A Relentless Hope

Surviving the Storm of Teen Depression

Gary E. Nelson

• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Year: 2007
• Print ISBN:
  9781556353093
  9781498210621
• eBook ISBN:
  9781621890089
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Church

Depression and related illnesses threaten to wreck the lives of many teens and their families. Suicide driven by these illnesses is one of the top killers of these young people. How do teens become depressed? What does depression feel like? How can we identify it? What helps depressed teens? What hurts them? How do families cope with teen depression? In A Relentless Hope Gary Nelson uses his experience as a pastor and pastoral counselor to guide the reader through an exploration of these and many other questions about teen depression. Nelson has worked with many teens over the years offering help to those who find themselves confronted by this potentially devastating attacker. The author also uses the story of his own son's journey through depression to weave together insights into the spiritual, emotional, cognitive, biological, and relational dimensions of teen depression. Through careful analysis, candid self-revelation, practical advice, and even humor, this pastor, counselor, and father reminds us that God's light of healing can shine through the darkness of depression and offer hope. A Relentless Hope is written for teens, parents, teachers, pastors, and any who walk with the afflicted through this valley of the shadow of death.

1

Three Fastballs Down the Middle (of the Hallway)

Looking at Teen Depression
from the “Outside”

It really wasn’t what you would call a fight. I’d say it was more of a disagreement between father and son. I don’t even remember raised voices. Tom and I were standing at the top of the stairs having some sort of discussion, which ended with him getting less than he wanted. It seemed simple enough. I thought it was settled when we finished talking and Tom walked down the stairs toward his bedroom.

Moments later, three loud “whomps” in quick succession contradicted my assumption. The explosions from the trio of fastballs signaled the beginning of the walk through the valley of the shadow of death that our family was about to begin. The sounds were just as foreign to us as Tom’s moods, thoughts, and behaviors would be in the next three years. When did the spaceship land and replace our son with an alien look alike?

The three baseballs Tom hurled through the downstairs hallway wall were the first in a long series of his actions and reactions totally baffling Patti and me. Never had we witnessed such behavior in our home. Never had disagreements or arguments been punctuated by acts of violence. Yet, there they were, the three round holes in the wall, marking the end of a discussion and the beginning of a nightmare.

The three fastballs had found their mark next to the closed door of Tom’s room. The door was the gateway to his private sanctuary. Unfortunately, the illness he was fighting soon turned the shelter of his sanctuary into a darkened torture chamber holding him in its clutches and threatening to drain his life force.

Tom was a great baseball player. By the time he was in middle school, he was an accurate pitcher with a seventy-mile an hour fastball. It explained why the holes in the wall were deep and neatly placed in a tight pattern. He was also a home run hitter with an incredibly powerful swing. Tom was good at a lot of things. Folks considered him a pretty well rounded guy who liked his friends, video games, baseball, and whatever else teens do when they “hang out.”

Tom’s academic record all the way to the end of middle school (sixth through eighth grade) was great. He was pretty self-motivated to complete his work on time and be as successful as possible in his academic endeavors. He made the honor roll many times. At the end of his eighth-grade year he was inducted into the Junior National Honor Society.

He was well liked by his coaches and teachers, and was very well behaved throughout his life. His mother and I enjoyed the compliments paid to him by many other adults. (Well, there was the time he clobbered one of the older women of the church with a snowball.)

I had just started serving as the pastor of a church in Rockport, Massachusetts. The church building had burned to the ground a few months before our arrival, so the congregation was meeting for worship in the basement of the town hall. Tom was five, and feeling his oats. He had just endured another Sunday morning worship service in the basement, and couldn’t wait to explode up the basement stairs and jump into the new fallen snow. He raced ahead of the adults to celebrate his freedom.

As one of the older women of the congregation began to ascend the stairs of the exterior basement stairwell, her head slowly appeared above the wall. Tom couldn’t resist the temptation. What a target! He plastered the side of her head with some of the newly accumulating ammunition he had expertly formed into a projectile. Fortunately, the woman wasn’t injured. The pastor was informed of his son’s mischievous behavior. Tom and I made the obligatory trip to her home for an apology. (I still have to admit, it was a huge temptation for a five-year-old, and a great shot as well.) Tom was well liked and appreciated by adults, even the snowball lady.

When Tom was nine years old we moved to northern Virginia where I began my work as a pastoral counselor. Patti and I bought a house with a big empty field across the street, so Tom and Rebekah would have plenty of room to play with friends. As Tom got older, his friends came to our house to hang out or to set up various activities in the field. Many a baseball found its way over the fence into the neighbor’s yard during the following sandlot games. They kept the field busy with baseball, football, and softball. When the snow covered the field and the adjacent hill, the sleds came out, and the neighborhood gang assembled for winter fun. The field rarely got a break.

Patti and I also found other ways to support our children’s social lives. Our van was often the neighborhood bus for activities like roller-skating and museum trips. When Tom became too old for the traditional birthday parties of his younger years, we’d celebrate his birthday by taking him and a minivan full of his friends to Camden Yards in Baltimore for an Orioles baseball game.

We also had a very active family life. The four of us traveled and played together, enjoying everything from national parks to amusement parks. We went hiking in the woods with our dogs when the weather permitted. When the snow arrived, we hit the slopes with our sleds. When weather trapped us inside, we resorted to board games, hobbies, and movies.

Life was great, so how did we go from enjoying life as a family to wondering if our son would make it through high school, or worse yet, remain alive for years to come? How did we go from laughing and celebrating to crying and cringing in fear? How did Tom wind up being so ugly to his parents and sister? Why did Tom retreat to his darkened bedroom and refuse to leave his bed for days and weeks on end? Why did Tom give up so much that seemed to be going so well for him? Why did Tom refuse to attend school, eventually finishing his education with a GED instead of a diploma? Why did Tom cut himself off from the world and almost bring about the end of his own life? When did the spaceship land and swap our beautiful son for an alien look-alike?

For many, if not most afflicted teens, depression, anxiety, and similar illnesses creep up gradually. Generally, there is not a single significant event the depressed teen can point to as the critical moment when their slide began. Occasionally, Tom would begin the school day by saying he had a stomachache, or that he didn’t feel well. When pressed, he really couldn’t say what was bothering him.

Gradually, the “I’m sick” days became more frequent. One missed school day began to follow another as Tom finished eighth grade and entered high school. Despite the fact that Patti and I were in frequent contact with his teachers and school counselor, the school’s computer started kicking out letters warning he might not pass the year, or that we could be turned over to the truancy department. Fear began to slowly gnaw at our insides like a silent, growing cancer.

Early on in the struggle, Patti and I tried the typical parent responses. “If you’re too sick to go to school, then you’re too sick to go to your friend’s house this evening.” We even tried, “If you’re too sick to go to school, then you’re definitely too sick to play baseball later today.” It really didn’t seem to matter. No amount of threatening or pushing could change his mind. Tom would just stay in the bed and pull the covers up higher over his head.

It was hard to imagine how Tom could hide under the covers for so long. There were so many interesting and exciting things awaiting him outside the boundaries of his darkened sanctuary. He was leading a very full life when this monstrous illness intensified its attack. Tom wasn’t hiding under the covers simply to avoid going to school; he was avoiding life. He wouldn’t even come out for his friends.

Tom’s buddies would knock at our front door and ask for him. Patti or I would have to tell them that Tom was home, but just didn’t want to see them. We could see the puzzled look on their faces as we gave them the news. Tom was their buddy. Why didn’t he want to see them? Patti and I began to recognize the same puzzled looks on a lot of faces as we found ourselves trying to explain the mystery of Tom’s illness to his teachers, coaches, and friends.

As the depression deepened and more school days were missed, Tom became more and more surly and irritable toward his family. He said ugly things to Patti and me. At times he was pretty hard on his younger sister. Patti and I tried to be observant and keep him from venting his frustrations on Rebekah, but I’m sure we were not always successful.

Along with Tom’s surliness came a hair-trigger temper, thus the three baseballs through the wall of the hallway. Tom’s anger seemed to come out of nowhere. He could be fairly even tempered one moment and then fly into a rage without a moment’s warning. More and more holes began to appear in the walls and ceiling of his room. Tom punched and kicked his painful feelings into the sheetrock that enclosed him in his tomb. The climax came one morning when he almost completely destroyed the door to his room. Something bothered him, so he repeatedly bashed the door with a barbell. The deafening noise almost scared us to death.

After that outburst, we found Tom lying on his bed, sobbing in his pillow. As he lay on his bed with his face buried in his pillow, it finally occurred to Tom what happened with his pummeled door was not a reflection of his true self. Tom knew deep within his soul he didn’t want to act that way. Patti and I had figured that out long before the morning of the door incident. We had known for quite awhile that we were not seeing “the real Tom.” Unfortunately, it took a while longer for us to help Tom come to that awareness. Tom wanted to believe his anger and moodiness were part of a teenager working out his parental conflicts.

As the door teetered on its hinges, Tom finally realized he was being driven to raging, destructive behavior by some force inside him that wasn’t part of his true self. He wasn’t acting from his normal personality or feelings. He really didn’t want to destroy things around him and damage relationships with people he loved. He finally had to admit to himself that he didn’t understand what was happening to him. That was the morning he was finally able to hear me when I explained to him that he was being attacked by the monster we call depression. Finally Tom agreed to let Patti and me get him some outside help. Thank God!

Most of the time Tom was able to handle his ugliness and temper in public. It was mainly reserved for home—lucky us. There were two exceptions I can recall. One night, early in the downward spiral, the four of us went out to dinner and then roller-skating at a local rink. While we were skating, there was some sort of bumping or pushing on the rink that involved Tom and three teenage boys who were strangers to us. The next thing I knew, Tom and the three young men were doing the teen posturing dance as though a fight was about to break out. I was shocked! I had never seen Tom handle himself like that. He was angry and ready to fight.

The other incident involving “public ugliness” happened several months later. A baseball coach was laying into Tom and giving him some pretty harsh criticism. Tom snapped, knocked over the water cooler and stormed out of the dugout. His temper flared instantly. He stormed out of the dugout and off the team.

As the strange and sometimes overwhelming feelings mounted, Tom became more and more isolated from the rest of his world. It was harder for him to do even the things he used to enjoy. His friends couldn’t get him to go out with them. He even pulled away from baseball. For a while, his mother, sister, and I were his only companions. Often it took every sort of urging, persuading, pushing, and dragging we could muster just to get him to leave the house and do something fun with us.

The real problem was that nothing was “fun” anymore. Tom felt more numbed than anything. In his mind, there was no reason to bother trying to do anything that might be fun. Nothing he could imagine could make him feel any better or different than numb. He was at the place of despair. The monster really had its hold on him.

The “down side” of the depression was also hidden from the public. When Tom was out and about, no one could tell there was anything wrong. He looked and acted pretty “normal” for a teenager. He wore brightly colored sports jerseys emblazoned with his favorite teams’ logos. He interacted with his friends in a healthy manner. Adults found him to be thoughtful, friendly, and helpful.

When Tom entered high school, he began to miss more and more days of school. Eventually, Patti and I went to the school for a team meeting with all of his teachers. His teachers said, “We don’t understand why we’re all sitting here in this conference. When Tom is in school, he’s a delight to be around. His classmates love him. We wish we had thirty more students just like him. When he gets up in front of the class to make a presentation, his content is excellent, and his delivery is incredibly entertaining. Last week Tom was doing a report about baseball and had the whole class doing ‘the wave’ like they were at the stadium.”

Patti and I responded, “We know the Tom you’re describing. He’s great. But here’s the other part you don’t see. When Tom is not in school, he’s home lying on his bed in a dark room. He’s not ‘skipping’ school so he can do something else instead of schoolwork. He won’t come out of his room for anyone or anything.” The teachers and school staff in the conference shook their heads in amazement. It just didn’t seem as though the two pictures were describing the same teen. How could the picture painted by the school staff be so bright and promising, while the picture presented by Patti and me was so dark and troubling? Sadly, both pictures really were describing the same troubled youth.

Part of the difficulty in fighting teenage depression is being able to identify it as it sneaks up on the teen. There is no one typical pattern that depression follows. There are signs that may hint at the presence of depression or a related illness, but the signs do not always coalesce into the same picture. Some teens may live a fairly normal public life and hide a private hell. Others may publicly display the wounds inflicted by the monster in their appearance and their actions. The truth is, it can be very difficult for the average person to spot a teen who is suffering from depression or one of its relatives. At times, it’s even difficult for professionals to spot these terrible maladies. That’s why we need more public discussion and education around depression and its related illnesses.

The subtlety and complexity of depression can make it difficult to spot. However, there are other reasons depression in teens can continue without being identified. Sometimes the untreated afflictions of the parents blind them to the struggles of their child. Not long ago I preached a sermon at a church and used part of Tom’s story as an example. A few days later I received a thank-you card from a young mother in her midthirties.

The young woman explained she had suffered tremendously from depression only a year before. Finally she went for professional help. In her words, “I had my ‘high’ times but mostly I was at an even low. Last year though I could no longer function and bring myself out of it. I saw my doctor and he put me on Zoloft (an antidepressant medication) and I can now look at every day as a gift instead of torment. Why my parents never saw the tears I cried every day I’ll never know. We have a terrible lineage of mental illness and addictions.” This young woman answered her own question. Her parents probably couldn’t see her struggles because of their own issues. If we want to help our children, we had better face our own demons first. We’ll get back to that later in this story.

Sometimes I’ve described the way people fighting depression appear to others by comparing depressed people to plates of food at a potluck lunch after church. The depressed person is the “filled plate,” and the various foo...

Table of contents

• A Relentless Hope
• Acknowledgments
• 1: Three Fastballs Down the Middle (of the Hallway)
• 2: “All My Bones Are Out of Joint” (Psalm 22:14)
• 3: Wrestling Holds to Use (on Parents)
• 4: How Do We Sing a Song to the Lord (in a Foreign Land?)
• 5: The Hurler, Anaconda, and Grizzly (and Other Things that Help)
• 6: Alligators (Swim with Caution)
• 7: Spiderman and the Hulk (A Wedding Dinner with Superheroes)
• Bibliography