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Getting Diagnosed

In some ways, I think it was easy to get diagnosed with depression and in other ways, I think it was very hard. Part of that was me.  I wouldn't feel bad all the time, just most of the time, and when I felt good, I felt really good.  And I really didn't want to be diagnosed with depression.  I had a huge stigma with it.  I personally thought that depression was something that could be worked out of for the most part with medical intervention.  I had been in and out of the doctors office with giving birth and regular check ups, but I just never brought up what I was going through on pretty much a daily basis, because it just didn't seem that bad, and the symptoms could be explained because of other things going on in my life. 
You do sleep more when you have a child, you do feel a little sad when your parents divorce after 30 plus years of marriage, you do get a little tired after traveling to Africa and back.  All those things were going on in my life and I figured that my inability to care for myself and the house would get under control.  But then I started not wanting to leave the house again.  One evening, very near Halloween, I had an anxiety attack while we were out. 
There was a huge trunk or treat event in our town and I wanted Hannah to go to it.  We were in the car, dressed and ready to go and then we couldn't easily find a parking spot.  I wasn't even driving and all I wanted was to go back home.  I realized at that point that this was not a good thing for me or my family.  I couldn't let fear decided what we could and couldn't do. 
In the next couple of days as I was laying in bed, I remember wondering and praying and I had the sense of a dark cloud over me.  I got up and made an appointment with my doctor and then I asked some email friends to pray for me.  I asked them to pray that I could be completely honest with the doctor and to not lie about what was going on.
When I got there, I was given a few checklists of signs and symptoms to go through, clicking off the ones that I had, still thinking that maybe I was blowing things out of proportion. When the doctor came in, she talked with me, and told me what I already knew, I was suffering from depression.  I was given some medication and sent on my way.
Once I got there to that moment, I wondered with such a simple process to diagnose if maybe I had missed something or that I had thought that this problem was much bigger than it really was.  I didn't know at that point how long it could take to find the right medication and the correct dose and how the insurance company wants to dictate a lot of the treatment. 
I do realize now though that because of the prayers of my sisters in Christ that I was able to start walking towards treatment instead of rotting in the unknown.


As always with my posts about depression, the comments will not be open, but you are encouraged to email me with any questions you may have  hohablog@gmail.com
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