10 Key Things That Helped Me Recover From Severe Clinical Depression

I have been asked by several people what I did to deal with and recover from depression, so I thought I’d write a very personal and autobiographical post that answers that question.

So, let me begin.

Background

I married when I was far too young, with hindsight (before I’d worked out who I was and what was important to me), to a lady who was three years older than I was.

Everything was going well for the first few years, until my wife lost her job and that seemed to be the trigger for substance abuse.

Shortly after that, I moved to a new job in a town over 150 miles from where we’d both lived all of our lives, and that was the start of a new cycle of her finding jobs and not liking them.

By the early to mid 1990s, she had stopped working completely, and it was obvious that she had a serious problem.

I didn’t know it at the time, but that is roughly when my depression started.

Without going into too much detail, she was verbally abusive to me (and others) on a daily basis, her substance abuse had grown to levels that, quite frankly, made me wonder why she was still alive, and I didn’t know what to do.

It soon became apparent that my best friend, and the lady I loved, did not seem to want to do anything about it, which was heartbreaking for me.

It got to the point where I felt physically sick at the thought of going home from work, and social engagements were out of the question because her behaviour could not be guaranteed.

As time went on, and the situation was only getting worse, I became suicidal. I spent hours and hours researching ways to kill myself painlessly, and where the risk of failure was low to zero.

In fact, that’s the only thing, at that stage, that kept me alive – I was too scared of screwing the job up and ending up worse off than I already was.

By late 2004, I was literally at my wit’s end – I wasn’t sleeping well, I would go days without food (mainly because of the constant nausea), and I found myself glad when I got home and found her asleep, because that meant she wasn’t shouting at me.

Even at this stage, however, I never used the word “depression”.

The Start Of Getting Better

I knew I needed some sort of help, but didn’t know what.

And then, just before Christmas 2004, we went on vacation for a couple of weeks.

I don’t know why, but I took my laptop with me, for the first time ever. It was actually my wife’s suggestion, for reasons unknown as she was always telling me I spent too long at my computer (because that was my escape from spending time with her, of course).

The day after we arrived, I started writing down everything about my situation – the early inklings of problems, how it got worse, how I felt about everything, my suicidal thoughts, and the options I thought I had to get out of my situation.

Like I say, I hadn’t planned on doing this before we left home, but once I was there, it just felt like it was something I needed to do. Perhaps the trigger for it was being by myself for the first couple of days, as my wife was out of it completely, thanks to her continued substance abuse.

Once I’d finished that first draft, I felt like a weight had been lifted off me – just the act of getting it down on (virtual) paper was so cathartic.

But I knew that wasn’t going to be the full solution – it was just a brain-dump of everything I felt.

Everything Comes Out

Once I returned home, and life returned to what had become my new normal, I found it harder and harder to function. (My work had been suffering for years because of this, and I felt guilty about it too.)

And then, one day at a team meeting, a colleague noticed my head twitching.

Those tics were one of the symptoms that had developed at some stage during the past few years, but I don’t remember when.

They lasted a few seconds only, and I’d managed to hide them from other people successfully – until that day.

I still don’t know whether I consciously decided not to hide the tics that day, in the hope that somebody would notice, because I wasn’t going to volunteer my issues otherwise, or whether they were just particularly severe.

Once again, for a reason I didn’t understand, I decided to tell my colleagues – it was only two or three of them, since I worked on a small team – about what was going on. Not in all the gory details, of course, but enough for them to know that something was seriously amiss.

They suggested, not surprisingly, that I go and see a doctor.

In this case, one reason why I’d not gone sooner was because that would be an admission that something was wrong with me – there would be no more pretending it wasn’t serious or real.

I’m not a big fan of the medical profession (except in true emergencies), but I scheduled a visit anyway.

My doctor was not normally somebody I respected – he was a “get them in and get them out as fast as possible” type, like so many of them, but this time, he actually took the time to listen to me and ask questions.

I was surprised to find him writing a note to sign me off work with stress, indefinitely, and he arranged for a referral to a psychiatrist in town.

He also tried to prescribe me antidepressants, but I refused – partly because I didn’t think I needed them and partly because I prefer not to take prescription drugs unless I have no other choice.

So, I went to see the psychiatrist, who also asked all sorts of questions and listened to what I said, and her diagnosis was given very succinctly and confidently – severe clinical depression. (I suppose suicidal thoughts are a bit of a giveaway.)

There, it was out in the open now!

I Slowly Get Better

It was recommended that I attend one-on-one therapy sessions, as well as five different group therapy sessions. (They had sessions for different aspects of mental health problems, and they said I needed to attend all of them, which I took as a sign I needed a lot of help.)

Concurrent with that, I told a couple of good friends about my problems, something I’d never done because I didn’t want to burden them with my problems when I knew they both had their own family issues to deal with.

They listened, as I knew they would, showed concern, didn’t judge (as far as I could tell), and that really helped. Bottling all of this up for five to ten years was clearly not a sensible course of action, but that was me all over.

A few months earlier, I’d met a person online, via a mutual interest in earning money online and not through a dating site, as I wasn’t looking for any other type of relationship, and by the end of 2004, we’d become business partners.

Even though I didn’t know her very well at that point, I told her about my problems too, and she was a real rock, offering a perspective that I’d never considered, presumably because she was an objective third party. (Again, why did I tell a relative stranger about all of this, when I’d refrained from discussing it even with people I knew well?)

We soon became close friends too, and since I was now off work, we spent hours a day talking to each other via Skype (since I was still in England and she was in the USA).

The key to everything was when she asked why I hadn’t gone for a divorce.

Here’s the thing: divorce had been a taboo subject in my family when I was growing up. Most of my immediate family were Roman Catholics, and while my aunt had divorced her husband, it was clear she was considered the proverbial black sheep for having done so.

The result of all this was that I had never considered divorce as an option – it simply wasn’t in my vocabulary.

It was a big step, mentally, but I knew my friend was right.

And so I initiated divorce proceedings.

When my wife found out, and received the papers that had been hand-delivered to the door, she did not take it well – which made my domestic situation even worse.

We still lived in the same house, but kept ourselves to ourselves – I lived and slept in my study, we shared the bathroom, and the rest of the house was hers. We interacted as little as possible, and when we did, it wasn’t pretty.

While the divorce process was tough, I knew that once it was complete, I would feel better.

Anyway, back to the therapy.

I found the one-on-one sessions difficult, which surprised me because I thought I would prefer those to the group sessions.

But there was something about being in a small group and talking about our issues together, and means to deal with them, that I found very helpful.

I hadn’t been one of those people who felt I was the only one in that situation – because that wouldn’t be sensible – but, much to my surprise, being there with other people, some older, some younger, some single, some married, some divorced, really helped.

Maybe it was hearing other people’s perspectives on similar issues, but I don’t know for certain.

It was sometime during therapy that I decided to take an early morning walk. I guess I must have read about it being useful in some online article or other.

So, every morning, at 6:00 am, I went for a 20 – 30 minute walk around the neighbourhood, regardless of the weather.

I’d never been one for exercise of any type, but I used to go to bed looking forward to waking up and going for my walk.

There was nothing to look at – it was just roads and houses I knew well anyway – which gave me time to reflect.

Once I got home and returned to my study, I had also bought one of those natural daylight lamps for my desk, which I put on for up to an hour.

It’s hard to say, but I think that helped too.

On the sleep front, I started taking a nap most afternoons, which helped reduce my massive sleep deficit from years of not sleeping well.

Food-wise, I started eating a couple of meals a day again (I had never been a breakfast person – eating too soon after waking had always made me feel sick), and I had cut out some of the more junky foods and drinks, including sodas and alcohol (not that I’d ever been a big drinker really), I once consumed.

There was one more thing that helped – because I was spending a large part of my day in my study, at my computer, I started listening to a lot more music.

And then, one morning in June, I think, when I was on my walk, I noticed something surprising – it felt like I was no longer depressed. True, there was still a lot of stress through sharing the house with the person I was divorcing, but the depression had gone, as far as I could tell.

Maybe it was the realization that the divorce was proceeding well, or maybe it was the result of everything I’d been doing to help myself deal with it.

I think it was in September that the divorce was finalized, which was a difficult day – my wife threw some expensive glasses against a wall and smashed them, which was the first time she’d been physically violent.

And finally, in October, I told her I was planning on going to the USA for a vacation for a while, ostensibly to work out what I wanted to do, while in fact I was leaving England for good. I was going to visit a friend in Chicago for a couple of days, and then fly on down to visit my online friend for a while – maybe permanently depending on how things went once we met in person for the first time.

The day before I left, I went to visit some friends I’d made via a hobby of mine, and during lunch, they told me the two of them often talked and wondered about how I was surviving in the environment I was in.

I’d never mentioned any of this to anybody, as I said earlier, but I suppose they’d noticed anyway – you can’t hide things for ever.

Knowing that others had worked it out made me feel warm inside – like I’d not been alone, even though I was, as far as I was concerned.

The day I said goodbye and walked out of the door, with my luggage, on the way to the airport, I knew that I was 99% better.

Closing the door behind me was like closing a door on my past, with only the promise of an unknown but more positive future.

So, What Are The Ten Key Lessons?

I realize this may have been a long and somewhat rambling story, so let me pluck out ten key things that I think helped me get better:

1. Writing down everything about my situation. I doubt it was called this at the time, but nowadays this would probably be referred to as journalling, which is associated with many benefits. I would recommend doing something like this, because it really helps you clarify your thinking about your situation.
2. Telling other people (e.g. friends and colleagues) about my problems was a massive breakthrough for me. Bottling this type of issue up is not healthy, especially not over the course of five to ten years. I would always recommend opening up to at least one person you can trust, who knows you well, who will listen without judging, and who will keep what you discuss private.
3. Seeking medical help, even though it wasn’t an option I liked, confirmed the seriousness of my situation and gave me a few tools to help me cope. There are many clues that might indicate you’re depressed, but only a trained professional can give you a definite diagnosis (including what type of depression you have), and the appropriate treatment plan. And, of course, the therapy sessions were beneficial to me too.
4. Exercise. I’m not sure a 30-minute walk counts as exercise in some people’s books, but it was 30 minutes more per day than I’d ever done. The chance to reflect on things while I wandered a familiar neighbourhood seemed beneficial. Of course, regular exercise has all sorts of benefits, and is something we should all do (even though as I write this, I’m still not doing what I know I should).
5. Using the daylight lamp gave me more exposure to sun-equivalent light (and vitamin D), which was something I had probably always lacked. (I worked in an office, and was never much of an outdoor person anyway). Vitamin D is one of many vitamins and minerals we need, and which can help relieve some of the symptoms of depression.
6. Getting more sleep, including my afternoon naps, meant I felt more ready to deal with each day.
7. Cutting out some of the unhealthier foods (e.g. french fries, fast food) and drinks (e.g. coffee, sodas, and alcohol), and starting to eat some of the better foods, gave my body a chance to heal.
8. Listening to music was calming. My friend in the US had sent me something that became “our music”, so even when we weren’t talking, I would listen to this and it was like she was there with me. There was other music too (e.g. Tubular Bells, which I had always found relaxing). I would recommend creating your own unique playlists that can help you relax when you need to de-stress.
9. Talking to my friend in the USA, who helped me in the process of working out who I was and what truly mattered to me. I had left this somewhat late in life, but better late than never. I do think that the sooner you do this, the better your life will be – from all sorts of perspectives (e.g. personal, business / work, health, relationships).
10. Initiating divorce was the one thing that helped me see the light at the end of the tunnel. Once I could see an end in sight, I knew somehow I would one day be OK again – especially when I had made plans to go and be with my friend in America. (Let’s just say we became more than friends during 2005.)

If I were in this situation again, I would also add meditation and/or mindfulness to the above list, but I wasn’t familiar with any of this back in 2005.

Note: none of this should be construed as medical advice – the above is only what worked for me, which means there is no guarantee that your results will be similar.

Conclusion

So, there you have it – my personal experience of depression, and, more importantly, key takeaways that most people can also benefit from.

As far as what happened next, I met my online friend, we got married, and we lived and worked together 24 x 7, until she died unexpected and suddenly a few days before Christmas in 2018.

Finally, as a postscript to the document I created way back in 2004, I have recently published this as a Kindle book (under a nom de plume), in the hope that others in similar situations can feel like they’re not alone.

Additional Resources

These are suggestions for those who wish to delve deeper into any of the above:

1. Find A Therapist (US only)
2. Light Therapy Box
3. Skype Credit