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Teen discusses ongoing battle with depression By Dominik Kurek OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF Stigma and ignorance are the biggest challenges for people suffering from depression, says an Oakville teenager. Despite having depression and even attempting suicide, Rita (not her real name) says she is a normal person. "People see you differently. They don't see you as the people they know, but as a pity party," she said. "We're normal people. We have hobbies, we like different things, we own a dog or a cat. People need to stop thinking depression is everything about us. Depression is a little part of me." The 17-year-old spoke to The Oakville Beaver r on condition of anonymity. She wants to reduce the stigma and raise awareness of mental health issues and promote a charitable event being led by Oakville's Frank Zamuner. Zamuner will be doing his third annual Swim for Mental Health at Appleby College Nov. 24-26. This year's event, so far, has reached $22,000 in donations, which will help pay for upgrades to a seclusion room at Oakville-Trafalgar Memorial Hospital's (OTMH) emergency department, where children often go when they arrive for a mental health emergency. Rita graduated high school last year but is now improving her grades for university. Now at the third high school she has attended, the road to depression was a long one, she admits. Recalling Grade 5, Rita said, "I loved school, but I found it difficult to find friends," she said. "I didn't seem to mesh. I felt (I was) the odd one out." She got along better with adults and though h h she h had h d a few f good d friends, f d she h said d she was bullied in school. Depression struck in Grade 7, when things got tougher. She was in a small grade group at her school with a lot of gossip going around. As the rumours increased, her grades decreased. At the suggestion of her teachers, Rita received tutoring for her schoolwork, but that did not solve the conflict with her tormentors at school. She would come home in tears, but when asked about it by her mother, she said nothing. By Grade 8, she said she was sent to a psychologist. That was after her parents l learned d of fh her unhappiness h at school h l and d the h bullying she faced despite efforts by adults to resolve the problem. She stayed at the school until Grade 9, but when the psychologist first mentioned the word depression, her parents took her out of the school, she recalled. At first, the transition to a new school was easy. Rita made friends easily, but soon learned there was a social order at this school just as in the previous. "So much is focused on material things for the level you were at, I didn't understand it," she said. See Depression page 18 7 · Wednesday, November 23, 2011 OAKVILLE BEAVER · www.insideHALTON.com Appleby College dives in Oakville's 75-year-old Frank Zamuner will be swimming 100 lengths of Appleby College's Olympic-sized pool each of the three days of the Swim for Mental Health, Nov. 24-26. To him, the event is more about raising awareness than funds, and swimming is a therapeutic. "If you swim for X amount of time and come out of the swimming pool, it does evaporate or it does exhaust stress and anxiety and you feel at peace," he said. Zamuner's bout with depression began after he had a triple heart bypass in 2005. Always an active person, after the surgery he began losing sleep, started feeling sorry for himself and it got to the point where he couldn't get out of bed. His psychologist suggested he return to swimming. "Swimming is one of the best things you can do to evaporate stress," he said. "The reason for that is that when I swim for an hour and 20 minutes, I do a 100 lengths continuous, without stopping. When you do that, you're forced to put your head in the water and then you're lifting it out. In other words, you're forced to breathe continuously. One of the therapies, in particular for mental illness, is breathing." Zamuner wants people to know depression does not discriminate and could hit anyone. It carries a price-tag of $51 billion in Canada each year, when combining the cost to the economy through lost productivity and healthcare expenses. Zamuner won't be the only one swimming. Appleby College will have teams of swimmers in the pool as the school also joined the fight. Frank Zamuner "Appleby College has a long history of community events," said Steve Poplar, a guidance counsellor at the school. "This one is sort of a natural for us, as far as mental illness and mental health. As a school and a high school, we do deal with those issues, not only with our students, but people within the community and we're happy to support that and OTMH (Oakville-Trafalgar Memorial Hospital) and their needs as far as mental health is concerned." Students at the school also helped organize the event. For information, visit www.swimformentalhealth.com. To sponsor a student swim team, contact Poplar at 905-845-4681, ext. 295. 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