Losing my parents drove me into years of depression

Rebecca Alfreds Cherop is a jovial 25 year old. Her beautiful smile lights up a room. But behind the glamourous smile, is a woman who is healing from emotional pain, inflicted on her, after the loss of her parents. Years later, after losing her parents at the age of six, she suffered from severe depression to the point that she contemplated committing suicide.
Cherop’s unfortunate story started in 2000. This is when her father became unwell and passed away in November, 2000. She was later to learn that the responsibility of looking after the family then fell on Cherop’ s mother, a turning point that took quite a toll on her. Her mother was not working at that time. In the end, the duty of being the new breadwinner became unbearable. The new family care taker fell ill and passed on in March 2001.
Because she was young, all she remembers was being told by her siblings that, “Daddy and mummy are away for some time. They will return soon.” She believed the lie. Meanwhile, a drastic change was about to happen in her life and that of her four older siblings.

New life
Losing both parents meant that Cherop (who was the last born) and her siblings, had to find a new home. Although they hail from Kapchorwa District in the eastern region, Cherop’s family was living in Kenya at the time.
The new life now required her to return to Uganda, Mbale to be exact, to stay with one of her maternal uncles. Her siblings also went to stay with other relatives. Life in a new home was not rosy. The whole experience of a child staying with individuals who are not his or her parents is never pleasant.
“Even when I was very young, I had to cook, wash and do other house chores,” Cherop says. I would not mind doing all these chores if only my uncle’s wife loved me and treated me like a child,” she says.
One day, during a visit to Mbale to check on Cherop, her eldest sister was shocked upon seeing the youngster. “She must have realised that I was being mistreated. She immediately took me to Kampala to stay with another relative, a paternal aunt,” she says.
Cherop, who had stayed with her uncle from 2001 to 2003, joined her aunt in 2004 who looked after her until she completed university. “She treated me like a daughter. She cared, loved and nurtured me. Even when I erred, she corrected me with love,” Cherop says.

Education
She completed primary seven in 2006 at Kireka Church of Uganda Primary School. Throughout her secondary and university, she studied on a scholarship courtesy of funds given to her by the Godparents association. Cherop sat her Senior Four in 2010 at Peace High School, Matugga and Senior Six in 2012 at Bethany High School, Naalya.
In 2013, she enrolled for a Bachelors Degree in Business Computing at Uganda Christian University (UCU) and graduated in 2016. Currently, she is studying a post graduate diploma in project planning and management at Uganda Management Institute (UMI).

The depression crisis
As Cherop grew older, it was hard for her to cope with life without her parents.
“What made things even harder was the fact that I was not staying with my siblings. We were all scattered in different locations. So, whenever I was having a difficult time, no one was there to comfort me. Neither my parents nor my siblings. Although my relatives were there, I needed to be loved and taken care of just like any other child,” she painfully recollects.
This forced Cherop to bottle up her feelings. It was until completing university that things took a turn for the worst. She slipped into depression.
“I reached a point where I was crying every day. I kept thinking that if my parents were alive, I would not be suffering like I was. I even began questioning God’s existence and why he chose to take my parents.”
The depression reached a tipping point that drove Cherop into solitude. “I was forced to leave my aunt’s house and started renting. My boyfriend paid the rent fees. I also managed to find work that kept me busy.”
After completing her university course, she undertook internship in 2017 at Uganda Non-Communicable Disease Alliance (UNCDA) before crossing over to Munu Technologies Associates Limited (MunuTech), to work as a data entry clerk and analyst.
“I resigned from MunuTech in mid-2018 after almost eight months on the job. I could not keep up with the work because of the depression,” she says. Cherop still felt that no one really cared or paid attention to her.
“All I ever wanted was people to always check on me asking how I was doing. I wanted them to love and care for me. But no one called. I decided to seek for attention elsewhere, especially on social media,” she says.

Social media antics
From time to time, Cherop wrote posts and uploaded pictures on different social media sites purposely to gather likes, comments and shares.
“I did get those likes and they indeed boosted my ego. This was a sign that there were people out there who at least cared for me,” she says.
For a while, Cherop thrived on social media attention. However, along the way, she began realising that both pictures and posts were not representing her true herself.
“I was faking life. The posts and pictures were just a cover up. There I was posting pictures that I was happy, but deep inside, I felt empty. The truth was that I was hurt, wounded and hiding behind a mask. Behind those smiling pictures, I was broken and sad,” she says.
When suicidal thoughts kept creeping in, Cherop realised that she needed to seek help. “While I contemplated suicide, it dawned on me that this action would break my siblings apart, yet we only had ourselves. Besides, they had so much hope in me. They looked up to me for a bright future. Killing myself would wound them the more?”
Cherop sought help. She got in touch with a professional counsellor who helped her to overcome grief as well as deal with depression.
On January 11, 2019, Cherop paid a visit to one of the city churches. During the service, members of the congregation with issues were asked to walk to the pulpit so that they could be prayed for.
“I remember standing up, walking to the podium and cried my heart out. I held onto one of the church leaders, who gave me an assurance that everything would be fine.” I stopped crying and most importantly accepted the fact that my parents passed away and will never come back,” she says.

Life today
Life is much better unlike before for Cherop. By sharing her story, she hopes that many people going through a similar ordeal will know that they are not alone. Instead of fighting life’s battles alone, Cherop advises individuals to always seek help.
“Talk to someone you trust about what you are going through. You will feel much better. Don’t conceal your feelings. Don’t die in silence. Speak out.” Cherop has decided to put her life story in writing by authoring the book titled, Gracefully mended, a memoir on finding hope in the detours of life. The book launch is slated for April 2020.
“The inspiration for writing this book was drawn from attending a one year- leadership course. Other participants and I were challenged to share our stories by documenting them,” she says. Most recently, she founded The Semicolon Nation, an organisation that addresses mental health issues.

What is depression?
According to information from the World Health Organisation (WHO), depression is a common mental disorder affecting more than 264 million people of all ages across the world. More women are affected by depression than men. Depending on the number and severity of symptoms, a depressive episode can be categorised as mild, moderate or severe. A case in point, the recurrent depressive disorder involves repeated depressive episodes. During these episodes, the person experiences depressed mood, loss of interest and enjoyment, and reduced energy leading to diminished activity for at least two weeks. Then, bipolar affective disorder is a type of depression consisting of both manic and depressive episodes separated by periods of normal mood. Manic episodes involve elevated or irritable mood, over-activity, pressure of speech, inflated self-esteem and a decreased need for sleep. There are effective treatments for moderate and severe depression. Health-care providers may offer psychological treatments such as behavioral activation, cognitive behavioral therapy and interpersonal psychotherapy, or antidepressant medication.

Staying afloat
As a way of limiting incidents of depression, Cherop says she does the following;
•Read a lot of positive material including books
•Keep the company of positive minded people. “I don’t hang around people who are always so negative about life.”
•Pray asking for God’s divine intervention. I always ask him to help me steer my mind away from negative thoughts.