Let's start at the beginning.
Five months ago I was diagnosed with depression.
If I'm honest, I should've had myself diagnosed a year ago, but the thing about my depression was that it came on so gradually that I didn't notice there was anything wrong - or at least, was able to more or less ignore what was wrong - until it crippled me.
I'm very conscious that a lot of people still don't think depression is a 'proper' condition. They wonder why sufferers can't simply pull themselves out of their low mood and get frustrated with their inability to cope with everyday life. The truth is that once you've reached that crashing low, there's no coming up without professional support, and even then many sufferers struggle simply to function.
My first experience of depression was when I was 21. I was halfway through my Masters degree when I contracted glandular fever. The physical effects of the illness were frustrating enough but the mental impact was something else entirely. I'd find myself crying for no reason that I could think of, feeling negative and lacking confidence both in my abilities and my self image. When I went to the GP for help, she made me feel like I was wasting her time. She insinuated that because I wasn't suicidal, it wasn't important enough to be worth her trouble. That's partly why it took me so long to get help this time around.
Depression manifests itself in many different ways, and in retrospect it seems obvious to me that something was wrong a long time before I was diagnosed. I was increasingly irritable, intolerant of others' behaviour, felt guilty and ashamed of myself almost constantly, punished myself for tiny things. As the months went by, I felt sadder and sadder, lost my sense of agency and had all but forgotten what it was to have a feeling of self worth and self esteem.
By June, my thoughts were persistently negative and I cried. All the time. I wasn't sleeping well, and found myself totally exhausted by keeping up the pretense at work that everything was OK. I would finish at five, get to my car and start sobbing as soon as I was halfway up the drive. If I managed to hold out until I got home, I would often find the thought of having to feed myself - an activity most of us never think twice about - completely overwhelming, and cry because I didn't know what to eat. More than once I went to bed hungry.
I realised I needed medication on the weekend that I went to help my parents decorate their new cottage in Devon. I hadn't slept all night and when my dad greeted me in the morning, I just burst into tears (again). I had been keeping my condition from my parents because I knew I'd feel guilty for making them worry about me, but that morning I couldn't hide it anymore. I was a complete mess.
Over the course of the weekend, my mum gently persuaded me that medication was likely to help, so I duly went to the GP. The experience couldn't have been more different. He was concerned and sensitive and reassuring - and didn't bat an eyelid when I struggled to talk about my mental state without crying all over again.
From that point, I'm relieved to say things have improved. It's not been easy, I've taken more than a few steps backwards on my road to recovery, but I have been working hard to get myself into a better place. Thanks to the incredible support of my friends, family, coaches and colleagues, I'm in a place where I can talk about my experience of depression without fear or shame.
It is the events of the past year that prompted me to sign up for the Machu Picchu trek with Ultimate Challenges. It's something I've wanted to do since I was a teenager, and finally I'm ready - both mentally and financially - to take on the challenge. The money I raise will go to Mind, who do an excellent job of supporting people with mental health difficulties and their families. It's thanks to charities like Mind that depression and other mental illnesses are now making it into the public consciousness, and that people are realising that having a mental condition doesn't make you 'crazy' or 'weird'; it's simply that whether short or long term, your brain functions a bit differently to other people's.
What follows is my journey to Machu Picchu, which starts, inevitably, with seven months of fundraising and training.
