Battling depression: The story of two Waterford men's brave fight
‘From The Bru to The Borough’ is the true story of Dungarvan native Dan O’Riordan’s battle with his mental health over the past three decades.
Dan, originally from Cathal Brugha Place, delved into his past to tell his story of what life was like growing up in Dungarvan in the 1970’s and 1980’s.
After suffering in silence for years, Dan finally found the courage to put pen to paper and document his own harrowing experiences of depression due to years of physical, sexual and mental health abuse.
“I had thought about writing a book for many years and in 2014 I felt it was time,” he says.
“I felt that I had a story to tell and wanted to use my experiences in the hopes that it may help someone realise that they do not have to suffer alone. There is a light at the end of every tunnel and, for me, the best remedy for combating my dark times was to talk openly about the issues that affected me most negatively.”
Dan, who first attempted to take his own life at just 14, was not diagnosed with a mental health illness until his late thirties.
“Doctors and psychiatrists refused to believe that I had an issue and always pointed the finger at alcohol abuse. I was eventually diagnosed with Suicidal Depression and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder when I was about 35 by a private-practising psychologist in Dublin.”
During his worst bouts of depression Dan struggled to find a reason to live.
“Your life is just one big, dark, wet cloud hanging over your head. You go to bed each night, if you can even sleep, hoping you don’t wake up. Nobody or nothing matters to you. All you want is for the mental torture to be relieved and the dullness in your mind to be cleared.”
Before he was officially diagnosed with depression, Dan says he had no quality of life and spent his days lying in bed sleeping and surfing the internet. In total, Dan has attempted to take his own life over 35 times.
Although local Gardaí in Dungarvan tried to help him on numerous occasions he never accepted their help.
After years of being in and out of psychiatric hospitals and taking anti-depressants, Dan realised the medication was not working and was only making his depression worse. He criticised doctors for prescribing anti-depressants rather than providing patients with other options such as counselling.
“GPs will prescribe the drugs rather than tell you about a service that would be more effective,” he says.
A medical condition that saw him unable to recognise when he needed to use the toilet resulted in years of bullying for Dan on the streets and in school. This, coupled with the physical and sexual abuse he endured, as well as a lack of social outlets in the town and isolation from his peers, were all contributing factors to his crippling depression.
Speaking out about his hometown, Dan says people need to be more aware of what’s on offer in Dungarvan.
“I think the services are there however, I don’t think they are being made available. People need to know what is available and where they can obtain such services.”
He also said the increasingly high suicide rate in Dungarvan should signal the need for more improved facilities in the town.
“Dungarvan needs to provide more information on the services that are available to people and upgrade those services to address the growing number of suicides in the town. How many more young men and women are going to have to be buried before something is done?”
In recent years the town has gradually began to highlight the importance of mental health by hosting the annual Darkness Into Light walk and the Cycle Against Suicide. Dungarvan native and ‘Patrick’s Day’ actor, Moe Dunford, officially launched Pieta House’s flagship fundraising event on March 10, 2015. Now in its fourth year, Darkness Into Light Dungarvan has seen a year-on-year increase in the number of participants choosing to walk and cycle the 5k route.
Dan, who now lives in Victoria, Australia, says there is a noticeable difference between the Irish and Australian outlook on mental health.
“Ireland is still very ignorant to the issues of mental health and a large majority refuse to admit that there is a growing issue. Australia focuses on the issue more. You walk into bars, casinos and supermarkets and you will find posters and flyers detailing the services that are available for depression, addiction and other mental health issues.”
Dan is only one of 450,000 people in Ireland to experience the chronic illness. 37-year-old Aaron Cowming, also from Dungarvan, Co. Waterford, has suffered from depression for as long as he can remember.
An unhappy home life when he was a young child as well as a tragic car accident when he was just 10-years-old were the catalysts for years of substance abuse, alcohol addiction, severe depression and multiple suicide attempts.
“I’ve always been sad. I’ve always felt like there was a piece missing inside me and I think a lot of people with depression would say the same thing,” he says.
Aaron lived a relatively normal life; attending university in Cork and continuing to hold down a job over the years, however self-sabotage would always get the better of him.
“I’ve had loads of good times but ninety percent of my really good times, I’d always question it. I’d always look back on it and I’d always withdraw again. For every good day there was two bad,” he says.
During his worst spells of depression, Aaron equates his state of mind to a bomb going off inside his head. He says there were days when he physically could not lift his head up off the ground, days where he would cry constantly and days where he was so anxious he would have to get down on a cold kitchen surface and just lie there.
“It’s awful. It takes over your body from top to toe and there’s nothing you can do about it at the time,” he says.
Aaron hid behind his crippling depression by submerging himself in a lifestyle of drink and drugs in an attempt to pretend everything was ok.
“It’s just so easy to hide behind alcohol and drugs and pretend that’s your main problem and forget about everything else,” he says.
His alcohol and drug abuse worsened his already fragile mental health and he became caught up in a vicious cycle of excessive drinking and drug binges and, consequently, became increasingly depressed.
“I could drink for six days; no food, no sleep and be so mentally drained that I couldn’t function at all. I was just not able to function and that would hit me in waves.”
Like Dan, the alcohol would block out the pain for a short period of time, but inevitably it would catch up with him.
“I’d get so badly upset. I’d get so bad in my head telling myself ‘You’re just worthless, you’re a worthless piece of crap’, or ‘The only thing you can do now is get wasted, make all the calls, hurt everybody because that’s the only way; that’s what they expect from you now so become what they expect’, and that’s what I did.”
After hitting serious rock bottoms in the past, things eventually came to a head for Aaron last year when he believed he didn’t want to live anymore and contemplated taking his own life again.
Reflecting on one of the darkest days of his life he says:
“This time was different. This time I did not want to live. I wanted out.”
Thankfully Aaron saw sense before it was too late and, finally, after being in and out of hospitals and addiction centres over the past two decades he received a proper diagnosis at 36-years-old.
Asked why it took so long for him to get the right help, he said:
“I don’t know. I was always thrown tablets by doctors saying ‘Here’s some tablets, take them you’re depressed’.”
However, similar to Dan, he firmly believes anti-depressants are not always the right answer.
“I think it’s too easy to get tablets. ‘I’m depressed’ is a very thrown around word. Really and truly we all have our down days, we all have our issues, we all have our problems and my problems are no bigger than anybody else’s. But it’s way too easy to go to a doctor and say, ‘You’re not having a good day and you’re feeling stressed’ and they just hand you tablets. It’s ridiculous.”
To help him in his recovery, Aaron decided to set up a Facebook page entitled ‘Positive Affirmations’ where he openly shares his day-to-day thoughts and encourages other Facebook users to do the same.
The blog has been a huge success for Aaron and has proved to be therapeutic for him on his road to recovery.
Although he says he never intended to reach out to anybody, the response he has received from people has been “fabulous”.
“I’ve always been honest with people but I’ve never put out stuff the way I have on that. It really helps and I think it’s the people I’ve met through it too. People that are in the same boat as me, people who have worse problems than I do and people who are in the middle of stuff they can’t get out of. It’s a very valuable commodity when someone tells you their story because that takes guts.”
In a country where mental health has been a taboo topic for so long, Aaron says it was a relief to finally talk openly about his troubles.
“I wasn’t intending to reach anybody. I just wanted to put it out there so I wasn’t hiding behind my shame anymore. I wasn’t hiding behind my fears and my troubles anymore.”
In the past he said there was pressure on him to keep quiet about his depression and suicidal thoughts.
“People just didn’t want it on their doorstep. People were afraid of it. They didn’t know what to say about it.”
Aaron believes words can make a difference and the promotion and encouragement of positive mental health is the number one aim behind his ‘Positive Affirmations’ blog page. Followers of the page support and help each other to stay positive; either by sharing their own personal experiences, talking about their day or posting inspirational quotes to the page.
Aaron is hopeful that his Facebook page will help to reduce the overriding negative stigma attached to mental health.
As well as blogging about his experiences, Aaron has also found acting to be therapeutic in his recovery. He recently joined Dungarvan Dramatic Club and performed in their latest show ‘Plaza Suite’.
Speaking about his acting debut, Aaron says:
“What a good feeling it was to walk backstage and realise that I have finally achieved a dream I never thought I would achieve. To think that seven months ago I had given up on life and today I am being given amazing opportunities. Life can change in an instant so I’m glad I didn’t give up.”
Aaron says he is finally looking forward to his future: “Recovery has given me my life back and I couldn’t be more excited at the prospect of an actual future.”
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