I have lived with depression for years and I finally came to accept that it is part of my life.

I was first aware of depression entering my life more than a decade ago when I broke up time with my husband. The divorce pained me in various ways – which I will share in a separate entry.

At the time whenever I walked along the balcony or somewhere high, all I saw was myself jumping over the barrier. I came to see the doctor who prescribed me several types of medicines including one that sent me into an unconscious state sooner after I took it.

One night I passed out in front of my two visiting friends just a few minutes after taking the medication. They convinced me not to take those medicines given I lived alone. I took their words and stopped the prescribed drugs and learned yoga at home with a coach, who helped me to stay active and positive.

I thought I could part ways with depression thanks to practicing yoga on a daily basis.

But I was wrong.

I saw myself falling back to depression, a worse cycle, on the late 2021 afternoon I witnessed a group of ICU doctors trying their best to prolong dad’s last breaths. I stood a few steps from his bed helplessly and lonely. Though the Covid pandemic was receding, the hospital allowed only one family member to be with one patient in the ICU.

Since that unforgettable moment of seeing my dad departing from this world with none of the family members but me by his side, I couldn’t close my eyes at night. White nights were my friend for nearly four months.

Depression medication failed to work on me. At the time, the doctor said he would prescribe another type of medicine which will induce hallucinatory experience.

I said no to taking that path since I lived by myself.

Instead I adopted a poodle right after coming across with a Facebook post by a newly divorced local musician who said adopting a puppy kept him in good mood.

What he said rang true to me. I must say mothering a poodle puppy and writing day in and day out lifted me out of depression and grief effectively and more swiftly than I expected.

Still, I know depression was still there. It was just back to its sleeping mode and it would immediately return whenever a trauma hit me.

Last year, depression revisited me on the day I was unexpectedly removed from a passionate job I have been with almost one quarter of a century.

I came back to see the doctor but I chose not to take the medicines he prescribed.

I managed to put depression back under my control soon thanks to the company of my two poodles and the decision to move back to my little hometown to stay close to my family.

This July, my life sprang back to depression and it stayed after I had to work with my lawyer on a lawsuit against the allegedly illegal termination of my work last year, after my brief absence from home indirectly resulted in the killing of a newly born puppy whose father is the puppy I adopted a few months after my dad passed away and after the father poodle hit me with various bloody bites on my hands and arms two times in a day.

To help me back to the ground, I had to see the doctor again. But I was late on that day and the doctor left right after his shift ended at 3 p.m. The hospital recommended me a new psychiatrist who graduated in the U.S. and garnered a decade of working there before joining it early this year.

He was the first doctor who gave me a thorough assessment of my depression, which took nearly an hour. At first he was a bit grumpy after I ran late due to a prolonged session with his colleague in the cardiology unit.

He suggested me to take prescribed medicine and stressed that no side effects would hit me. He asked me to take half of a pill daily for the first week before swallowing the full pill for a month. He said this type of medicine would work best when it was taken in 6 months in a row.

Today thankfully marked the first time in nearly two months depression didn’t revisit me without the need to take prescribed medication.