Nearing the end of my second year of university, I began feeling really down on myself. I had also recently taken a course called abnormal psychology and was admittedly applying a lot of the diagnoses I was learning about for the first time to myself. I started isolating, rarely speaking to anyone, including my two roommates, with whom I’m friends to this day. I felt like a numb zombie walking around campus. Eventually, I walked into a counselor’s office and asked them to prescribe me an antidepressant. I then went straight to the ER (because apparently, counselors can’t do that), and all I had to say was that I was having trouble sleeping, and they wrote a prescription.
A week or so later (around one week before my first final exam), I was on the phone with my mom and told her I did not want to be alive anymore. There’s not much worse I could have said to the person who loves me more than anyone and who suffered and made countless sacrifices just for me to be alive. But I couldn’t think about any of that. I truly just wanted out. Shortly after this call, I remember Dad showing up. He must have been directed to get on the next flight and bring me home. I remember we tried going to a movie on our way to catch our flight, but I couldn’t do it. There wasn’t anything that was going to distract me from hating myself.
When I was back home, the shame of not sticking it out and writing my exams was at a 10/10. I rarely left my bed for at least a month, and part of the reason was definitely because if anyone found out that I had moved back home before finishing my final exams, they’d know the truth: I was a loser and a quitter. My parents were forcing me to get “help,” but I felt like I just needed to be left alone. I had this skewed self-concept, and it was only getting worse. Any sort of socializing seemed impossible. I would just stay in my head the entire time. I was completely terrified of any added judgment.
All the while, I had been taking antidepressants, which only added another layer of shame to it all. “I have to take these pills and I still feel miserable.” After about three months and a couple of trips to the psych ward later, it was decided I should be placed on a “therapeutic dosage.” Within a few days of being on this increased dose, I felt better than ever. The cloud had lifted! However, my behaviour was unusual, to say the least. I would best be described as manic: having an immense amount of energy and ideas that rarely made any sense.
The antidepressants flipped me too much in the other direction, making me extremely impulsive. I can vaguely remember the nights getting shorter, where three or four hours of sleep turned into one or two hours, and then eventually no sleep—just pacing around frantically, organizing my room, obsessing over nothing, and feeling like I was about to explode. I remember feeling strongly that a relative was passing away and that I was fully experiencing that. I wish I could say that was the only “crazy” thing I exposed my poor family to.
Eventually, my parents drove me back to the psych ward, and this time I was admitted. I must have slept for like 24 hours that first day. I was taken off the antidepressant (Effexor) and put on an antipsychotic (Risperidone). Rather than being weaned off the antidepressants, they abruptly switched the medication, all because of the symptoms the antidepressant had induced in the first place. Apparently, I was there for two weeks as I experienced withdrawal symptoms, including nightmares, brain fog, and irritability. Eventually, I was allowed to leave for short periods each day. Safe to say I was very ready to get out of there.
The following semester at school, I only took two courses and worked part-time. As time went on, I slowly detached myself from that whole period of darkness, attempting to focus on the future rather than the past. I have to credit friends and family for the stability and support they provided during all that. I am now (somehow) about 10 years removed from that experience. It took at least four years before I could begin to forgive myself for all of it.
I have spent a lot of time reflecting on this experience and have chalked the majority of it up to simply being overwhelmed. When I think back, I was away from friends and family, doing a full course load at one of the top academic schools in Canada, spending around 20 hours a week committed to their basketball program, and, most vexing of all, trying to manage a deteriorating long-distance relationship with my first-ever girlfriend. I think I was too young to process the fact that that would be enough for anyone to feel overwhelmed. I lacked the ability to express my overwhelm at the time and became increasingly hard on myself. I lived in rumination and self-doubt.
If nothing else, that period showed me how fragile one’s mind can be. I am proud of myself for working through my often negative perception of self. I have become much better at coping with challenging life events. Other than time itself, relying on personal and professional support, as well as embracing the writing process, have helped me see things more clearly. I believe I’m telling my story simply with the hope of normalizing mental health issues. Even if it makes a small impact on one person, it won’t be in vain. Thanks for reading. 😊
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