart, normal, happy kid. What in the world was I doing hospitalized for a trial of psychotropic drugs?