Wednesday, January 21, 2015 // The Statement
4B
Wednesday, January 21, 2015 // The Statement 
5B

Editor’s Note: Some names have 

been changed to protect the privacy of 
individuals mentioned in the article.
M

aria is sitting on her bed, 
telling me about her medi-
cation. She is lying on her 

side with her head propped onto her 
right arm and her hand immersed in 
her long black hair. She has a freshly 
poured bowl of Fruit Loops in front 
of her. She apologizes in advance for 
eating while she talks, but she doesn’t 
want the cereal to get soggy. She isn’t 
wearing pants, just underwear, and 
I can see her hipbone jutting out. 
When she was at rehab for two weeks 
over the summer, staff members had 
to follow her into the bathroom to 
ensure she wasn’t bulimic.

“This is my natural body weight,” 

she says.

I believe her, but when I wrap my 

arms around her I worry she might 
break.

Maria’s room is a Candyland of 

designer clothes and scattered fur-
niture. Two months into the school 
year, she is still in the move-in pro-
cess, and shelves, dressers and boxes 
all line the floor of her bedroom 
helter-skelter. On a newly-built shelf 
adjacent to Maria’s bed rests a two-
foot-tall bong.

Next to this, Maria manages her 

own private pharmacy. Bottles of 
Klonopin, Seroquel, Lomictal and 
Vyvanse lie in a row. The Seroquel is 
new. She opens the lid and turns the 
bottle upside down, letting the pink, 
shockingly tiny pills fall into the cap.

“It’s smaller than my birth con-

trol,” she notes.

Maria is not the only American 

with a hefty collection of medica-
tions. Roughly 7 in 10 Americans are 
taking a prescription drug. A sizable 
portion of these drugs treats mental 
illness, the two most prevalent of 
which are depression and anxiety.

Anxiety is the most common 

mental illness in the United States, 
affecting 40 million Americans, or 
18 percent of the population. Depres-
sion is a close second — 19 million 
Americans have depression in a 
given year, and the lifetime risk of 
becoming depressed is 17 percent, 

according to the Anxiety Disorders 
Association of America.

Where there is illness in America, 

there is medication. Data shows 1 in 
10 Americans take an antidepressant, 
a drug used to treat both depression 
and 
anxiety. 

For women, this 
number is clos-
er to 1 in 4.

Maria 
is 

playing 
with 

a twiddler — 
a 
worm-like 

green necklace 
she bought at a 
drugstore. She 
has trichotillo-
mania, meaning 
she obsessively 
pulls out her 
hair. Her bald 
part-line 
is 

twice the thick-
ness it should 
be, 
because 

that’s where she prefers to uproot 
the black strands of keratin from 
their homes. She does this because 
she suffers from severe anxiety.

“I try and wear a hat all the time, 

but I also try and have something in 
my hands.”

As we talk, Maria repeatedly for-

gets about the twiddler and absent-
mindedly 
sticks her fin-
gers into her 
hair. 
When-

ever she does 
this, I silently 
hand her the 
twiddler.

Maria 
had 

good 
rea-

son to see a 
psychiatrist. 
She has been 
arrested twice 
— both times 
for assaulting 
a 
cop. 
Both 

while 
black-

out.

Her second arrest is what got her 

sent to rehab for drug and alcohol 
abuse. Since then, Maria has been 
diagnosed with Bipolar II Disor-

der. This is much less scary than 
it sounds, as Maria makes sure to 
inform me.

“I’ve never had a state of mania 

like a real bipolar person would,” she 
says. “Other than when I’m blackout 

drunk. That’s mania.”

Given her past, Maria’s diagno-

sis seems neither surprising nor 
inaccurate. Still, the pill bottles on 
her shelves draw my curiosity. The 
Klonopin treats her anxiety. The 
Lomictal and Seroquel act as mood 
stabilizers. The Vyvanse helps her 
focus.

She refers to herself and her psy-

chiatrist in the collective when she 
discusses why she takes all of these 
pills. In particular, the Lomictal no 

longer seems necessary now that she 
has been prescribed Seroquel.

“We don’t know what would hap-

pen if I got off it,” she says. “It’s not 
doing anything bad.”

Over the last decade, it has become 

more 
and 

more com-
mon for col-
lege-aged 
women 
to 

be on the 
types 
of 

medication 
that Maria 
takes. 
The 

chance 
of 

a 
major 

depressive 
episode 
in 
18 
to 

29-year-
olds is three 
times high-
er than in 
individuals 

60 years or older, according to the 
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of 
Mental Disorders.

Most of these episodes occur 

in females. A quarter of American 
women take a drug for a mental 
health disorder, compared to 15 per-
cent of men. The ratio of women to 
men on anti-anxiety meds is 2 to 1.

For many 

of my female 
friends, 
it 

began 
with 

anxiety. 
They 
went 

to a psychia-
trist because 
they 
were 

too anxious 
to 
function 

normally, 
and 
were 

ultimately 
prescribed 
either 
an 

antidepres-
sant or an 
anti-anxiety 

medication. From there, most were 
eventually labeled with a term like 
bipolar or clinically depressed.

“It’s important to not let the labels 

bother you,” Maria tells me, taking a 
bite of Fruit Loops. “All it is is a label 
for your symptoms.”

I ask Maria if she always knew 

she had a mental illness. The short 
answer is yes.

“I was really an angry kid, I did 

not have a great childhood.”

She sticks her fingers in her hair.
“It looked picture-perfect, but a 

picture-perfect family is usually not 
a close family.”

In my mind, I contrast my own 

experience with Maria’s. I grew up 
in an extraordinarily tight-knit fam-
ily. My father and mother spoiled me 
endlessly, and my three best friends 
— my sisters — were never more than 
a bedroom away.

Every day of my childhood, my 

father took my sisters and me on 
different adventures, like the movie 
theatre or the arcade or the park. 
He called these outings “secret mis-
sions.”

There was even a secret mission 

song (which I have now discovered, 
to my disappointment, is actually the 
James Bond movie theme). When 
we got home, my mom would brush 
our hair and take our coats off for us, 
then heat something up for dinner 
(she is an awful cook).

Growing up, I went to the same 

private school for eight years, but 
when I walked out of those heavy 
iron doors for good, I had made few 
close friends. My sisters and my par-
ents were my best friends.

When I started my freshman year 

of college, I left my family members 
behind. My older sister didn’t go 
away to college. I was the first one, 
and I had no idea what I was in for. 
At school, I felt completely alone. My 
family was only 45 minutes away, 
but it might as well have been light-
years. I had no one close to me, and 
no idea how to let someone get close 
to me. I missed my family terribly.

All I could think about was how 

my life would never be the same 
again, how it would never be good 
again.

I stopped eating. I stopped sleep-

ing.

I thought about death and dying 

constantly, and I cried all the time. 

This went on for months.

Despite some of my peers’ con-

cerns, I never sought professional 
help. I was sure if I told a therapist 
what I was going through, he or she 
would try and convince me to take 
medication. The concept of taking 
a pill to make me happy made me 
uncomfortable. It reminded me of all 
the books I’ve read where the main 
character gets brainwashed, and 
suddenly she’s lost all her individual 
thoughts. She becomes the minion 
of some generic Disney-type villain 
who has an odd hairstyle and gives 
long monologues about his evil plans.

I used to tear through these types 

of books. Experiencing my favorite 
character lose the ability to think for 
herself gave me a sick sort of pleasure. 
It would almost be freeing, I thought, 
to have someone else controlling you, 
thinking for you. I didn’t want to be 
prescribed antidepressants because 
I wasn’t sure I could resist. I wasn’t 
sure I could stop myself from tak-
ing one of those tiny pink pills that 
would wipe my sadness blank.

When Marilyn Gilbert returned 

my phone call, she was elated for the 
chance to get to know me. She left me 
a voicemail: “I have seen your photo 
in your dad’s office, so I have kind of 
already met you.”

A patient in my dad’s internal med-

icine practice, Gilbert, who holds a 
doctorate in psychology, verifies the 
rumor that doctors need doctors too.

Over the phone, her voice sounds 

like a character from Sesame Street. 
It maintains a softness, like she is 
teaching a child, but it is comforting 
rather than condescending.

As she talks, she continually uses 

examples drawn from tennis. I smile, 
realizing she knows I’ve played the 
sport my whole life.

Gilbert says she believes antide-

pressants are overprescribed, par-
ticularly to teenagers.

As a psychologist, Gilbert does 

not have the ability to prescribe the 
medication herself. What she can do 
is help to wean her young patients off 
antidepressants when she finds them 
unnecessary.

“It becomes a real problem for a 

lot of the college-age kids that are on 

them,” she tells me. “They’re embar-
rassed. They don’t want people to 
know, and they begin to worry it’s 
interfering with other functions.”

In place of drugs, Gilbert pre-

fers to trigger our body’s natural 
medication 
— 
endor-

phins. 
Endorphins 
are endog-
enous 
opioid neu-
ropeptides. 
Essentially, 
they’re 
our body’s 
built-in 
drug path-
ways meant 
to 
induce 

pleasure 
and relieve 
pain.

There 

are 
mul-

titudes of healthy ways to trigger a 
spike in endorphins: eating a good 
meal, exercising, getting enough 
sleep. Even seemingly superficial 
pleasures like eating dark chocolate 
or getting a massage will increase 
endorphins. High endorphin levels 
make people happier, reducing the 
need for antidepressants.

In some 

cases, 
though, 
drugs 
are 

necessary 
to 
treat 

depression, 
namely 
when 
the 

depression 
is 
defined 

as 
“clini-

cal.” 
But 

the 
line 

between 
clinical and 
non-clini-
cal can be 
fuzzy.

You can’t take a blood sample and 

tell if someone is depressed or not — 
you have to have a conversation.

Gilbert draws the clinical depres-

sion line based on two factors: inten-
sity and duration.

“How bad is it, and how long have 

you been struggling with this?” she 
asks her patients.

Questions of intensity and dura-

tion get at the larger question — is 
your depression so powerful that 
you can’t function? Inherent in this 
criterion is the idea that humans are 
supposed to be sad sometimes. It 
wouldn’t be natural if we were never 
anxious, angry, or upset.

“A good case of the blues, and 

dealing with loss and life changes is 

part of being alive,” Gilbert says.

If your mental illness is not harm-

ing your life in any tangible way, it’s 
not a mental illness. It’s a feeling.

Some instances of clinical depres-

sion stand out to Gilbert. These 
patients’ stories seem rehearsed, as if 
Gilbert has recalled them repeatedly.

One story is of a Michigan State 

University student who took a semes-
ter off, in part due to her depression. 
Every morning, she would run her-
self a hot bath, and stay in the bath-
tub for hours. She couldn’t convince 
herself to get out.

“The longer she stayed in the tub, 

the harder it was to get out and face 
the day,” Gilbert says.

The next story is of a man who 

compared living his life to “walking 
in glue.”

She pauses and takes a slow breath: 

“When someone says that to you, 
you get a pretty good image of how 

hard it 
is to get 
through 
each 
day.”

Raina 

sits 
across 
from me 
in 
one 

of 
the 

study 
rooms 
in 
my 

apart-
ment 
build-
ing. She 
usually 
texts me 

every morning, but she didn’t answer 
my texts for three days leading up to 
her interview. She’s dressed up to her 
usual hipster standard — a red-plaid, 
sleeveless collared shirt buttoned up 
to her chin, dark-wash blue jeans and 
black combat boots with silver studs 
on them. She kicks the boots off and 
they rest, homeless, under the table.

The 

room 
is 

entirely 
white. 
White 
walls, 
white 
table, 
white 
chairs 
— 
the 

blank, 
empty 
kind 
of 

white 
that 
is 

almost 
reflec-
tive 
in 

its uniformity. It’s the color of the 
Elmer’s glue kids use for their pre-
school art projects. The door of the 
small, square room is closed, and it’s 

so quiet that I can hear Raina’s slow 
breaths echo off of the erased walls.

Raina is on Zoloft, an SSRI or 

Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibi-
tor. SSRI’s are by far the most com-
mon type of antidepressant. They 
work by increasing your brain’s lev-
els of Serotonin, a mood-elevating 
neurotransmitter.

At the beginning of her sophomore 

year, Raina decided she wanted med-
ication for her anxiety. She had tried 
regular talk therapy, and she says 
it didn’t work for her. From a psy-
chologist’s point of view, Raina was 
a textbook candidate for medication: 
her anxiety was interfering with her 
everyday life.

“It was happening all the time,” 

she tells me. “I would feel awkward 
participating in class … Random stuff 
like that.”

Raina’s dark brown hair is pulled 

back, a typical style for her, and she 
plays with her ponytail as she talks. 
I watch her cleave the hair that 
is trapped in her hair tie into two 
strands with her fingers, then pull in 
opposite directions, tightening the 
ponytail.

“I was unhappy for no reason.”
I watch her loosen her ponytail 

and bring her hair over one shoulder.

“There would be fun things going 

on and I would still be overly emo-
tional about everything and overre-
act to things.”

When Raina first began to feel 

anxious, she turned to the Univer-
sity’s resources for students with 
mental health concerns. She went 
to Counseling and Psychological 
Services, which provides University 
students free mental health care, for 
individual therapy sessions to psy-
chiatry appointments.

Outside of the door of its third 

floor Michigan Union office, there 
is a wooden board with block let-
ters that say “Stop Student Suicide.” 
There are about 20 hooks nailed into 
the board with handwritten notes 
hanging from them. I don’t stop to 
read the notes as I walk in.

There is a rumor at the Univer-

sity that, if your roommate commits 
suicide, you get straight As for the 
semester. The rumor has such dark 
implications that I can’t fathom how 
it continues to seep through college 
freshmen like water spreading on a 
dry paper towel. Maybe it’s because 
everyone imagines it’s just a rumor 
— that no one’s roommate will ever 
actually commit suicide.

But they do, I think to myself as I 

stare at those words.

Stop Student Suicide.
Suddenly, I am 16 years old again. 

It’s morning, and my parents are 
talking in hushed whispers outside 

W a l k i n g i n G l u e :

Mental health among college women and the role of prescription medication

By Amabel Karoub, Daily News Editor

See GLUE, Page 8B

LUNA ANNA ARCHEY/DAILY

LUNA ANNA ARCHEY/DAILY

LUNA ANNA ARCHEY/DAILY

LUNA ANNA ARCHEY/DAILY

