How many of you have your depression linked to another physical condition or disability? My depression seems to be linked to my epilepsy. All anticonvulsants have this as a side effect, and theres nothing more depressing than waking with your face swollen, your mouth cut to pieces and sore muscles and bruises. I spend a great deal of my time serving on City and State Commissiond, focusing on disabilities, housing, homelessness, and Disabled Veterans, Including those returning with traumatic brain injuries, and Post Traumatic Stress disorder.

My downfall is that I have recently been deprived or paratransit, and fixed route service is very limited, so I have to be home by 8 p.m., and recreation or Church on Sundays, and events on Holidays (like the 4th of July fireworks). This has forced me to resign from many of the boards I serve on, and eliminated all social activities. Although I do enjoy walking. Having to put my dog down a few years ago, eliminated my security, and makes me more depressed when I go to the park, because all I do is think of her! Now I feal institutionalized within my own home!

How many of you suffer similar symptoms for the inability to drive, a heart or respitory problem that limits you from walking, the blind who find it difficult to navigate sidewalks, and so many other conditions that make you depressed? I found from my own disability, and working with others that this is quite common. I would have loved to go swiming at the beach this summer, and a friend in a wheelchair just cried when we went to a little league game. Simply because he was deprived as a child.

Do you esperience this kind of depression?