In a message dated 11/09/1999 11:23:48 AM Eastern Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

<<
         I have personally had two periods of depression in my life. One
 lasted for about two and a half years and I did not recognize it. I had
 trouble sleeping and I have no zest for life. I hated my job and my life.
 It felt like I was wading in wet cement, just to get through the day. I
 tried one antidepressant and it made a zombie of me. I just "grew" out of
 that one. It was in 1979-1982.
         The other one, around 1995-96 was short and was related to about 8
 people close to me dying in a short period of time. I really think I
 "talked" myself into that one because I felt it was the "thing to so". I
 tried an SSRI with disastrous results. Now, my wife thinks I am mildly
 depressed most of the time. I think I just don't have the energy I used to.
 I do not really see any of this being related directly to CP, but to the
 normal phases of life.
  >>

Hard to know.  The older we get, the less energy we seem to have.  I guess
there can be depression in that too, if it bothers you.

I have a fire department experience, but it doesn't have anything to do with
disability stuff:
During my time in the fire service, we had three teenager suicide attempts
within a month's time.  I was on two of the calls and directly involved in
both.  One of those teenagers did not survive the attempt.  In that era of my
life, I took an avid interest in what is called "critical incidence stress,"
which is a term used to describe the kind of psychological stress that can
happen to emergency service personnel.  Calls involving children are supposed
to have the greatest impact (highly believable). I always wondered if those
particular calls affected me in ways that I didn't realize.  I don't think
I'm depressed about it, but I know I think about them a lot more than the
other calls I ran.

I was thinking about one of the calls about a month ago.  It was the one that
the teenager died.  I'm sure it was triggered by a recent telephone
conversation with an old firefighting buddy.  The weird thing was that I ran
a kind of a "memory tape" from beginning to end of the call -- every detail
that I remembered -- the sounds, things people said and did.  I was so into
that memory that I completely blanked out of the here and now.  And it was so
vivid!!!  Then I looked up at my computer monitor and was actually startled.
It was such a profound memory that I was startled by it!  I didn't
consciously try to remember it either -- it just happened.  I don't think I'm
depressed by it, but I'm still a little astounded by the impact of it.  This
is not the first time this has happened, and each time it does I'm startled
again by the power it seems to have.  It doesn't happen often at all though.

I remember Trisha talking about a flashback, and now this reminds me of her
comment.

Betty