Depression
The number of people who’ve asked me why Charmaine Dragun took her own life… I’d never met the Channel 10 journalist but, because she was a newsreader, people assume I must have or, at the very least, understood her anguish. She was gorgeous, intelligent, in love, had great friends and an enviable job, so why? Suicide rarely makes sense but even less so when it’s by someone who seemed to have it all.
The speculation about Charmaine’s deep emotional pain must end because we weren’t inside her head. But this very sad death is a reminder of how little is still known about depression. It can be hardest to fathom in someone who isn’t shouldering any obvious burdens like a marriage breakdown, child custody battle, bankruptcy, terminal illness… When you’re young and beautiful, the consensus is to buck up and get over it. There’s little tolerance for what’s still commonly regarded as a major weakness.
Depression is a solo struggle because how do you share with others that you’re falling apart when there’s no solid reason for it? You have no right when you have the world at your feet. Depression is for struggling artists not pretty young things with promising careers and people who love them. I’ve had depression and I was told to get over myself and advised to visit a hospital to remind myself how lucky I was. I don’t think that would’ve helped, just quietly. It’s hard to see beyond your own suffering when it’s all consuming. There’s little room for comparing misfortune.
I was dealing with a breakup at the time but, heh, who hasn’t? I had my health, sanity and a great job – reading news at the ABC. But I couldn’t get out of bed. I couldn’t sleep, eat or hold a conversation. I could only see a day in front of me and no good in any of it and when I started panicking about going to the drycleaner, I knew I was in trouble. In the end I followed doctor’s orders and succumbed to a course of antidepressants to haul me over the line.
Happy pills I called them. I swallowed it hard having to take them because I’d always adhered to the doctrine of mind over matter and was disappointed in myself for having to seek medical intervention in my contentment. I wouldn’t have resisted for so long had I known I’d be part of such a band of merry players. When I started to quietly mention it, I was stunned to discover hoards of friends and colleagues had taken antidepressants at some stage. But they’re not letting on. And that’s the problem. The depression tide will only start to turn when it is no longer regarded as shameful. Or selfish.
To own up to depression is a risk. Owen Wilson shocked the world with his depression. Happy larrikins don’t fit the bill. He’s famous and funny so what’s his problem? He musn’t be over Kate Hudson. Joey Johns blamed ecstacy, but which came first? In its very early days of tolerance it’s still regarded as a great indignity. I didn’t miss one day of work when I went through it. You wouldn’t want anyone to cotton on.
It’s not just what others might think but the lurking suspicion that perhaps it’s your own fault. There’s one school of thought that depression is rooted in childhood trauma – that this debilitating pain is an adult manifestation of things not dealt with. Maybe there’d be more empathy if we took the view that it’s thrust upon us.
Perhaps the best that can come out of all this is it inspires the rest of us to take the time to inquire of the people around us if they’re ok, and give them the space to admit it if they’re not. It may not cure the illness, but at least they’ll know they’re not alone.