The woman who ended her life in a stand-off with police, (Antidepressants, the Truth, and a Tribute, Pt.1) wouldn’t have seen herself as worthy of a tribute. But if she could have one, she would have wanted something that could help other people. 

After she thanked everyone who tried to help her.

No one chooses to be depressed. Just like everyone I’ve even seen with depression, she tried very, very hard for days and weeks and then years. Does anyone really think that a depressed person would say “No!” if offered a pill that would help? 

I make this tribute to the woman who tried hard, but lost, as she would have wanted it. That is, by honoring everyone of you who has, as she did, courageously taken medication in the face of exhausting and debilitating side effects.  Antidepressants aren’t magic and every one of them has side effects.  Few people can find the not-perfect, but best fit between side effects and positive results –with the first perscription.  The woman who finally gave up, bravely took one medication after another, always hopeful that one day she would see in a sunset the awe-inspiring beauty  typical people take for granted. 

And there’s how depression turns other people off.  Here was a woman who knew that when friends or relatives or even her doctors saw her coming, they felt dread.  She knew she’d gone from being a blessing to being a burden.  She took more medication hopeful that one day her friends and relatives would see her coming and feel some of the old welcome. She put up with the muscles twitches, the overpowering fatigue, the sleepless nights, the confusion…hoping that one day she’d approach others and see towards her… the kind of easiness her friends and relatives experienced around everyone…it seemed to her…everyone but her.

“What has happened to me?”  She’d ask.  “I’m not who I used to be and I can’t find her anymore.”

Taking medication is hard.  I have the greatest respect for each person willing to take antidepressents. Depression and Bipolar Disorder are biological realities that if we are lucky enough to not have in our genes, we should kiss the ground and never forget how blessed we are. Imagine, feeling blessed because a smile bubbles up when you watch a puppy at play.  Kiss the ground. We did not do anything to deserve this automatic response, this easy access to joy. Neither does a depressed person do anything to lose that easy access to joy.

Antidepressants are good medicine. The medications we have available now are a hundred times more patient friendly and side effect free when compared to what was available when I first worked at a hospital. I am most definitely not suggesting the use of medications contributed to suicide.  I’m saying that psychotropic medications are limited; medication isn’t the cure most people think. Less than one-third of people taking anti-depressants get an “adequate” response, one third experience a little positive change and life-dampening side effects, and one-third have more symptoms than they did without medications.

To each and every one of you who has braved medication, who has struggled to feel the joy most people take for granted–hats off.