My struggle with depression and anxiety

This article is written by Jenna Bottcher Hansen, manager of ministerial relations and services at the New Zealand Ministry of Justice

Often in public service agencies there isn’t much of a handover when you start a new role.

Even with a standard four-week notice period, by the time a new hire has handed in their notice, there’s little space for any overlap. When I was pregnant with my eldest daughter, I figured there’d be ample time to arrange a decent handover with the new member of my team. I was keen to set a great first impression, so we scheduled a week for just this purpose.

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One hour into the handover, I explained I had to nip out for my standard pregnancy check-up. I didn’t return to work and my daughter was born at 4:30pm that afternoon.

It was a traumatic birth. My daughter was born prematurely in hospital, and it took time for me to recover from the caesarean. I struggled with breastfeeding, and all the hormonal changes that go with it, and so began my struggle with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression and anxiety.

My daughter is now five and a half years old, which is exactly how long I have been living with these mental health issues.

Returning to work

I returned to work when she was 13 months old. With my second daughter, who is two years younger, I returned to work when she was 10 months old and able to attend day-care.

I wasn’t actually due to start back at work for a good couple of months. However, my depression became so bad that work felt like a safer place for me to be than at home with my two girls.

It wasn’t that I was unhappy with my two girls, or that I didn’t still occasionally struggle at work. I can recall one occasion, when I had already worked full-time for about two years, I had written a monthly report on our organisation’s performance that I was very invested in and proud of. My deputy secretary rewrote the whole thing, and I ended up crying in the work bathroom. It took me a long time to get used to having my work re-organised by others, and to not take this as a personal attack.

An ongoing struggle

In the last couple of years, there have been several occasions where I’ve once again found myself in the bathroom crying. Sometimes I’ve had to go outside for a walk around the block, circling it maybe once, maybe five times. Last week I sat in silence in a meeting room by myself for half an hour, just trying to get my energy levels back up.

I know logically that whatever email or piece of news has set me off, it has nothing to do with me personally. Nonetheless, it triggers my fight or flight response, a very easy thing to trigger in someone with anxiety. I can make sense of it when I am at home and parenting. In terms of our basic chemistry as human beings, I can appreciate well enough the instinct to get fired up so as to protect and guide our children. At work though, we are constantly expected to manage our primal instincts to defend ourselves with civility, calm and professionalism.

I try to recognise, particularly at work, when other people may not themselves be at their best.

I also know that this isn’t necessarily something I will learn to master in the next few years of my career. There are ways to minimise certain work triggers, such as learning what words or stylistic preferences my deputy secretary has, or factoring in extra time for rewrites. However, the truth is that my fight or flight response is now much less predictable, or rational, than it was before my mental health battle began.

I take medication for both my depression and my anxiety. I have been to traditional talking therapy and have even tried hypnotherapy. I practice yoga, mindfulness and breathing exercises. I consciously track my moods and emotions, using apps such as Youper. I make sure to spend time doing things I enjoy, such as playing with my girls. At work, I make sure to recognise the wins, big and small. I am authentic with my team and I am vocal when I sense I am not my best self.

Suffice it to say, I am a work in progress. Often, I come home from work and have to lie down for a while before I can shift into parenting mode. I usually work on the train to and from work, but I know I could often use that time better by giving my mind a break. I am notoriously bad at stepping away from my desk. This is one thing I know I must get better at.

Be patient, be kind

I have slowly learned to be more patient with myself, and with others too. I try to recognise, particularly at work, when other people may not themselves be at their best. I often feel as though I barely manage my own struggles, and so don’t claim to be of much help to anyone else with theirs.

Now, every day ends with a handover from the person I am today to the person I will wake up as tomorrow. This clears the deck, and encourages me to embrace the fact that tomorrow will be hard. But as the minister of the Free Church of Scotland, Reverend Dr. John Watson said: “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

I haven’t written this to offer easy solutions, to raise awareness or tell a story of triumph over adversity. Rather, I simply want to share with other public servants the kind of struggles we acknowledge in the abstract, but perhaps don’t talk about in enough detail. If you’re fighting a hard battle, don’t fight it alone. We are all here, ready to listen and learn. —Jenna Bottcher Hansen

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