Amy
Amy
You have to talk about the struggles
Amy knew Jason had depression long before she married him. He told her about it early in their relationship; he said he’d struggled in college. But stories are one thing. Living with it is another.
Two years into our marriage, when our son was 6 months old, we came back from a simple family vacation. We hadn’t even unpacked. Jason sat down on the couch and said quietly, without drama or excuses, ‘I need to go to the hospital.’
That was the first of 30 hospitalizations for Jason.
For years, Amy kept believing maybe “this one” will fix it. This medication. This series of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) sessions. This cycle of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). This specialist. This hospital admission.
But Jason’s depression was the kind the brochures don’t sugarcoat: chronic, treatment-resistant, and often including thoughts of suicide.
From the start, we made a decision not to keep his depression a secret from our son. When Cooper was little, we told him, in language a child could hold, that some dads need help keeping their feelings safe.
Cooper grew up always knowing about “the feelings hospital.” There was no whispering behind doors. No pretending.
That didn’t mean it was easy.
Living with chronic crisis wears down even the most loving marriage. I hit a wall.
I started therapy, not because I was failing, but because loving someone with severe illness without supporting yourself will break you.
Jason and I did couples work. Eventually Cooper needed his own therapy too. We leaned on friends, on his school, on anyone who would stand with us.
“You can grow up inside of a hard story and still thrive, not in spite of it but strengthened by it.”
Years later, Jason and Amy divorced. Not angrily, just honestly. They shared custody. And Cooper remained deeply connected to his dad without losing himself to his dad’s illness.
That is the thing I am proudest of: Cooper is his own person. He loves his father. He understands mental health challenges. And he takes care of himself.
He’s now a young adult in art school, designing his own life. Therapy taught Cooper he can have compassion without carrying responsibility. He does not walk around in fear of inheriting his father’s pain. He walks around knowing help exists.
Amy recognizes the shift in her openness about mental health. She recalls sitting on aluminum bleachers at a Little League game, casually asking the other parents if they knew a good child therapist.
When I heard my own voice, that level, public, unashamed question, I realized how far I’d come.
Jason deserves credit for that. So many people never ask for help, but Jason always did.
You have to talk about the struggles. You have to ask for help, not only for the person who is sick, but for the people who love them.”
Amy is a firm believer that silence does not protect families. It isolates them.
My son’s life proves the opposite: You can grow up inside of a hard story and still thrive, not in spite of it but strengthened by it.
