Antje: 40 kg less and no more depression!

Antje: 40 kg less and no more depression!

Dear Mrs. Herzog,

I would like to thank you. Since I met you one year ago, my life has changed completely for the better. I am so happy and glad that I even celebrate my birthday twice a year now, once on my actual birthday and once when I started living again—the day I went to your seminar. It's only been one year, but it seems like forever that I feel so good.

I think I was a pretty hopeless case. I was really exhausted and broken and beyond what you call life. Basically, I just existed, functioned, and vegetated. Today, I think I can say that I was very depressed.

The way I treated myself was really not good. I thought I was worthless, disgusting, an imposition on those around me, and stupid. I thought others were as disgusted with me as I was with myself. Every day, I wished I would die. I didn't know in the morning whether I would come home again in the evening and whether I would still be there in the morning. I had no positive feelings at all.

I started destroying things as a child and loved to get into fights. Then, I was fine for a short time as a 16-year-old. I lost a lot of weight and made friends again. I had real self-confidence and self-esteem. Unfortunately, that didn't last long.

When I was doing my internship, I was raped. I blamed myself because of the clothes I wore, that I had gone along, and that I should have fought more. I managed to hide it. Everyone thought I was fine. I did much better at school, I didn't have any more problems, and I lost a lot of weight at first. But I was anything but well.

At some point, I started hurting myself. At first, it was small things like tearing a wound open again and again; later, I scratched my arms with a razor blade, and when that wasn't enough, because I had run out of space, I scratched my legs. However, I have to say that I was always careful not to cut too deeply. It was enough for me to see the blood and feel the slight burning sensation, which was very pleasant for me at the time. I don't think it's bad. Back then, I needed it to feel something, to see that I was still there, and to get rid of the inner pressure. If I hadn't discovered this possibility back then, I probably wouldn't be alive today. The only disadvantage of scoring is that if you do it for a while, you must cut deeper to get blood. When there was nothing left, I did it under the soles of my feet and wore sneakers barefoot. This had the advantage that it burns longer as it sometimes becomes inflamed.

As I thought I was an imposition on my family and friends, I isolated myself more and more. And on the other hand, I didn't want people around me either. The only company I liked was animals, especially dogs. For a long time, I thought animals were better than people. I locked myself in my room and only came out for the essentials like school, eating, and going to the toilet. I sat in the dark with my blinds pulled down, watched TV, and ate anything that got in my way. My room had become a pigsty with tripping hazards.

Then, I hoped that everything would get better with my education, but it only got worse. I played my part, but inside I was dead. When my dog died, I was completely alone. I started feeling nothing, which was even worse than feeling bad. In order to feel anything at all, I started taking heroin. I couldn't take it the first time, but then I felt something good. I finally felt warm for a long time, and I could fall asleep. I knew it wasn't good for me, but I didn't care. It was more important for me to have the feeling.

When I passed my apprenticeship and moved back home, I was happy for once not to have any feelings because it was easy for me to come down from the stuff. Nobody noticed because I locked myself away. But I have to admit that I longed for that feeling for years. I spent many nights on the road, driving there and back and back and back, saying every time I was there, if you're at home and still want it, you're going back. It's only really been out of my head since I started having my own feelings again.

It was a terrible time, and I don't know if I could survive it again today. This absolute isolation, this gorging on everything that was somehow still edible, not being able to sleep properly at night, not being able to bear being touched, always being under constant power to recognize danger, calculating escape options in every building, trying to think what the other person wants to hear and anticipating what answers might come in order to be able to react to them. Anyone who doesn't go crazy or lose it has a really thick skin. It's really frightening.