Conquering Depression Without Drugs (Part 1)

The first time it happened was 17yrs ago, when I was just 25. It was in response to finding myself a single mum, my greatest fear. I was devastated and was very hard on myself for allowing this to happen. After weeks of trying to pull myself back together and feeling very weak and apathetic, I eventually asked my mother to drive me to the doctor (I felt unable to drive myself). I was diagnosed with post-natal depression, but I knew it wasn't that. The doctor prescribed antidepressants, which I didn't want to take, but I didn't know what else to do. After a week or two I still was not feeling any better and was told I had to give the drugs time to work. About that time I discovered Louise Hay's book 'You Can Heal Your Life', and I knew I would no longer take the drugs.

The book on its own did not help me to cure my depression, but it set me on a new path of personal responsibility, very empowering. I also joined a meditation group and suddenly my world expanded. I realised I was much more than what I had previously thought. The group became my lifeline and slowly I made progress. It was not a quick recovery and I tried many other things along the way, including counselling and hypnotherapy, but eventually I did feel better.

I met a new partner after 7yrs on my own and in the next few years I studied and practised several different natural therapy modalities and found myself attracting people who were dealing with physical symptoms caused by emotional distress. I was dealing with a lot of stress myself at the time, all of it self induced. I was being very hard on myself for not making any money from my work. Then my son was born and I gave up on my practice, but not on being hard on myself. Eventually it affected my relationship and we separated after 8yrs together. I was a single mum once again. However, it wasn't that that set me off on my second bout of depression. It was financial struggle.

I was in the middle of my life coaching certification training and I'd just researched and written a 25 page document on how effective life coaching was for stress relief. But this had gone beyond stress relief. Even my meditation classes weren't helping. I needed something else. Again, I didn't want to take medication but did not know what else to do. So I went to a doctor for a physical checkup to see if there was something going on but my physical health was fine. She offered a referral to a psychologist but instinctively I felt this was not for me.

A few months earlier I'd attended a seminar where I'd learnt about NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) and I searched for a coach who had done this company's training. Fortunately for me, I found the perfect coach who taught me, with just a small exercise, a huge lesson in self-talk.