How I overcome my depression
It was 2015. Or was it 2016? To be honest I don’t even recall it that well. I know I was depressed as fu… hell. I was working at a private company and living in one of my boss’s apartments somewhere 40 kilometers away from the office. I was commuting everyday and spent almost a third of my miserable salary on transportation. I had an apartment colleague that eventually moved in the city and I ended up alone.
The days weren’t different one from another and I slowly slipped into a pretty bad depression. I wasn’t eating too much, wasn’t doing too much and barely could sleep or when I slept I slept for 14–18 hours or maybe days. At some point I even barely got to go to the office. I just laid in my one person foldable bed that almost resembled a boat. I laid there and watched the ceiling thinking about death, suicide and the meaninglessness of life.
I remember that at some point I stood at the margin of the bed and just thought to myself that I haven’t got any rope good enough to hang myself in the house. And thinking about this I thought that maybe I could cut some wires from the power strips and tie them together and use that to hang myself. But I was also thinking that they might not last like this and I wouldn’t be successful. And I dreaded that thought.
So I told myself that I have to get up and choose one of two options: I get out of the house and go to buy some rope or I call someone for help.
On my way to the store I called for help and decided to see a psychiatrist.
Not long after I was in her office telling her about my dark thoughts and about how life had no meaning and wasn’t worth living. She listened carefully and put me on antidepressants. I started taking them, a higher dose almost every time I came back for another session. Day after day, over a long period of time my life seemed to be going back to normal. Meanwhile I started seeing a psychologist and started my therapy.
While trying to get myself on the right track I realized that I hated from my guts the job I had and the field I was working on, that being actually the one I had took my bachelor’s degree in. I ended up being fired from that job, having a huge fight with my father and not talking to my parents or almost anyone for three months.
Those have been some of the most fruitful three months of my life. Free as birds in the sky, no job, no home, no money and taking depression pills. It is amazing how many things you can learn about yourself while being alone and turning nights into days and days into nights. It was a time of profound insights I learned about myself. I was eating once each two or three days, I was sleeping in the office were I used to work, on the floor, and leaving in the morning before my former colleagues were getting in to work. All I had to myself was a backpack and a bag full of stuff.
This was the time I wrote myself a book full of letters, spent my nights at a shop nearby with the employees there and with homeless people in the area, played chess, and taught myself lots of stuff from youtube and the internet. I found out who real friends were and learned that life is all about being on your own and making it.
I don’t know exactly what motivated me or what made me keep going but I know for sure that I felt like I’d rather die before going back to my parents and telling them I didn’t make it. I could say that it was in this time that I defined my life to be.
In those nights that I spent awake I figured out that I wanted to work in the creative industry and I started to search for my way. I eventually got a remote job as a recruiter and I also left that job after 8 months or so to work as a graphic designer as I rediscovered the pleasure to draw. I was drawing women and I fell in love with the human anatomy. Trying to find a way to earn money from something that I loved doing I found myself a job as a graphic designer at a club.
I worked there for six months doing things that I hated while searching for a job in advertising. I have done all this while being in a totally dysfunctional long distance relationship. When I landed my first job as a graphic designer it actually started as an unpaid internship for a month.
I remember it very well. Though I had a lot of interviews in that time, I had a special feeling for this one. I went to it well dressed because my recruiting job was paying well and I invested in clothes and things that I felt i needed. I was as honest as I could and I had a real connection with my future boss. He offered me this internship with the promise of a job if I did well and when the positive answer came, I just quit my job at the club and sent a mail saying I am available for work.
After one month I was hired and I started to go to psychotherapy again as I postponed it in the time I wasn’t able to pay for it. Also in that time I had a fried I moved with in a one room apartment that helped more than I could’ve hoped for. In this whole time I’ve quit smoking for one year and six months and I’ve also took depression medication for something like two years and eventually quit on my own. Not having a scheme from the doctor I felt the withdrawal symptoms that weren’t too pretty.
I felt like my life was finally on track and I could have done it on my own. I felt like psychotherapy was helping me a lot and I felt really motivated in my new job. It went well for something like two years, with some ups and downs. In the third year I already felt I could earn more by doing more because I’ve learned so much. I directed my career towards UI/UX Design and I knew I could do better.
Meanwhile, doing all this I found out about Krav Maga martial arts. I started doing that and I will tell you all about it in another story. Doing martial arts added up to my whole way of living and felt like it helps me be a better person for myself.
Meanwhile in 2019 the coronavirus pandemic came and we all started to work from home. I started jumping rope and doing physical exercises in my home and in the park nearby. Two months prior to this pandemic I was already looking for a new job and five months later when I lost my job because business difficulties I was not put down by this but instead motivated.
I was already involved in a relationship that made it’s way into my life one month into the pandemic. This was something important for me and it gave me an extra motivation and trust that I will find another job. In the first two months I lost my job in the ad agency I was working I changed two other jobs, one which I am involved still. First I found myself a job in another ad agency because I needed work. While being newly employed there another opportunity showed itself in one of the biggest e-commerce companies in my country. I got myself a job there as a UI/UX Designer — my dream.
Having already learnt to take care of what is in my best interest I accepted the job and moved on in my career — I regret nothing.
I eventually gave up psychotherapy after five years or so, because I felt like I needed to prove myself I can do it on my own. Meantime I went to some other psychiatrist that gave me different medications I chose not to take and I was involved with other women prior to my actual relationship. All this has taught me some important lessons.
I overcame my depression by doing things and by actually choosing to overcome it. If you’ve read everything until here I am sorry to disappoint you by telling you that there is no easy way to get out of such an episode. You have to put in the work and to chose happiness over sadness.
I’ve took antidepressants for two years and have done five years of psychotherapy. I’ve learnt to accept that everything is in my power and that everything is my fault. I’ve learnt to accept that I am who I am and that is my power. I have gained a lot of friends and I’ve lost others. I have ended up relationships and I’ve got involved in others. i’ve got and lost jobs and that didn’t stop me a second cause I always knew that no one could take what I have inside my head.
There is no easy way to overcome depression but I want you to know that there is always a way. Cling to the things that make you happy in life and always choose yourself. You are living just only one life. Quitting lit should not be an option.
I am writing this to let you know that you are not alone out there and you can always reach to someone. You will eventually find someone that knows what you are feeling. I am not saying I don’t have depressive episodes anymore, but I’ve learnt to recognize and manage them.
I know for sure that if I could have done it you will too.
