[meliejv]

Hello

I am a new member and I just wanted to introduce myself and tell you what led me to this community. My name is Mel short for Melissa. i am 31 years old. I am married with no children yet. I have been severly depressed all of my life. I started feeling suicdal when I was 11 years old before i even knew the word suicide. My mother told me i was going thru a phase and i would grow out of it so my depression when untreated until i was 17 when I went into treatment. I have been on meds for 14 years. For the first three years i tried everything and nothing worked until i found Serzone. once i got on the serzone i was able to start actually repairng my life. Over the 11 year period, I cleaned out the cluttter in my life but i would still have dips of depression when my meds needed to be adjusted. A little over a year ago I was doing my usual shopping when i had my first panic attack in 11 years. They were constant for 6 months. I couldn't even leave my house. It was hell. i still have daily anxiety and a panic attack occassionally. i do use zanax but i take 1/2 of a 5mg pill a day so I don't feel drugged at all. i have tapered down from (3) half pills a day. It really helps calm the physical anxiety but I don't want to have to rely on them forever. Thank God i have such a wonderful husband that watched me every second. I just wanted to die. Since this breakdown i am slowly getting better. i still sometimes struggle with gorraphobia. I don't leave my house much. We just moved to Tennesse 4 months ago. i thought i was strong enough to handle the change but when we got here, i regressed back to not wanting to go outside. Anyway I was searching the net and stumble across this community and all of the love and support gave me warm fuzzies so I wanted to be apart of. Before I got sober my depression really reflected the condition of my life at the time. i lived my life for the last 11 years really happy. i have a great life today. the frustrating part is what I am feeling on the inside does not match up with whats going on on the outside. I'm sure people would look at my life and say what is she whinig about. Today I know that its depression and even though i know I am not my depression, it still hurts like hell. the nice thing about this community is that i don't feel alone. Anyway as I have shared on another thread, I am looking for an alternative treatment to my depression other than meds. So there it is. i just wanted to give you an introduction . i look forward to being apart of the threads.

mel