'I'm depressed – and it's frustrating that students don't understand'

A lot of students are pretty intolerant when it comes to mental health issues, says 22-year-old John Servante, who suffers from severe depression.

"Most students still think mental illness is a myth, that it's just the result of not enough sex, or not having a positive mental attitude, or not smoking enough weed," he says.

"They have no idea that mental conditions are genuine neurobiological illnesses. Someone confronted me, for example, about why I so seldom turn up to lectures, and I explained it was because of mental health issues. They just looked at me and said, 'Right, so you could actually just go to lectures. It's not like you're really sick'."

Servantes, a third-year English literature student at Warwick University, was diagnosed with clinical depression at the beginning of his second year.

In January of that academic year, his university sent him an email threatening him with expulsion over poor attendance, even though his personal tutor knew about his condition. The university later put this down to an "admin error". At the same time, Servante found he was being ostracised by other students.

In March, he set up an anonymous blog called A Diary of a Depressed Student under the pseudonym Charlie Brown (the anxious little boy in the Peanuts comic strip).

"I started the blog because I was having a miserable time at university and I was threatened with deregistration," Servante says. "I thought people needed to know how people like me were being treated, and I wanted to vent my frustrations in a way that might improve the social landscape for mentally ill students."

Servante was overwhelmed by the response from students around the world, who emailed him their stories of coping with depression at university. A year later, he decided to reveal his identity in the hope that it would give more students the courage to speak out.

Servante tells me that during bad patches, he suffers from insomnia and often awakens to suicidal thoughts: "Your mind races with these horrible voices telling you that life's not worth living – that you have no friends, no talents, no worth.

"By morning, you're exhausted, and you reach this inert phase where your mind's alive but your body's dead. With all the will in the world, you can't do anything to get up. If you cry or dribble or something, liquids just run down the side of your face."

The feelings of worthlessness and despair continue to haunt him throughout the day.

"If you make it out of the house, you experience this intense paranoia that everyone knows you're mentally ill and that they're disgusted with you, that you're so pathetic a mugger wouldn't bother with you," he says.

"The world becomes really loud with the sounds of your heart beating and your heavy breathing. You may not eat as a form of punishment for being so pathetic, so you'll starve yourself and not drink."

Sometimes he sets off in his car, but never completes the 20-minute journey to campus: "While driving, I go into this state where I feel that the misery in my head is a physical thing," he says. "The next thing I know, it's like an hour later, I've missed a seminar, and I'm curled up in the foetal position in my car by the side of the road."

Servante's illness has had a severe impact on his relationships with the opposite sex. "I'm now going out with a girl who also has depression," he says. "She's great and we have a lovely relationship, but no way would a non-depressed person go out with me.

"I've tried it before. You start seeing a girl, you admit that you have a mental illness and that's it – they are no longer remotely interested. You are placed firmly in the 'friend zone'. Or in a worst case scenario, they stop talking to you altogether."

Servante says there is more of a stigma about men having depression than women. "I find tutors are less sympathetic to male students with depression, judging by the stories I've had through the blog and personal experience," he says. "Girls can talk about being depressed and get some sympathy. Guys, even at Warwick, are treated as though they should shut up, man up, drink more and have more sex."

He had a "brief spell" of counselling at Warwick, but says it was underfunded and of little help.

"I quickly turned to the NHS and went through a long course of cognitive behavioural therapy," he says. "Undoubtedly – though I'm in no way cured – therapy saved my life."

He adds: "I never used anything like Samaritans because, until my family and friends confronted me about my depression, I was in deep denial. I used to put feeling suicidal down to being tired or not having eaten properly. It took me a long time to accept my mental illness."

Besides seeking professional help, he advises students suffering from mental illness to talk to other people about it.

"If you're unfortunate enough to find that those you talk to have no empathy, don't give up, because you aren't alone. No one should ever feel ashamed of an illness or disability. Talk to people and seek help any way you can."

(Source: TheGuardian)