A Shocking Development: How ECT Gave Me Back My Writing

"There is not much else I can do for you chemically," my psychiatrist told me directly.

"And that means?" I asked, trying to care.

"I'm recommending ECT."

ECT. Electro-convulsive therapy, once known as electro-shock. I knew what that was all about, or at least I thought I did. I'd seen One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

But I also understood that it was time for something drastic. My moods have always been on a roller coaster to hell thanks to my bipolar disorder. In December of last year, a cruel depression had swept in, obliterating everything that was good in my life. Motivation became a thing of the past. Next my concentration failed me and I began making stupid, rookie mistakes. As one medication after another failed to restore me to even a semblance of normalcy, my thoughts turned to suicide. And fixated there.

Yes, it was time for something drastic, but I still trembled as I approached the hospital for my first session of ECT. (The initial phase of ECT usually consists of three outpatient treatments a week for four weeks.) I had visions of being dragged into an empty room and restrained in a straitjacket.