Anxiety and depression - the desperation of a family

I have a family member who has anxiety and depression – it has been a battle their whole life. They have gone without real treatment for many years. The doctor in the last ten years did finally prescribe medication to assist with the anxiety and help prevent the extreme reactions, panic attacks and other intense emotion. The depression also ebbs and flows. They have been self-medicating with alcohol for many years. As a family, we realize this now but did not in the past as we were unaware of the emotional turmoil our family member was facing. Some big life events, death in the family and serious health issues, have made the depression and anxiety even more difficult for this family member. We have struggled to help them and to educate them. They do not believe they have an alcohol problem but do regularly take the anxiety medication prescribed by the doctor.

When I look at my family’s situation, I realize that there are number of things that could have helped along the way. My family and I were not aware of the signs of depression and anxiety and so did not recognize them in our family member. The medical system did not assess for anxiety and depression until our family member was in distress. We are ill-equipped to help with the alcohol issues and it impacts our whole family. We have finally been able to tap into resources but it’s much more of an issue as it has been such a problem for a long time. Obtaining treatment for the anxiety and depression is difficult because the wait lists are so long and it’s difficult to know the best course of treatment.

If things could have been done differently, there would be good education for families and it would be early so for kids, for parents, for siblings and so many other places. This is available now but needs to be built upon. The stigma related to mental health needs to change. We also didn’t know or understand the difference between healthy and unhealthy drinking. It would have been useful at the time to know the difference. We sought out and educated ourselves but it would have been good to know the early warning signs so we could have helped earlier.

There also needs to be a recognition among health professionals between the physical, like high blood pressure, shortness of breath and chest pain, with anxiety, depression and other mental health conditions. Our family members physical conditions were exacerbated by the mental health issues. Only when a really good family physician realized this did the mental health care start. This should be part of all assessments.

Lastly, treatment is really critical. Wait lists mean people who are ready for and desperately need treatment may be far worse before getting into treatment, leading to horrible outcomes. Families are stressed and relationships are broken. The treatment model needs to include the family and been focused on everything. Families need to know how they can support and undermine treatment. They also need to understand that relationships have been impacted and how you can work to repair these relationships. Access to mental health services is essential and sorely lacking and support for caregivers of those with mental illness is even worse. Caregivers need support as well and need to know how to care for themselves.