Depression is my life, it seems. I only have lapses in my issues with chronic depression. Interestingly enough, I've never seen my depression as the most difficult of my illnesses to deal with. While, yes, it is ever consuming and leaves me begging for mercy every time, it is the anxiety and insomnia (and what those disorders umbrella) that maintains an unbearable strain on my life. However, answering the original question, I've dealt with depression for the better part of my life. Earliest I think I could've been diagnosed with depression was probably as young as six. I wasn't actually diagnosed until high school, though.