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Patricia began experiencing symptoms of depression when she was a young child. As she grew older, she used alcohol to try to deal with her emotions, and she recalls cutting herself as a teenager.
Patricia got married at age fifteen, and had her first child when she was nineteen. After her son committed suicide at age eighteen, she started attending talk therapy sessions. Over time, Patricia continued to experience depression, but she would hide her feelings and began using alcohol again. While stationed with her husband in Germany, Patricia was finally diagnosed with depression.
Once diagnosed, she started to take anti-depressant medications. Unfortunately, each of the medications she tried would stop working after a couple months or cause side effects that were intolerable. Patricia estimates she tried twenty different medications without relief. She began feeling like a bad mother to her two children and an inadequate wife to her husband. Using alcohol to deal with the pain she felt was ineffective.
After a while, Patricia started Alcoholics Anonymous classes and tried to live a normal life, but she still felt disoriented, unsatisfied and “spacey”. She began working at a California school system and started attending more intense therapy sessions. Unfortunately, her depression continued and became physically disabling. She began having gastrointestinal problems and had to have several stomach operations. Patricia has now been on disability since 2004.
Patricia heard about VNS Therapy from her psychiatrist and decided it was something she should experience. In the first 6 months since she had the implant procedure, Patricia has not had suicidal thoughts or experienced a depressive episode. Today, she feels more energetic and is spending more time outside of her home taking care of shopping needs, errands, and her own scheduled appointments. She is currently doing more housework and spending time reading, one of her favorite past times. Today, Patricia is happy to be able to spend more quality time with her husband and her children, and is enjoying her new found serenity.
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