Depression and Self-Harm

 

            Many transgender individuals suffer from one form of depression or another at some point during their lives. For some, it can be a life long battle. Depression is more than just being sad. Depression is a mental illness that requires treatment and can be difficult to handle alone. There are many treatment options for depression but also a lot of life struggles that come with suffering from it. As someone who has struggled with depression for many years, I know how difficult it can be to live with.

            I started struggling with depression when I was about twelve years old. It was also at that time when I started getting really active in my religious activities but also started getting made fun of in school. Everyone seemed to know I was a lesbian except for me, and I struggled with being teased and harassed my entire school career. When I first started being called a dyke, among other awful names, I didn’t know what they meant. It took the first half of my seventh grade year to understand what it all meant, but I still didn’t grasp who I was. I hid behind my mask of being good Molly Mormon and dove into church. At the age of twelve is when young men and women enter a higher degree of learning. We split up into Young Women’s and Young Men’s to learn what our roles in life and in God’s plan are to be. I was being educated on church doctrine and began to learn how to be a good wife and mother. I loved church, but I dreamed of the day when I could join the Young Men and wear a white dress shirt and tie to pass the sacrament. I wanted desperately to serve a mission and preach the gospel, but I wanted to die thinking about spending two long years in a dress. I ached deep inside wondering what was wrong with me.

 

            I was so depressed but tried to hide it behind my church activities and being around my family that loved me. I worked hard to learn the gospel and prayed constantly that God would let me wake up a man or at least fix me. At twelve I was realizing that I was drawn to women. I didn’t realize it was a sexual attraction until high school. I thought maybe I just wanted a female role model to make myself more feminine and less like a boy. I tried everything I could think of but by the time I entered high school, I was consumed with a feeling of hopelessness and began cutting my wrists. I engaged in dangerous behavior and didn’t care if I fell or did something to injure or bruise myself. I felt like I deserved to be punished. I felt like a hypocrite going to church and being a youth leader in many aspects when I was suffering with gender and sexuality issues. I felt immense guilt and pain and anything bad that happened to me, whether it was getting sick, being teased at school, being hurt, or hurting myself, was all punishment from God that I deserved.

 

            By the time I started high school, I realized that I had to cut somewhere other than my wrists because my mom had caught me. I never did clean my wounds and they often got infected, but she made me clean them up and promise to stop. I began cutting on my upper arm whenever I needed to punish myself. I only cut every few weeks, but it was enough to leave scars. My self-hatred for my sins was agonizing, and I felt torn between my desires and my religious beliefs. I tried to commit suicide for the first time in eighth grade by sticking a large knife into my chest but my friend had called just as I was about to. High school brought ten more suicide attempts throughout the years. I wanted so bad to just end the pain and stop feeling so torn. I didn’t feel that I deserved to live and how could I walk away from the church when it was all I knew? How could anyone be gay and be okay with that if it was so against God? I was in pain daily and often cried myself to sleep just begging God to take my life.

 

            In college I began seeing a doctor and got on anti-depressants. They didn’t work so well but did help me stop smoking for a while. I began seeing a therapist for my gender issues and a lot of things came to light. I was still suffering from major depression and struggled with self-harm on a daily basis. I mostly was a cutter but every now and then I’d burn myself and be careless in things I did so as to injure myself. I began cutting on my chest when dealing with break ups because I wanted to cut my heart right out. I started switching from anti-depressant to anti-depressant but got even more depressed when they didn’t work. I started self-medicating with alcohol and cigarettes and sunk deeper and deeper into the feeling of hopelessness. I was having problems with friends and family and had several times in life where I was homeless. School was a lot more difficult than high school and my grades suffered. I gained weight and stopped working out. I stopped enjoying things that I had enjoyed even through high school. I stopped going to church and felt like I was doomed to hell. I had two more failed suicide attempts in college. I was even more depressed when they didn’t work. After twelve failed suicide attempts, I couldn’t contain my anger and self-loathing so I made sure that the thirteenth try would end my life- I woke up in bed with the worst headache and weakness I had ever felt; failed yet again. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t just fucking die!

 

            I figured that I was doomed to live and hated God for making me stay in this pitiful and painful existence, so I might as well make the best of it. I started getting serious about my therapy and searching out what it meant to be transgender. I was sick of the merry go round of anti-depressants so I stopped taking them and figured I’d been suffering for so long that I could handle it. I was obviously well enough to get my letter to transition and having turned 21 and meeting new friends, I felt I was doing okay.

 

            When I started the testosterone shots, I promised myself that I wouldn’t cut myself anymore. I was tired of lectures from people, and I felt ashamed of all the scars I had. It was time to start working towards bettering myself. Unfortunately my depression didn’t just go away. I still suffer with depression, but I’m better at dealing with it now. I am working with my regular doctor to manage my medications, testosterone, and anti-depressants. I have had to change my eating and exercise to better my health and have regular check ups at the doctor. I am in the process of finding a new therapist to talk to and have remained clean since starting the testosterone two and a half years ago. The only slip was a suicide attempt in September of 2011. I don’t remember much about it except that I was on a lot of medications that caused me memory loss with brain damage, liver damage, and I spent most the summer and fall of 2011 like a zombie on drugs. I do not believe the attempt was something I had planned, but I honestly cannot be sure.

 

 

With everything that I have struggled with, I know that depression is a serious illness and not to be taken lightly. I know the feelings of emptiness, hopelessness, loss, feeling unloved, hurting, aching, pain, loneliness, despair, and the complete throbbing ache within ones soul that you feel like you couldn’t possibly go on another moment. Yet somehow I, along with many others, have survived. We have grown stronger from the pain and weakness that haunt us. We have found the piece of the human soul that desires to live.

 

            I know that suffering from depression is hard, but I also know that it can be overcome. There is help out there for those who seek it. The number of people suffering from depression is vast and there are many different ways that depression can manifest itself. Everyone suffers from and deals with depression in different ways. No one is the same because we are all individuals. And sadly there is no miracle cure for depression. Different therapies will work for different people. Some people will suffer from depression for a short period, some for a few years, and some will battle it for the rest of their lives, but it is nothing to despair over. There is help and sometimes we just have to try different therapies until we find what works. There are medications, psychiatric therapies, meditation, nature therapy, spiritual guidance, among others.

 

            Depression can be a difficult road and for those of us who are considered “different”, it can feel debilitating. If you are suffering from depression, know that it is not hopeless. Reach out to those whom you love and who love you. Reach out to professional help if you need it. There is no shame in asking for help. I suffered the most when I tried to hide but openly admitting my suffering and seeking help allowed me to start the path to healing. I’m not perfect, but I am happy, and it is nice to finally be able to say that.