Depression and the Wait for ECT

I am still waiting for news of clearance from my insurance company for ECT. I hope I hear something tomorrow, I'd like to go in the hospital Friday and get medical clearance over the weekend so I can begin treament on Monday. In the meantime I am suffering through a seemingly unsuccessful med switch. I think in this post I will give a sort of summary of this mental condition of mine that has lead me to this point, the point of embracing an opportunity for such a stigmatized treatment. I will try to go over the subject of the stigma carried by ECT, and maybe its history, in a subsequent post. But for now, I present the situation which has led this particular individual to seek ECT.

I think I should begin with a rundown on the history of this battle with myself and my faulty mind. I am doing this to provide you with an idea of how one apparently ECT-qualifying background looks.

What would over time become a barrage of conflicting diagnoses had humble enough beginnings. At the age of eleven I found myself suffering through an escalating cycle of abuse in my family while I was homeschooled, and I will admit that my oftentimes rebellious reactions didn't bring much relief to the situations. Upon entering private school I found few friends and the interactions that carried the greatest emotional impact were those degrading exchanges I had with "bully types". Eventually I landed in a shrinks office, I cried for the duration of the visit and left with a diagnosis of Major Depression and a bottle of Prozac which I was practically force-fed with threats of institutions and medication-laden IVs.

I was eleven.

Being that I am now twenty-two, eleven years have passed since my initiation into the crazy club. In those years I have accumulated quite the rap sheet; mostly psychiatric, although admittedly the disorder has at times contributed to criminal activity. I have gone through an extensive list of diagnoses, each one causing substantial distress as with each new label I had to redefine my self-image, accompanied by that plaguing, ever-lingering question so many of us are undoubtedy familiar with, "am I crazy?"

The first few years after my diagnosis I fought the medicine and my need for it. However, at about the age of 17 I began to weigh my life during the short bouts away from medicine against the life I was able to experience on an effective medication regimine. I began actively participting in my treatment and complying with my psychiatrist's suggestions. I only wish that was my formula for a happily ever after like it apparently can be to a number of people. But not me.

Despite my best efforts, I have been involuntarily hospitalized several times, once at the state mental hospital following an arrest for violent behavior that took place during a high stress hypomanic episode which occurred during a doctor ordered medswitch. The medications, although they do help, are insufficient and unreliable in my case. The side effects have been rough on my body, and I know in my heart that the depression never stops looming and medications cannot keep it at bay forever. Sooner or later I will sink, and when I sink I go blind to life and to hope and cannot find my way out and my only option is death. Add to this the fact that over the years that my suicide fantasies -when I do have them- have grown more attainable.

All of these things were stressed in my ECT consultation, and they apparently are adequate qualifications. So now I am waiting, and it is a very long wait for me. I feel like my life is hingeing on this.