Biological Loading

The story goes that my great grandmother’s great uncles were the Brothers Grimm who collected the fairy tales, but I’ve never found anyone to confirm it. My great grandparents came to Elberta, Alabama, from Cincinnati. The bought the farm sight unseen and traveled miles by train expecting to see fruit trees and fields pregnant with grain. Instead they found fields filled with stumps. They had three sons, John, Joe, and Frank. The family spoke German at home and the boys spoke English at school.

At that time, satsumas were a cash crop in this area. They are a type of citrus fruit, similar to a tangerine, easy to peel and with segments that break apart. The skin was thick and smelled spicy with pine undertones. They are always ripe around Thanksgiving and although they are not a commercial crop any more, nearly everyone has at least one tree in their yard. Hand-painted signs, a dollar a dozen, dot the landscape but the locals aren’t buying. If they don’t have enough of their own, someone is sure to give them all they need.

But back when my grandfather, Joe, was a young man, they were grown in great orchards. He would take a truck load full and head north, selling them until he ran out, then returning home. His family was shocked when on one of these satsuma trips he returned with a wife.

I have a copy of their wedding picture hanging in my living room. My grandmother is in a beautiful dress with a high collar, her head held proud, a half smile on her face. I’ve seen that same smile over and over again on the faces of my cousins when they think they’ve accomplished something sly or clever.

Her three sisters went on to become nuns and she went on to have twelve children, six boys, six girls. Two of the boys died at birth or shortly after.

I first saw that wedding picture only recently and I was incredulous. All the other pictures I’d seen portrayed a women exhausted and drained. Here she was young and beautiful. Of course, this was before the debilitating depressions that sent her to the hospital in New Orleans, where, when she was able to, she enjoyed looking through shop windows at the Hummel figurines. Without the benefits of the SSRI’s or even the tricyclics she endured the ECT that enabled her to return home.

One of her daughters has refused treatment time and time again for her symptoms. Some say it is severe bipolar disorder with psychotic features. Others say she is schizophrenic. I don’t know. I just remember when I was very young and she let me hold one of her many rabbits. I could feel its heart purr beneath my hands. I don’t associate her with her outrageous behavior, the son she eventually was forced to give up, the reaction she creates in her brothers and sisters. I just close my eyes and remember how gentle she was with that rabbit, leaning low to me, showing me where to feel the heart and what it was. Maybe I see the person where other people see the disease. I know she isn’t pleasant to be around sometimes, but her world isn’t pleasant to her sometimes.

My mother gets phone calls. What is Melissa’s diagnosis? When did you know? How did you know? What medication does she take? They never call me directly. I’m not sure why. But I do know why my mother is the one that gets the calls as opposed to the others who are in treatment. It is because I’ve been the most open and realistic about where I am and who I am. I know there are others but they don’t talk about it. We just hear the whispers, shadows of the truth.

There is nothing worse than going to a family function where mothers with small children hang back. They offer the baby to everyone old enough but me. They don’t ask me about my plans, my aspirations. I get pity looks and although they want all the details of my illness, they won’t ask me directly. And the favor is not always returned.

Then there are those who treat me like I am a normal person with normal feelings. I think they are the ones who understand intimately what I am going through.

Sometimes I am amazed that the worst stigma I can face comes from my own extended family.

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Discussions

Nikki (July 28, 2003): This makes a lot of sense to me, however, I do have a question. What does it have to do with German heritage? I would like to understand the relationship between being of German ancestry and depression. I heard that there is a huge relationship between being German and depression? Other than that, what this article posted made a lot of sense and I may even show this article to my father who does not know anything about depression at all.

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Melissa

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