I was hospitalized for my depression at one point and I had suicidal thoughts.  I never got to the point where I’d actually do something but I wanted to.  For the past couple of years I had been seeing my therapist who I was very close to.  Before I saw her, I was having trouble dealing with some health conditions and really not doing well. 

I saw a Psychiatrist, was on a few different meds, and I was just feeling dull.  Like I didn’t have feelings and was just “blah”.  I felt more fatigued and after two years my therapist had found out about TMS from Dr. Perera.  My therapist was trying to convince me to give it a shot and I was skeptical at first.  Then, I began researching it. 

I got to the point where it felt like it was one thing after another and I just felt stuck.  I was seeing this same pattern for years and I finally decided to just give up.  I was having suicidal thoughts again and I ended up calling my therapist while I was driving and told her I just couldn’t take it anymore.  I just wanted it to end.  It was either:  go back to the hospital, or try NeuroStar TMS Therapy. 

My stepdad has been a strong influence in my life and I am so thankful for him.  He put out the effort to help me and has really pushed me to get TMS.

It really is a commitment to yourself… And what better commitment is here?  TMS saved me.  The support I got from my doctor, the assistants, my therapist, everything.  TMS doesn’t just change you like that, it takes time.  But now I’m awake and ready to take on anything.  The old Jen would want to just hide, stay under my comforter all day, lay in bed – I didn’t want to deal with anything or anyone.  I feel more than anything that NeuroStar TMS Therapy has given me the courage to move forward and take on each day.  I have the energy and confidence now.  It has opened my eyes.

9 years later the drug stopped working. Life started to suck again. Over the next 10 years, a revolving door of doctors switched me from one medication to the next, then tried combinations of multiple medications, all of which made me more depressed.

After quitting meds in frustration, I ended up in the hospital for observation because I was contemplating suicide. Back on the meds I went. Instead of pushing my luck I decided to pick one drug that didn’t make me irritable/paranoid/suicidal and didn’t interrupt my sleep too bad. After all, when life sucks the least one can hope for is a fairly uninterrupted bout of sleep. 

I was beginning to resign myself to this feeling of not-quite-on-the-verge of utter despair. Medication kept me from being a suicidal nutbag, but I certainly had no zest for life.

Over the past 3 years, my mood and personality had devolved into a single dimension that my boyfriend and I jokingly refer to as ”meh.” Get a promotion at work? Meh. Boyfriend does something completely extraordinary by cooking dinner, doing the laundry, changing the cat box AND buying flowers? Meh. Win a million dollars in the lottery? Meh.

Nothing I experienced changed my mood. I didn’t care about anything. I wasn’t sad, I felt no joy, sometimes I felt despair. I hated myself for feeling that way, but my brain left me so distracted that I could never concentrate long enough to do anything to change it. Or to care. Meh, indeed.

On top of that, I felt like my latest drug was beginning to betray me. I couldn’t think logically or rationally anymore. I couldn’t multi-task. My memory was shot. I poured all of my energy into my job, but I was faltering there, too. I would come home and ignore the state of my existence–I was physically/mentally/emotionally incapable of doing laundry, feeding my pets, vacuuming my carpet or generally taking care of myself. I was becoming a shut-in. I slept a lot. Or not at all. I gained 30 pounds. I stopped doing all the things I loved–walking, running, cooking, reading. Living.

And all of this ”meh” jeopardized my relationship with my boyfriend, who is my best friend and has been my partner for over 6 years. If I didn’t do something I was going to lose everything. But what hope do I have? Over the years I’ve tried more than a dozen different medications and combinations of meds and they simply don’t make me feel better. I am avoiding confronting head-on the notion that ”meh” might be as good as it gets. 

And then, a miracle.

I saw my psychiatrist, Dr. Tim Jennings, in August 2011 for my semi-annual state of ”meh” evaluation. Nothing was ”really” wrong, really. But certainly nothing was right. He told me about a new treatment called TMS. I’m sure the look on my face was one he’d seen before. 

”Let me get this straight,” the expression on my face was saying. ”You’re going to point a magnet at my head for 6 weeks, and I’m going to feel better?” He briefly talked about the studies, the science, how the treatment works. I was skeptical, but felt a glimmer of hope. I started to cry. Too implausible. No way. I schedule a free consultation anyway. I grow more hopeful. I go home and read up on TMS, review other patient testimonials, and still can’t believe it. 

Today I’m almost finished with my TMS treatments and will be transitioning to maintenance treatments in the next 30 days. Never in my entire life have I felt as fantastic as I feel today, and I owe these feelings to TMS. I am a multi-dimensional human being again! I am experiencing true feelings and real emotion like everybody does, but I’m feeling them for the very first time, unfettered and uninfluenced by emotion-numbing medications.

Like a wandering traveler in a foreign land who experiences tastes, touches, smells and sounds that are alien and wondrous and marvelous, I’m rediscovering who I am and who are the people around me. I’m alive! And I love it.

If I could give one bit of advice to other people enduring a lifelong battle with depression, it’s this: You owe it to yourself to explore TMS as a treatment option. It’s expensive, yes. But so is a lifetime on anti-depressants. Consider it an investment in your happiness.

And while you go through the treatment, be patient with yourself. You won’t feel a difference in your mood for weeks, and then one day you’ll wake up and realize that everything has changed. “Hey!” you’ll shout, overjoyed. “Life doesn’t suck!”

My hopes and dreams have vanished, and yet there’s still a part of me that keeps fighting on. I don’t know why, maybe it is all the nutrition and exercising and taking care of myself that keeps me pushing. My heart weeps that no amount of goodness I do for myself has any affect on my horrible mood; I want to believe in every treatment I try…and I have tried many, everything from acupuncture to homeopathy, not to mention dozens of medicines and nutritional supplements.

Maybe I should feel this way, maybe it’s nature’s course I don’t know. I know that I feel doubly bad for anyone else hit with this disease who has not been as lucky as I in other ways. I fortunately have a job that lets me slide in how late I come in and how long I work. I have a good mind, and no other health problems. But due to the double whammy of social-difficulty and depression I have zero self esteem and fully expect to have a shortened lifespan. Loneliness and grief are real, despite not being medically quantifiable.

For now as much as I can I am going to try to give up control. I also want to try TMS as well. We’ll see.

I am a 54-year-old woman married for 33 years to a wonderful man.  I love reading, gardening and hope to get back to hiking and bicycling after I get my weight down and get my knee fixed surgically.  I am a homemaker at present.

I have had too many episodes of depression to count over the last 30 + years and they never really ended.  Some would not be as strong so I would use my energy to “climb” out of the depression as much as possible for as long as possible then I would withdraw and isolate.

The most memorable depressive episode of mine occurred as a sophomore in High School though I had had others earlier in my life, but none lasted as long.  I had my first anxiety/panic attack when I was 10 years old.

Since I isolate more and more as my depression and anxiety would escalate, I did not let people really know the depressed/anxious side of myself.  Once I felt I couldn’t hide it (it was shameful to me and I hated myself for being so weak), I would give 2 week notice if it was a job…I didn’t have close friends as I only let people in so far.  I would just disappear and rarely leave my home. My husband would have to pick up the slack as much as possible.  My psychiatrist would continue to try new meds and more therapy to help….so many different meds……either bad side effects, no effects or they would work a little while then the depression/anxiety would begin the same pattern.

I felt I was going to die soon…luckily we were able to get a loan for a treatment we were praying would help me: TMS.

I could not continue much longer in the state I was in and felt suicide or institutionalization was in my immediate future.  I now have a long road ahead, but I have a road!  Prior to the TMS treatments, there was no more “pavement” left for me.  If I sound dramatic, it is only because this experience has been dramatic.  How can a person who is facing a very real, seemingly incurable, painful disease in 23 days be a functioning, peaceful, mostly happy individual after 30 plus years of treatment that failed over and over again.

I noticed early on in the treatments that my thoughts were more positive during and after treatment and that, I had more energy.  It took a while for this to “stick”, but when it did I felt like a different person….I had been so very ill that in the beginning even a few seconds of relief meant everything to me.  Luckily, it continued to stay with me longer and longer.

NeuroStar TMS Therapy was different for me because I didn’t have to worry about weird side effects from oral medications…I also felt like the area of the brain that was causing the problem was being targeted without going on a long travel through my body and various organs as meds do.  I had already grown to feel that “chemical” treatment was not enough for my illness. TMS worked more quickly and the results were astounding in my opinion, especially after the 2nd week.

My very life was saved by this miraculous system that is virtually non-invasive and requires no hospitalization, IV’s, or special aftercare nor the higher risks of ECT.   It was not only my lifesaving antidepressant, it was my way back from a tortuous mental state that, after 30 plus years of treatment, once again was not responding to medicine or treatment.