M.E. and Depression

When I first heard about M.E., long before I had it, I was told "it's kind of like depression".  At the time, a good friend of mine had had a bad relapse of M.E.  Since I had only known her during remission, I didn't really know what M.E. was, so when asking a mutual friend what exactly she was going through, his response had been to compare it to depression.

Now clinical depression is nothing to scoff at.  It's a terrible illness as well.  It is also an illness with biologic abnormalities and not in any way the "fault" of the sufferer.  I have an immediate family member who has struggled with serious depression, so I understand how disabling an illness it can be.  But when I was told that M.E. was "like depression" it didn't quite correlate with this person I knew.  I had never known her to show any signs or features of depression that I had experienced with my family member.

I remember talking to her during her relapse (she had had to drop out of graduate studies and move home with her parents) and her trying to describe the M.E. to me.  She didn't necessarily sound terribly depressed.  Her M.E. was dominated by the cognitive dysfunction with the fatigue a lesser (but still disabling) factor.  She had gotten sick as a teen after contracting chicken pox (post viral M.E.).  She recovered, only to relapse again about five years later.  (Today she considers herself recovered, is married and works full time, although she still struggles with minor symptoms).

The year I got M.E. after a bad bout of Mono, I reconnected with her and the first thing I said was "I'm so so so sorry".  "I had no idea what you were going through all those years back, I had no idea you were so very sick, I wish I'd been a better friend".

Why am I writing about this?  Well, someone with M.E. who I know through one degree of separation took his own life this week.  It has had me thinking about the role depression can play in M.E.  Obviously, to take your own life, there has to be some level of hopelessness or depression, even if it's a temporary state.

Personally, I don't believe the two illnesses are the same or even close relatives (and most the research would corroborate this). However, CFS or M.E., because it does not have a diagnostic test probably contains a certain amount of heterogeneity within the group diagnosed.  Perhaps some people with M.E. have clinical depression instead, or there is no reason why one couldn't have both. But mostly, I think that because on the whole M.E. is a severe and disabling illness, people get depressed.

I was thinking about depression in relation to myself and asking myself that "could I, or would I ever kill myself?" question.  I doubt I'm alone.  I think most people with moderate or severe M.E. would at least have days where they feel unable to take it any more.  And how many steps are there between the terrible daily grind of sickness with seemingly no end in sight, and taking one's own life?  I don't know.

Of course add on top of the suffering the fact that compared to most illnesses, there is virtually no research being conducted, that most Drs. throw their hands up at the suffering asking if they've tried "exercise" and "counselling', along with the social stigma the person with M.E. usually has to face.

So while I believe M.E is a neuro-immune illness of some sort, perhaps with an infectious factor, I also think that if you're sick long enough, facing depression at some point is almost inevitable.  Wouldn't anyone who was sick at the level of influenza everyday enough to loose their hobbies, jobs, maybe homes, friends/social life and sometimes even partners all while dealing with lack of medical or societal support?

While I've never come close to suicide, I have had many days this past 12 months where I go to bed, 1/2 hoping I don't wake up,  not knowing how I could possibly do another day in this body.  I look to the future and see little hope.  I have no partner, no children (I always thought I'd at least adopt), no career or job to go to, little social life, and few hobbies.  While I do have pockets of feeling less hellatious, they inevitably end with me doing too much and crashing - feeling once again powerless to create any kind of quality of life.

At some level I'm depressed. It seems the more sick I am with the M.E. (the more the fevers, throat, ache, fluiness, chest ache, dizzy spells, fatigue, weakness, and tremors), the worse the depression.  My specialist calls it "reactive" depression, but it's depression of some kind nonetheless.  However, I'm not worried about taking my life at present.  And I hope none of my friends with M.E. ever get to that point.

I think the "cure" for the depression and M.E. combo will  come when they find and offer treatment for sufferers.  If I wasn't forced to spend most my life in bed sick, would I be so down?  In the mean time, I hope that those who are close to that place (of suicide) feel they can reach out to others in the community (myself included) for support.