The first-time life broke my heart.
The first time I experienced depression, I was in my early twenties.
At the time, I didn't understand what was happening to me.
I was young.
I was in love.
And I believed I had found the person I would spend my life with.
One evening after work, he asked if he could come over.
Looking back, I think I already knew why.
We sat together in my apartment.
Then he told me our relationship was over.
I was heartbroken.
It wasn't just the loss of someone I loved.
It was the loss of the future I had already begun imagining.
The sadness consumed me.
A few days later, Barbara and I had spent the afternoon together. I don't remember where we'd been.
I only remember the drive home.
I sat beside her, sobbing uncontrollably.
Barbara drove.
She listened.
She didn't try to fix my broken heart.
She simply stayed with me.
A few months later, he asked me to meet him for lunch.
Hope has a way of returning when we least expect it.
For a little while, I wondered if maybe we were finding our way back to each other.
We weren't.
Then, early one November morning, I was in a taxi on my way to the airport to catch a flight to Montreal to visit a friend.
It had snowed overnight, and the city looked beautiful.
As we drove a block or two from my apartment, I saw his car.
It was blanketed in snow.
In a split second, my heart hurt and my stomach flipped.
Then I knew.
He wasn't there for me.
That was the moment I finally let go of the hope I had been quietly carrying.
Not long after, the depression became impossible to ignore.
Today, people talk much more openly about depression.
We understand that mental health is part of being human.
But this was the mid-1980s.
Depression wasn't something people talked about.
It wasn't something you mentioned to friends.
It was something you hid.
And I was terrified.
Not just because I was depressed.
Because I was afraid people would think I was crazy.
So I became very good at pretending.
I smiled when I didn't feel like smiling.
I went to work.
I showed up.
I tried to convince everyone around me that I was fine.
Even my medication became something I wanted to hide.
The antidepressants made my hands shake constantly.
I became painfully aware of them.
Whenever I could, I tucked my hands into my pockets or rested them quietly in my lap.
I was afraid someone would notice and ask questions I wasn't ready to answer.
I wasn't just hiding my depression.
I was hiding the evidence of it.
My parents knew how much I was struggling.
My mom came with me to one of my appointments with my psychiatrist.
I still remember him sitting behind his desk, his ashtray overflowing as he chain-smoked while we talked.
It sounds unbelievable now, but at the time no one thought much of it.
My mom spoke with him about my medication because she was worried about me.
After the appointment, she took me home with her for a few days.
She was afraid I might hurt myself.
She never told my sisters.
She never spoke about it with anyone except my dad.
She quietly protected my privacy.
And she quietly protected me.
Eventually, I got better.
Life moved forward.
I built a career.
I raised a family.
I laughed again.
I experienced joy again.
Depression became one chapter of my life.
Not the whole story.
Years later, when Barbara came for a sleepover, we found ourselves talking about that time again.
She looked at me and said, "I was very, very worried about you. I didn't know how to help you."
I was surprised.
I had completely forgotten about that drive home.
Back then, I had been so wrapped up in my own heartbreak that I had never stopped to think about what it had been like for her.
Looking back now, I realize she had helped me more than she knew.
She had simply stayed beside me until I found my way forward.
Today, I no longer hide my hands.
And I no longer hide this story.
A thought to take with you
Have you ever gone through something difficult while trying to convince everyone around you that you were fine?
Who helped you simply by staying beside you when you needed them most?
Something come to mind?
If you'd like to share it, I'd love to hear what this story made you think about.