For years, I tried healing from depression, anxiety, and complex PTSD by myself. I was the little lone ranger of healing. I now know that it was about pride. I wanted to heal myself by myself. I was the small child who often said, “I can do it all by myself!” Pride goes before a fall, as the book of Proverbs in the Bible says. And fall farther into depression and anxiety I did.
Last year, the depression and anxiety worsened during April. That is a rough month for Armenians as April 24 marks the anniversary of when the genocide began in 1915. The inter-generational trauma passed down to those of us with Armenian ancestry is enormous, given that the perpetrating country continues to deny the genocide. The inter-generational trauma prompted me to seek help in the form of medication for it compounded the damage done by my trauma.
I began taking Celexa, an antidepressant, about a year ago. Over the summer, I noticed the anxiety lessened. I am now on the maximum dose, and my anxiety is nearly gone. I am living with minimal to no anxiety for the first time. However, without the anxiety, I notice more that I am depressed. Yesterday, I began taking a second antidepressant, hoping it helps alleviate depression. I take the first antidepressant at night and the second one in the morning.
I am shame-based. It’s hard not to be when sexual abuse starts in your toddler years. Shame’s tentacles wrap around me. I am reading several books on shame. Recognizing it in myself and my interactions with people is the first step towards freeing myself from its grasp. I see how it affects me daily. I first noticed its effects as I read a book on the subject. I became very hot and dizzy while reading it. I knew I was experiencing a trigger. The antidote for that is reading it slowly.
Shame is another reason why I didn’t seek help. I felt like damaged goods. I couldn’t see my inherent worth as a human being. There is something about sexual abuse that leaves survivors with deep-seated feelings of self-loathing. Perhaps it is the intimate nature of the abuse and that perpetrators are almost always someone the victim knows. Instead of blaming the perpetrator where it belongs, children shift it inward. We become adults who are intensely shame-based.
Before I can be free of the shame, I need relief for dysthymia, which John Hopkins University defines as “a milder, but long-lasting form of depression.” It is also called a persistent depressive disorder. My genetics—I’m from a family filled with mental illnesses—and the abuse set me up for it. I am determined to overcome it. I am open to whatever help is available, including EMDR and cognitive behavioral therapy. (More about those in a later post.) I will not go it alone when I don’t have to do so.
Image by Jackson David from Pixabay
Application
Reach out for help if you need it. Don’t fight PTSD, depression, and anxiety on your own. Help is available.
Resources
Healing the Shame That Binds You by John Bradshaw
It Wasn't Your Fault: Freeing Yourself from the Shame of Childhood Abuse with the Power of Self-Compassion by Beverly Engel
National Alliance on Mental Illness
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I am so proud of you for sharing your story so that others can know there is hope in this healing journey. Love you, dear Gina. <3
I will never be able to overcome the very same things from my childhood andxa gene pool full of depression and mental illness.
As image by the day I feel my chance has passed me by.
Self loathing. Substance (perscribed) and alcohol abuse.
I don't see a way out.