The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Feeling helpless, hopeless
I am an alt
Registered User new member
Registered User new member
Not quite sure where to begin here.. I'm sorry if this ends up being a huge wall of text.
I'm almost 21. I'm in my senior year of university. I was diagnosed with anxiety disorder and clinical depression over a year ago. My doctor, saying I was a 'classic case', offered to put me on psychiatric medication, but feeling uneasy with radically modifying my brain chemistry, I opted to start eating right and exercising instead. I bought a bike to commute on, cut down on the amount of McDonald's I ate, and started seeing a therapist.
I still live at home, and my family didn't believe (and still don't believe) that I have depression, opting instead to imply either that my symptoms are the result of character defects or some weird new condition they found on Wikipedia. (This week it's hypothyroidism. Last week it was vitamin deficiency, despite the fact that I take a multivitamin and fish oil pills already.) My girlfriend tries to be supportive, but she has no real idea how to deal with me when I'm severely depressed, which I can understand.
When I get really bad, all I can do is just sit in a chair and stare into space. I feel like someone's sitting on my chest, preventing me from doing anything, and I'm numb, like I'm on heavy sedatives. All I can think about in these moods is how much of a burden I am, how I don't deserve the life I"m living, and how I'm squandering this time in university on self-loathing and criticism when I could be getting much better at my creative pursuits. I feel like I should be able to just shake it off, but I can't and that makes me feel worse. I don't know how to deal with it, so why should she?
I also don't really talk about it much. My therapist wasn't much of a help. That's partially my fault, too, because I'm really quite ashamed of this condition, so I endeavoured to make my life appear normal. Often, what would happen is that I'd bike to the session, and high on post-exercise energy, I'd be bubbly and exuberant, close to the way I used to feel 3-4 years ago. I'd go through the session, and then about half an hour afterwards I'd crash right back into the way I usually am, which is to say withdrawn and despairing. The few times I got a ride, I'd be closer to "normal" (meaning depressed), but I still tried to play it off. I've since stopped seeing her, because she wasn't helping me. (She also wasn't providing cognitive-behavioural therapy, which is what my doctor prescribed, and I/my family can't afford actual therapy. She was through my university.)
I told a few friends about it. One stopped talking to me completely. One insisted that it was a failure of will, that it had nothing to do with brain chemistry. Those didn't help much, although the second one had the best of intentions. I don't blame him for it, as there are quite a few educated psychiatrists with similar opinions and it's not far from some popular models of depression. It is, however, far from helpful. Please avoid talking about that here, and go to D&D if you want to talk about over-prescription of psychiatric medication.
The other three moved away a short time ago. I'm quite active on this forum, but I hesitate to talk about it much because 1) I know there are people here in much worse situations, with much worse problems, and I feel that my own problems pale by comparison and 2) I don't want to seem like an attention whore, shouting 'look at me I'm depressed!' Hence the alt. I even debated making this thread, but I figured the worst that can happen is that some alt gets yelled at. Thanatos or Pheezer will likely check my IP, but I'd appreciate it if they didn't out me.
The reason I'm posting this is that I've been much worse lately. It's affecting my job, my school, and my relationships. I have a midterm tomorrow, for example. I've spent most of the day in bed, and I haven't studied for it at all. I can't concentrate on the readings. I can't concentrate in class, zoning out when the professor is talking. School seems like the most pointless thing in the world - I'm just going through the motions. I don't care about any of the assignments, but I'm still getting A's. I've started to be distant to my girlfriend, which makes me panic because I love her more than anything, and she is quite literally the best thing that has ever happened to me.
What's worse, death has started to hold a strange fascination to me. I would never commit suicide, I feel it's the coward's way out and that it's the most selfish action that you can take. It would hurt every member of my family and my girlfriend immensely, and waste my potential (not to toot my own horn, but I have a bit.) I am quite familiar with suicide hotline numbers, due to some other events which have taken place on these forums, and I know full well the impact on people. A close friend of my girlfriend jumped in front of a train. I never want to make her feel like that again.
Still, in the course of researching depression I've come across a few accounts that keep popping up in my thoughts, either because they're strikingly similar to mine or I can relate to them on a frightening level. One woman took most of a bottle of sleeping pills with gin, not out of a desire to die, but of a desire to just calm down. Her thinking was just clouded to the degree where she thought it was a good idea. She survived through sheer chance. I read that at work, and had to spend fifteen minutes blinking back tears because of how close to home it was. I have no difficulty seeing myself accidentally doing that in a year or two if this slide keeps up.
I took my bike apart last week to put it in my girlfriend's car. Since then, I've been unable to muster up the conviction to put it back together, as temperatures have dropped sharply and I won't be able to use it anyway. Most of my exercise now comes from walking around campus, and I have to choose between eating fast food or not eating at all while I pull 14-hour days at school either painting or studying. I try to keep it healthy, but sometimes there's not much you can eat healthy without a car on campus.
So basically - things have been getting worse steadily for some time. It frightens me. I'm considering psych meds again, but I've recently talked to a few people who advise against it in the extreme because they cause higher rates of suicide either while on the drug or while withdrawing from it.
I feel like I'm rapidly running out of options, and as a result I spend more and more time fighting off panic. I'm edging towards moving out, but once I'm off my dad's drug plan, there will be very little chance I can afford psych drugs in addition to rent.
I need help. Or advice. I feel alone. I don't know what to do.
I'm almost 21. I'm in my senior year of university. I was diagnosed with anxiety disorder and clinical depression over a year ago. My doctor, saying I was a 'classic case', offered to put me on psychiatric medication, but feeling uneasy with radically modifying my brain chemistry, I opted to start eating right and exercising instead. I bought a bike to commute on, cut down on the amount of McDonald's I ate, and started seeing a therapist.
I still live at home, and my family didn't believe (and still don't believe) that I have depression, opting instead to imply either that my symptoms are the result of character defects or some weird new condition they found on Wikipedia. (This week it's hypothyroidism. Last week it was vitamin deficiency, despite the fact that I take a multivitamin and fish oil pills already.) My girlfriend tries to be supportive, but she has no real idea how to deal with me when I'm severely depressed, which I can understand.
When I get really bad, all I can do is just sit in a chair and stare into space. I feel like someone's sitting on my chest, preventing me from doing anything, and I'm numb, like I'm on heavy sedatives. All I can think about in these moods is how much of a burden I am, how I don't deserve the life I"m living, and how I'm squandering this time in university on self-loathing and criticism when I could be getting much better at my creative pursuits. I feel like I should be able to just shake it off, but I can't and that makes me feel worse. I don't know how to deal with it, so why should she?
I also don't really talk about it much. My therapist wasn't much of a help. That's partially my fault, too, because I'm really quite ashamed of this condition, so I endeavoured to make my life appear normal. Often, what would happen is that I'd bike to the session, and high on post-exercise energy, I'd be bubbly and exuberant, close to the way I used to feel 3-4 years ago. I'd go through the session, and then about half an hour afterwards I'd crash right back into the way I usually am, which is to say withdrawn and despairing. The few times I got a ride, I'd be closer to "normal" (meaning depressed), but I still tried to play it off. I've since stopped seeing her, because she wasn't helping me. (She also wasn't providing cognitive-behavioural therapy, which is what my doctor prescribed, and I/my family can't afford actual therapy. She was through my university.)
I told a few friends about it. One stopped talking to me completely. One insisted that it was a failure of will, that it had nothing to do with brain chemistry. Those didn't help much, although the second one had the best of intentions. I don't blame him for it, as there are quite a few educated psychiatrists with similar opinions and it's not far from some popular models of depression. It is, however, far from helpful. Please avoid talking about that here, and go to D&D if you want to talk about over-prescription of psychiatric medication.
The other three moved away a short time ago. I'm quite active on this forum, but I hesitate to talk about it much because 1) I know there are people here in much worse situations, with much worse problems, and I feel that my own problems pale by comparison and 2) I don't want to seem like an attention whore, shouting 'look at me I'm depressed!' Hence the alt. I even debated making this thread, but I figured the worst that can happen is that some alt gets yelled at. Thanatos or Pheezer will likely check my IP, but I'd appreciate it if they didn't out me.
The reason I'm posting this is that I've been much worse lately. It's affecting my job, my school, and my relationships. I have a midterm tomorrow, for example. I've spent most of the day in bed, and I haven't studied for it at all. I can't concentrate on the readings. I can't concentrate in class, zoning out when the professor is talking. School seems like the most pointless thing in the world - I'm just going through the motions. I don't care about any of the assignments, but I'm still getting A's. I've started to be distant to my girlfriend, which makes me panic because I love her more than anything, and she is quite literally the best thing that has ever happened to me.
What's worse, death has started to hold a strange fascination to me. I would never commit suicide, I feel it's the coward's way out and that it's the most selfish action that you can take. It would hurt every member of my family and my girlfriend immensely, and waste my potential (not to toot my own horn, but I have a bit.) I am quite familiar with suicide hotline numbers, due to some other events which have taken place on these forums, and I know full well the impact on people. A close friend of my girlfriend jumped in front of a train. I never want to make her feel like that again.
Still, in the course of researching depression I've come across a few accounts that keep popping up in my thoughts, either because they're strikingly similar to mine or I can relate to them on a frightening level. One woman took most of a bottle of sleeping pills with gin, not out of a desire to die, but of a desire to just calm down. Her thinking was just clouded to the degree where she thought it was a good idea. She survived through sheer chance. I read that at work, and had to spend fifteen minutes blinking back tears because of how close to home it was. I have no difficulty seeing myself accidentally doing that in a year or two if this slide keeps up.
I took my bike apart last week to put it in my girlfriend's car. Since then, I've been unable to muster up the conviction to put it back together, as temperatures have dropped sharply and I won't be able to use it anyway. Most of my exercise now comes from walking around campus, and I have to choose between eating fast food or not eating at all while I pull 14-hour days at school either painting or studying. I try to keep it healthy, but sometimes there's not much you can eat healthy without a car on campus.
So basically - things have been getting worse steadily for some time. It frightens me. I'm considering psych meds again, but I've recently talked to a few people who advise against it in the extreme because they cause higher rates of suicide either while on the drug or while withdrawing from it.
I feel like I'm rapidly running out of options, and as a result I spend more and more time fighting off panic. I'm edging towards moving out, but once I'm off my dad's drug plan, there will be very little chance I can afford psych drugs in addition to rent.
I need help. Or advice. I feel alone. I don't know what to do.
I am an alt on
0
Posts
Make some goals, if you really want them, maybe the drive to achieve them will help. You can start with small goals like, get an A on this test. Get at least a 85 in this class. But eventually after you realize you can self motivate, make bigger, more difficult, and more self-rewarding goals.
As an aside, I've seen volunteer work do wonders for people. Go help others who are incapable of helping themselves. Now, I don't say do this to try to make you feel like "omg these people are worse than me I shouldn't be depressed cuz my life is way better than theirs i have no right" but because helping others just has a way of making people feel amazing.
B.net: Kusanku
It should be noted that this type of mindset usually only makes people more upset/depressed. Its baffling to think some people believe "you shouldnt feel shitty about life cause these people have even shittier lives!" is good advice.
edited cause i cant speal
Depression is very common. There are who-knows (Wikipedia probably) how many possible causes for this state; it is very dependent on the person and their environment. That said, you are also the only expert on yourself and your environment. Unfortunately, your judgment is clouded by the depression and by the fact that you know you have depression. Both of these can affect how you view yourself and your actions. You may find yourself saying "Well, yeah I could do X, but I have depression and so I just can't". This isn't going to be very useful, as I'm sure you can agree. You must be vigilant and fight down these thoughts. And if it is hard, which may very well be, then you have resist the urge to give up and give in to the "well, I have depression, so what do I expect" thoughts (the very ones you are fighting!)
A psychologist (not a psychiatrist, which is a medical doctor which can, and will with haste, prescribe drugs) is who you really need to speak to. If you go to one for, say, 12 sessions and things aren't any better - tell that person so; if it keeps being not better, you are free to find another. A psychologist is trained to look for the reasons and the causes, the specific combination of scenarios I mentioned above, and work with the client to address them. However, they are also human and sometimes the match won't click; so give it enough time to be certain it isn't working, but not too much to waste your time. Be absolutely honest with them about everything. How can they help if they don't know everything?
Another option, honestly, is anti-depressants. Brain chemistry affects a person in every possible way. No branch of serious psychology believes that the brain is 100% unimportant to the treatment of psychological issues (though the "how does that make you feel? I see, and how does THAT make you feel?" group does try its hardest to believe it doesn't exist). Now, there are plenty of ways to adjust a system that is off kilter. One is though time, as these things can correct themselves. Another is a lifestyle change, such as you have performed (exercise releases chemicals that improve mood). Of course, yet another are drugs.
Entire branches of medicine have been devoted to anti-depressants, so you would need to do a lot of study into specific brands and their particular affects. First step is a psychiatrist, obviously, since you would need someone to supply the prescription. Unfortunately, you won't get much talk out of most of these doctors, since they are being paid to supply you meds, not talk about squishy things like feelings. There are those which do both... and you most certainly should go through a psychologist to get a referral first anyway (and so that the psychiatrist will have the psychologist's report to work from). As for the dangers... keep in mind "The squeaky wheel makes all the noise". You can find reams of news reports and personal blogs talking about the horrors of such-and-such drug... but you won't see nearly the same amount of data on the success stories because, well, they are better now and they have no reason to voice complaints about the item. Yes, in teenagers and young adults, certain classes of meds will increase suicide rates; this is not true for all classes of anti-depressants. Yes, some of these drugs have a hell of a withdrawl scenario; again this is not true for all of them. Some screw up your moods in bad ways; not all of them. Some of them flat out don't work for some people; again not all drugs nor all people. It may take time and energy to find one that works for your specific brain chemistry and life.
You know, it may actually be an issue with your thyroid or vitamins. When was the last time you had a full physical WITH blood work? Specifically work looking at a variety of signatures for output from various glands. As I said, every person is different.
As for your family - they mean well but some people simply don't have the capacity to empathize with depression. Either they have never had it OR they have it and are desperately attempting to ignore it and anything that may remind them of it OR they just aren't empathic people... who knows. Accept that they evidently do care and go no further with their intentions. If you can, perhaps try sitting down and telling them what it is like when you're in that mood. Don't mention depression or anything like that, just say that some times you feel horribly unable to do anything and you are trying to fight it but you need general support. Perhaps they can help drag you out of bed when you can't get up, help you remember to eat if you forgot to do so, or whatever. But if it is too much effort of them to do it or you to stand them (I know what that's like), then you may also need to explain that to them.
As for your girlfriend, again you need to explain it to her. Make sure she knows it isn't your fault and that you don't want to make her feel unloved but that sometimes it is very hard to do anything at all about anything and that you need her help. DO NOT FEEL GUILTY about asking her help or in making her feel bad for you. In fact, see my next paragraph...
Stop trying to hide this. It is no different, in function, to a broken leg. You can't just hobble around and be ashamed of the broken bone. You have to say "hey, look, I have a broken leg! I can't walk around on my own very well! If I need help, I hope that I may lean on someone until I can move on my own once more! I know that it will eventually heal and I will be better once more!" Not saying this will just lead you to even more sadness and sorrow because sometimes you will feel like you cannot handle the weight of things. If you aren't able to accept help and admit momentary setbacks, you will be trapped. There is nothing to be ashamed of here. As was said by your therapist, this is classic depression and, as such, is as I said: nothing special. It is something you will recover. Who cares if thousands haven't? Guess what? Millions and Millions have.
Depression is just something that happens. Do not be ashamed. Do not feel that it is the fault of anyone. Move through it and you will one day find yourself no longer depressed. Seek help from others because the nature of the problem is that you cannot always get by alone (which isn't to say that you need help; some people are able to pull themselves out without help... it all depends on a combination of countless inputs).
Murphy's Paradox: The more you plan, the more that can go wrong. The less you plan, the less likely your plan will succeed.
So I set goals. Yeah, sometimes it took time to set the "right" ones or ones that really worked, but that's kinda the key. You can't just accept other people's goals (like lord knows I'd be miserable if I lived the life my mother wanted for me), you have to find ones that keep you motivated. So I would decide on things like move to city X, achieve milestone Y (actually achieving them at times can be really scary, cuz then I have to find new goals...).
But in all that time you spend stewing and sitting around and thinking and such, I would recommend you try to find "what makes you happy," and then set goals to achieve that. Currently I'm trying to get a dog. It's a pretty difficult goal because of living situations and such, but it's what keeps me motivated going to work, trying to earn more money, achieve a stable lifestyle (like maybe if I stay at this one address long enough and develop a good enough relationship with the landlord he'll let me keep one here...), save, etc.
So yeah -- set goals, work towards them. That would be my first advice. And DON'T just let them be other people's goals, have them be YOUR goals.
You said in your own experience that you are wary of modifying your brain chemistry. I think this is a pretty common fear among the depressed, I know I had those same thoughts. However, consider the possibility that the depression is already altering your brain chemistry away from what it should be. The whole idea of the meds is to try and counteract that. They won't make you into a totally different person with a sudden obsession with knitting or anything. ;-) Side effects for the various pills can vary, but you can luck out as I did and have only very mild ones.
So, back to visting your doctor. This post here describing your feelings, you should pretty much print that out and take it with you to give him some insight into your current condition. Do not let some people's anecdotal evidence and fear mongering stop you from seeking treatment.
Normally, I'd advise talking your family, but that sounds like maybe it won't help much. If you haven't, sit down with your girl-friend and talk to her about your situation.
If you do want to improve your thinking then something like zoloft and therapy will help. You may have to bite the bullet and fork over some cash for therapy.
I was seeing a therapist for a year and funnily enough the only advice i got from that year was knowing that we feel the way we think. We actively change the chemical functions of our brain with our consciuos thoughts. The hardest thing to do is to change the daily thought that flit through your mind through the day. Pick a mantra of any sort to get your mind thinking along a more positive route. I'm an aspiring jazz musician and the current thing i'll be working on (and using as a makeshift mantra throughout the day) are ii v i chord progressions, i'll use this to take my mind off the multitude of humanist thoughts that i am prone to thinking.
ABOVE ALL TALK TO YOUR GIRL AS MUCH AS YOU CAN. Your parents sound like twits so save the effort of opening up to them and open up to your partner, it will strengthen what you already have with her.
She can definitely be helpful to you, and honesty is good with a partner, but she's not your therapist and leaning on her too hard will ruin your relationship.
Best analogy ever and sound ass advice. Listen to this person.
Not to say that this is the fix for your situation, because I am no doctor or anything, but . . . If you get this post exercise energy, maybe you can concentrate on that. I know that it sucks in the winter, and getting up the motivation is hard (like you said), but putting together that bike may help too. If not the bike, maybe whenever you feel yourself slipping into one of your moods, throw some shoes on and go for a run. Maybe that will help a li'l bit!
One of the other keys for recovering from clinical depression was to get as much sleep as you can. Don't set an alarm if you can manage that. At least make sure you get to bed to give yourself enough time to sleep. (I have real problems with that. I spent a few months struggling with setting an alarm on the opposite end of staying up late, and all it did was totally screw me over)
and in addition to avoiding heavy exercise, avoid stress which also kicks in hormones to use up lots of energy whether you have it or not. proper diet, blah blah blah.
Edit: Hell, it might even be worse than I thought... Oh my
Anyway, I've pimped this book before, and I'll pimp it again:
This is not your usual self-help book. It's about undoing the self-defeating habits that depression engenders. Despite the subtitle, it is neither anti-therapy nor anti-medication. Rather, it's best used as a compliment to both. It's not an "easy" book either, it's not the sort of thing you sit down and read in a weekend, it challenges you to constantly reassess your negative thought patterns and behaviors (and the negative thoughts and behaviors of the people around you) in a constructive way.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I've found that when I've been badly depressed, I'll get short bursts of energy from day to day, and it's tempting to overdo it. I'll feel really good on a given day, so I'll go running for like an hour and then crash out. That does me no good.
However, there is a ton of evidence that a moderate amount of exercise - 30 minutes a day, three days a week, of moderately intense cardio - is as good as medication for alleviating depression. The key is to be consistent... don't overdo it, and don't skip weeks.
Basically, overcoming depression is simple. It is not easy by any stretch, but it is simple. A combination of therapy, medication, and exercise on a consistent schedule, combined with an active effort to cut out negative influences from your life (that can include bad habits like drinking too much or playing WoW too much, or it can include overly negative and critical people who bring you down) and to improve your thought patterns and behaviors to break depressive cycles.
But to do it, you need to be fully present and honest in your therapy sessions. Hiding your emotions from a therapist is only going to sabotage you.
And if you're worried about the cost of medication, there are generics available now. When you start talking to a doctor again, let him know that you're concerned that you might lose your health insurance, and he'll take that into account when prescribing for you.
There's no magic bullet, unfortunately, but there is a way out.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
If you've been LACKING sleep, then sleeping more than 12 hours may be exactly what your body needs to CATCH UP.
When you're lacking energy, stressing your system constantly by cutting your sleep time, putting yourself under stress, getting hormones pumping from vigorous exercise... well, whatever. People can do whatever they like. If they want to burn themselves out constantly, they can. Just don't be surprised when you have to spend a lot longer to recover than you thought.
This. Your brain chemistry is already altered. Hence the depression. Trying meds to try and counter this alteration is not a bad idea. Try it. I would not be here today if it weren't for antidepressants.
but here's the page
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/5/9/83936/58483
I think part 2 you kind of have to search around to find. it's not just linked from the first article.
and sorry about the thread necromancy. I was doing a search for "depression" looking for stuff related to another Great Depression and stumbled upon that out of curiosity.
Also I think the point of volunteering and helping others is not so that you see people who are in worse conditions than you and then you should be happier because of it. The reason to do it is because in depression you tend to be very inward focused and need to make a habit of "getting out of yourself."
One of the things that stood out to me in your post was your lack of desire to try taking medication. In all honesty, when you're as badly depressed as you seem to be, medication is one of the most important steps to beating the problem. I remember reading a thread like this several years ago when I was still suffering depression, and someone said something to the tune of 'you don't want to take meds because you don't want to change who you are, but you're depressed with who you are, so why wouldn't you want to change that'. It may sound silly to say a simple sentence like that changed the way I thought about being depressed, but it really did.
If you do choose to get on medication, be aware that it might take a while before you find a medication that really works for you. I went through about ten different medications before I found one that actually worked for me without having unbearable side-effects. Even when I settled on that medication, it still had the one side-effect of making me sleep for 15 hours a day, which made me completely screw up my first year at university. But that was all worth it. If I hadn't taken those meds then, I would've probably not got better, and ended up killing myself.
Taking meds can give you a big step forward towards resolving whatever issues you have. It won't be like taking a magic pill that makes all your worries go away, you still have to deal with whatever makes you depressed, and to do that it would help if you continued seeing a therapist of some kind. I know you feel like your current therapist isn't helping much, so perhaps it's time you tried to find a new one. Just like with medication, you have to find a therapist that you feel fits well with you. But, you also have to stop trying to pretend to your therapist that you're okay, because that is not going to be at all helpful. You need to really open up to them before they can help you.
I get the feeling I'm rambling now, there's so much else I could say on the whole subject, but I'll leave it here. If you need someone to talk more to about this, feel free to drop me a PM. Most importantly though, just remember that there are plenty of people out there, such as myself, who've been exactly where you have, and gotten through it. It's not easy to get there, but you can be happy again.
Piling on. I waited until I was over FORTY to finally try an antidepressant. I should have done it a long time ago but I had the same "Don't want to artificially change my chemistry" idea as you.
If you decide to try them then listen to what your doctor tells you and make sure you're aware that antidepressants can increase likelihood of suicide when you start taking them. Just mentioning it because it happened in the 1st couple of weeks I took the meds and then went promptly away.
Moods were kinda weird for 1st 10-14 days then stabilized.
Only side effects noted were:
1) I started sleeping a LOT better (and that persists to this day)
2) Weird sensation of someone else "driving", like you're looking over your own shoulder. Hard to explain. This went away after 10 days or so.
All in all, the meds are a win for me...I just wish I hadn't waited 20 some years to try them.
Also, to be clear, they don't seem to elevate your mood artificially (which is what I was afraid of), it's more like a stabilizing effect. I still get all the same emotions I used to and in varying intensities just like you'd expect but stress doesn't seem to stick as easily. Stuff rolls off a little more.
And for reference I'm on Bupropion.
PSN: Broichan
This really does vary widely from person to person, based on that person's biology, as well as what type of issue they are taking anti depressants for, as well as what drug they are on. Keep in mind that there are different types of depression, and some cases may need drugs longer than others.
Ideally, the goal is not to be on anti-depressants permanently, but when you come of then depends on how you're responding to treatment, if your depression lifts or is continuous, etc. People may have recurrences of depression later in life, so they may need to go back on meds later in life.
From Wikipedia:
Note, that this is the length of treatment suggested *after* someone's symptoms are gone, and the length of time for that to happen is going to be very individual based.