Please note: Accuracy and availability of IPR transcripts may vary. 00;00;00;07 - 00;00;33;22 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Genetics, brain chemistry, personality and life events all are contributing factors to the more than 40 million adults in the US who suffer from anxiety or depression. Yet with nearly 12% of the overall population battling these illnesses, mental health is still stigmatized and misunderstood. I'm J.R. Jamison today on the Facing project. I'll share the story of a missionary who battled depression 4000 miles from home, and another from a college student with a broken brain who says the best way to help is to listen. 00;00;33;25 - 00;00;56;04 J.R. Jamison Later in the show, I'll be joined by that former college student who is now a high school English teacher. Today's episode does involve instances of suicide contemplation that may be upsetting to some listeners. 00;00;56;06 - 00;01;18;21 Amy Leffingwell Leffingwell: It's not the common cold. Bailie Sage's story as told to Jon Toronto, performed by Amy Leffingwell. I never thought of myself as a sad person, just an anxious one. I first noticed that I was experiencing something other than my normal anxiety. While training for a latter day Saints mission in South America. I still can't explain what I felt. 00;01;18;22 - 00;01;48;21 Amy Leffingwell Confusion, darkness. When the bad feelings became unbearable. I told my training leaders that I needed to go home. They didn't listen. No matter how hard I tried to explain how emotionally off I felt, they insisted there was nothing wrong with me. They were convinced that if I went home, I regret it forever. I was frustrated. My feelings weren't being heard, and it didn't seem to matter that the idea of going home was the only thing that brought me clarity and peace of mind. 00;01;48;23 - 00;02;15;11 Amy Leffingwell Once out of training, I was sent to Ayacucho, a Peruvian city only accessible by a 12 hour switchback mountainous bus ride, a bus the missionaries had appropriately renamed the Vomit Comet. Once there, I was partnered with a missionary from Mexico. She was stripped and we butted heads immediately and my negative feelings quickly resurfaced. Three weeks in, I decided I would be going home. 00;02;15;13 - 00;02;37;02 Amy Leffingwell I hated the work. I hated that we climbed literal mountains every day, only to be met with doors closing in on our faces. I hated how most of the people didn't even speak Spanish, but rather an ancient Incan dialect that I couldn't learn. Then there was my companion. I hated how literal she took everything. I hated her public shaming of those who didn't go to church. 00;02;37;05 - 00;02;57;17 Amy Leffingwell I hated how she made me feel like I was doing everything wrong. I especially hated that she walked blocks in front of me whenever we were out. It made the loneliness of my thoughts even worse. When I eventually mentioned what I was feeling, she lectured me with Bible passages. She, like my previous training leaders, told me that I needed to stay. 00;02;57;22 - 00;03;19;02 Amy Leffingwell God would harshly judge me if I were to go home early. My fellow missionaries found out my struggles and advised me to call our mission president. The second he answered the phone. My tears started. I explained a little how I was feeling before he interrupted to give me a 40 minute pep talk. He told me to hang in there. 00;03;19;03 - 00;03;49;08 Amy Leffingwell Six weeks was not enough time to decide whether a mission was for me, and that I should keep going a little longer. Silent tears rolled down my face the entire conversation. I couldn't believe I was being dismissed once again. The mission president eventually visit Ayacucho and I was able to talk to him in person. He listened and told me about an American psychologist in Lima who often helped missionaries that had a hard time adjusting, so I was moved to Lima. 00;03;49;11 - 00;04;11;08 Amy Leffingwell Right off the bat, the psychologist diagnosed me with depression and anxiety, but there was no talk of going home. Instead, he prescribed me Zoloft and Tylenol PM and sent me on my way. I won't lie and say it worked immediately. It took over a month before I felt good. When I did, it was the most amazing feeling, like a heavy dark cloud had just been lifted. 00;04;11;11 - 00;04;39;26 Amy Leffingwell It was around then that my whole perspective changed. I stopped missing my family. I stopped complaining and I stopped feeling down. I began to love the Peru experience. Every rejection we got, the hilarious cultural miscommunications that happened daily, even the frustration of aimlessly wandering the streets. It was all good. My medication worked pretty well for five months. Then one day my companion asked me if I was all right. 00;04;40;00 - 00;05;02;08 Amy Leffingwell She told me that I'd barely said anything the last few days. I was startled and before realizing that she was right, we had spent the last two days in silence. I apologized before attempting to carry on a conversation, but my heart really wasn't in it. My silence grew worse before eventually turning into sob fests. My companion didn't know what to do. 00;05;02;09 - 00;05;31;06 Amy Leffingwell One particular morning, I burst into tears for no reason at all. She wasted no time in calling the mission president. The conclusion was made that my medicine needed to be adjusted. I was put into contact with a local Peruvian psychiatrist. She didn't speak any English and could only communicate with me through a translator. By the end of the appointment, she concluded that I was a perfectionist, with intense psychological damage that resulted from the terrible relationship I had with my father. 00;05;31;08 - 00;05;52;10 Amy Leffingwell What I left more miserable than ever. My mission president told me to disregard anything the psychiatrist had told me. The visit had only been necessary in order to receive a new prescription. He then put me on a strict schedule. We were to be home by 8:00 every night. I was then to do yoga breathing techniques for 30 minutes. 00;05;52;11 - 00;06;22;10 Amy Leffingwell I was to sleep in and given muscle relaxers to help me sleep. Additionally, the head missionary psychologist in Salt Lake City was calling me once a week with such crazy changes. I felt like a medical patient rather than a missionary. I also felt like a burden. After two weeks, I had balanced out a little. When the psychologist from Salt Lake called that Friday, I did my best to act normally, but a few minutes in I couldn't stop the tears that were running down my face. 00;06;22;13 - 00;06;43;15 Amy Leffingwell He finally asked if I had a cold. I admitted I was crying. I was always crying. When he asked why, I couldn't answer. He then explained that it would take about two months for my new prescription to kick in two months. Oh, I had done it before, but I wondered if I could do it again. There was a long silence on his end. 00;06;43;16 - 00;07;07;26 Amy Leffingwell Finally, very softly and calmly, he said, Airman Sage, my job is to make sure missionaries are adjusting. It sounds like in the ten months you've been out, you've never truly adjusted. You're trying. You're hanging on, but barely. That's not healthy. He paused. Have you considered going home? I hated to admit that I had. I had had a feeling that this was going to be how it was going to end. 00;07;07;28 - 00;07;32;12 Amy Leffingwell After a long silence, I finally agreed. Going home. Maybe the best. The psychologist then asked, do you want to call your mission president or should I? Oh, I didn't have the heart. This was something I'd attempted to voice many times over several weeks. Not something taken seriously. I had been given numerous words of advice and many hugs, but never a solution that immediately improved anything. 00;07;32;14 - 00;07;55;10 Amy Leffingwell I was called in later that day to meet with my mission president. I sat down to see his eyes full of sadness and conflict. He said, do you regret being here? Of course not, I said. I was offended by his question. I wanted to go on, express my love for everything I'd learned over the past year. But the tears had started and emotionally, I just couldn't. 00;07;55;12 - 00;08;19;15 Amy Leffingwell He studied me and then said, I don't think depression something you'll be faced with forever. I wished I could agree after that Friday meeting, everything happened so fast. By Sunday afternoon, I was sitting in a car on the way to the airport with the mission president's wife rattling off advice. Be upfront and honest about why you're home. You're going to get a lot of questions, but you don't have to answer them right away. 00;08;19;16 - 00;08;41;17 Amy Leffingwell Don't be embarrassed, she was saying. I nodded along, half listening as she continued. Never before had I felt so defeated. My mom and dad hovered a lot my first two weeks back, but they, like me, were lost. Finally, I started seeing a therapist named Andy and all I had gone through. He was the first person to actually listen to me. 00;08;41;17 - 00;09;04;18 Amy Leffingwell He really listened to me. Having my feelings validated was a refreshing change because people are constantly asking, what's wrong with you? What can we do to make you happy again? So many people looked at this as if it was something you'd get over, like the common cold. But overcoming depression isn't easy. It isn't something you can fix with a quick dose of antidepressants. 00;09;04;18 - 00;09;24;16 Amy Leffingwell It's a long process that requires lots of patients. With the help I've had. There's still a lot that I deal with. Having depression is definitely the experience of a lifetime. 00;09;24;19 - 00;09;52;29 Melinda Messineo Messineo: It's not my fault. My brain is broken. Kiah Penfield’s story is told to Chris Bavendar, performed by Melinda. It's an odd feeling. Depression. I think when people hear it, they just think, oh, you feel sad. But that's not entirely it. When my depression is acting up, my heart feels heavy. My brain feels foggy. My muscles feel sore and don't stretch well. 00;09;53;01 - 00;10;17;17 Melinda Messineo My chest gets tight. I'm nauseous. I react to the world around me, apathetic for no reason at all. Other than the up connection between my frontal lobe and my amygdala, I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. My freshman year of high school. Two years later, I was also diagnosed with panic disorder. Unfortunately, these disorders feed off each other. 00;10;17;19 - 00;10;43;11 Melinda Messineo It's it's also interesting because they each become a more dominant part of my mental illness at certain points in time. Currently in my life, my panic disorder is the most prevalent, with the depression almost co dominating its present more often, but doesn't have a strong hold despite only knowing of my diagnoses for four years. I suspect I suffered much longer. 00;10;43;15 - 00;11;10;21 Melinda Messineo No clue how long really, but I wasn't diagnosed until it became very bad. During that time, I remember wanting to run to the street while oncoming traffic was about to speed past. I'd hoped a car would hit me, but I was too afraid I would live through it and be found out. And of course, I was worried people would judge me for wanting to die. 00;11;10;23 - 00;11;41;02 Melinda Messineo But I don't really want to die. My third therapist helped me figure it out. When my depression is bad, all I can think about is getting hit by a bus, crushed by a falling object, or falling myself in such a way that I break multiple bones. A coma would be nice. Part of it is that I want to take a break from life, have some time just to catch up, even if it's in a hospital bed. 00;11;41;04 - 00;12;03;06 Melinda Messineo I want a good excuse to ditch all of my responsibilities and just focus on my own healing. I also think if I had a physical reason for the pain I felt inside, I would be better, I'd feel better, I would have a reason and it would make sense. The thing about depression, though, is that it doesn't make sense. 00;12;03;08 - 00;12;27;02 Melinda Messineo People with depression have an illness caused by a broken brain. They don't choose their illness. They don't cause it by anything they do. They've just been unlucky enough to have brains that don't work correctly. When I'm feeling very depressed, I feel like I need to vomit. I can't though, so it's just the awful feeling of needing to without an actual feeling of relief. 00;12;27;03 - 00;12;52;00 Melinda Messineo I also feel physical pain in my heart, sort of heaviness. It sounds pretty silly, but I can always tell I'm feeling depressed when my chest gets heavy. Sometimes I feel like I can't fill my lungs all the way up with air and can't get enough oxygen. All I want to do when I'm depressed is curl up under my blanket, knees to my chest and lay in bed. 00;12;52;01 - 00;13;20;27 Melinda Messineo Usually not sleeping, just lying there dead to the world. I feel the sense of safety under my covers. I also feel like if I can isolate myself, no one can make my pain worse. I know this doesn't work and it never has before, but I always want to do it. I take medication daily. 112.5mg of Effexor and 150mg of propane. 00;13;20;29 - 00;13;49;17 Melinda Messineo I also take birth control to skip periods since my depression gets worse during that time. I also have propane lol that I take as needed if I feel like I might have a panic attack. But medication? It's crazy. There's there's no magic pill and what works for one person may be horrific for another. When I was on Zoloft, I became so suicidal I found myself googling the dosage it would take for me to kill myself. 00;13;49;19 - 00;14;14;25 Melinda Messineo I didn't feel safe being alone on that particular night, so I drove to the hospital that my mom works at and I stayed with her. It was the absolute worst I've ever felt in my life. I don't I don't remember much about it. Well, other than that, though, when people who don't have depression try to help. It can be good, but only if they manage to understand it. 00;14;14;26 - 00;14;37;17 Melinda Messineo For example, my mom told me once to just focus on feeling better and not let the depression consume me. You know, that's all well and great, but it's not something you can just get rid of. A good analogy of the pain is to ask someone if they've ever had a head splitting migraine. Did focusing on feeling better help it? 00;14;37;21 - 00;15;07;16 Melinda Messineo Did not focusing on it help? Could you think about anything other than the pain you felt? The difference is that there's no Advil depression to ease the pain in that moment. You just have to live through it. People mean well, and sometimes they help, but overall they don't get it. They can't get it. The best way I can explain it, it's like being trapped underwater with a sheet of ice above you, holding you in. 00;15;07;18 - 00;15;29;04 Melinda Messineo But. But definitely ask if there is anything you can do to help. If they say no, then accept you can't do anything. If you know them well, ask if they're on medication or seeing someone or if they have considered these options. Encourage them to try these out and if they want to, but you know, maybe are having some trouble getting started. 00;15;29;07 - 00;15;56;28 Melinda Messineo Help them with it. If one experiences depression differently so there's no perfect thing to do to help. But the most important thing you can do, in my opinion, is to listen. Listen without trying to fix things. Listen to try to understand how they feel. But if you don't know how they feel. Don't say you do. Let them know you see they are hurting and that you care about them. 00;15;57;00 - 00;16;10;11 Melinda Messineo Listen without judging. 00;16;10;14 - 00;16;20;01 J.R. Jamison Jamison: I want to welcome to the show Kiah Penfield. Whose story you just heard. Kiah is now a 12th grade English teacher at a virtual public school in Washington state. Kiah, thank you for joining me. 00;16;20;03 - 00;16;22;24 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Hi. Thanks for having me. It's so great to see you again. 00;16;22;25 - 00;16;43;04 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Yes, I'm so excited that you are on the show today because you and I originally met. I want to say it was four, six, seven years ago. And you shared your story with the Facing Project at that time. It was in 2015 when you were only a freshman in college. How has life changed for you since that time? 00;16;43;05 - 00;17;12;12 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Oh my gosh, it's been a lot of changes. I got a treatment called transcranial magnetic stimulation, or TMS, and I got that at the end of 2018 at the Neuropsychiatric Treatment Center of Seattle. And that was crazy because before that I had failed 15 antidepressants. I had a diagnosis of severe recurrent treatment resistant depression, which is just a terrible diagnosis to carry around treatment resistant depression. 00;17;12;16 - 00;17;33;00 Kiah Penfield And I've been in remission now for three years. I'm entering my fourth year, which is something I never thought was possible, especially as a freshman in college, having gone through so much depression. So really a lot of changes. Like I see colors that I didn't see before, which sounds like a thing that people make up, but is actually true. 00;17;33;01 - 00;17;37;15 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Oh, true. So can you share an example of what that was like? 00;17;37;20 - 00;18;09;03 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Yeah. So another thing too was music. So previously, like I only wore dark colors because I just didn't care for bright colors. It felt like they hurt in a way. I didn't like listening to happy music. I was like listening to the sad stuff like Ben Folds Five brick type of type of sad music. And then as soon as I went into remission and it was like a switch hit one day, I think it was a Thursday, a switch flipped, and all of a sudden this weight was lifted off of me and I could see the sun and I could see all these things that I hadn't noticed before. 00;18;09;04 - 00;18;26;29 Kiah Penfield Like in Washington, we have these lovely mountains that I had never paid attention to, and I could see the mountains. And I was listening to like pop music, where people were talking about falling in love. And I was like, not mad at them for talking about that. So that was a really a really crazy change that I did not expect. 00;18;27;00 - 00;18;33;25 J.R. Jamison Jamison: So in some ways, it's almost like your brain woke up in a different way, right? 00;18;33;28 - 00;18;56;01 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So one of the things they do with TMS is they put a magnet on your head and it taps. I like to think of it as a metallic woodpecker, the way it taps on your brain. And theoretically, I suppose, that reroutes the electric flow of your brain. So I don't know if it was just, you know, all of a sudden, the electricity, my brain with the right direction, so to speak, or what? 00;18;56;01 - 00;19;03;07 Kiah Penfield But yeah, it was completely like having a totally, totally different neurological experience. 00;19;03;10 - 00;19;22;25 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Let's talk a bit about TMS, because in all honesty, I hadn't heard about it until you had shared with me you'd gone through this treatment. So of course, no, I'm googling and looking this up and and it's quite fascinating and has worked for so many people. Can you talk a bit about the process? 00;19;22;26 - 00;19;42;11 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Yeah, absolutely. So I was honestly so sick of being depressed that I was just going to go straight to electroconvulsive therapy. I was like, shock my brain, get this out of me. I want to be done. And my, my doctor, my neuro psychiatrist was like, I get that. But like, if you will just trust me, let's maybe not go all the way right away. 00;19;42;11 - 00;20;08;11 Kiah Penfield Let's try something a little bit simpler. And TMS is a lot safer because there's fewer side effects, but it does have a lower success rate than electric convulsive therapy, which is not super surprising. And essentially what you do, it's it's a really big time commitment. You have about 36 sessions, and the sessions themselves are only like ten minutes long of, you know, the metallic woodpecker pecking on your head. 00;20;08;14 - 00;20;27;22 Kiah Penfield But when I got TMS, it was not a super popular treatment. So I had to drive an hour in to Seattle to get the treatment and then an hour out. And when you first start, you're going five days a week, and then you go down to three days a week, and then you go down to one day a week for a few weeks to get all of those 36 sessions then. 00;20;27;22 - 00;20;53;10 Kiah Penfield And so it was actually not a super accessible treatment at the time, because if you didn't have a clinic near you that offered it, you were just out of luck. There's a lot more clinics now that offer it, which is really fantastic. Actually. My psychiatrist just started offering it because I told her about it. But there's also a lot of misinformation, like my, one of my psychiatrists that I had when I was in college said that I wasn't depressed enough to try TMS. 00;20;53;15 - 00;20;54;21 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Interesting. 00;20;54;23 - 00;21;11;01 Kiah Penfield Penfield: So I yeah, I ended up self referring. And this is something I think a lot of people miss to when they have mental illnesses. You don't have to have a doctor refer you for treatment, and in fact you shouldn't rely on one because the only person who really knows what's going on inside your head is you. You're the one stuck living in it. 00;21;11;08 - 00;21;31;28 Kiah Penfield So I self referred and the first thing you do is you undergo this big interview, which is really stressful because they ask you about your symptoms. And if there's one thing you learn as a person with mental illness, it's to try and make people more comfortable by saying less. And my doctor, he said, I just want you to know you are underreporting your symptoms right now. 00;21;31;28 - 00;21;48;16 Kiah Penfield I can tell and I cannot get you help if you under report. And that was huge lesson for me. So yeah, went through all of that. Had my mom was there, had to say some really hard stuff that she had never heard before. It was like, you know, how bad is your depression? And I said, well, to be honest with you. 00;21;48;17 - 00;22;00;23 Kiah Penfield I've decided if I hit 30 and I'm not better, it's not fair to ask me to live anymore, and I'm going to kill myself because it was that painful. The the experience of living with it. 00;22;00;25 - 00;22;25;08 J.R. Jamison Jamison: You shared with me offline as we were catching up about relearning who you are as a person once you went through the therapy, and that had to do with figuring out who you are without depression and how much of your personality was built around the depression. Can you talk a bit about what that waking up and discovering rediscovering yourself was like. 00;22;25;10 - 00;22;48;28 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Oh yeah. So it definitely was like I had this idea of who I was as a person. I think we all do. This is me. This is my personality. And then when I went into remission, I had like this identity crisis because I, I learned about trauma that I had that I hadn't been familiar with. I learned that I wasn't actually a cynical person. 00;22;48;28 - 00;23;09;09 Kiah Penfield I had just been severely depressed. So all these things before where I looked at them and been like, yeah, right. People, people don't really do that. That's not how the world works. People are basically evil. I didn't think anymore. And that was really jarring to basically wake up with this person that I didn't know, but that person was me. 00;23;09;12 - 00;23;39;13 Kiah Penfield So I went through a lot of therapy of trying to figure out who I was. I also had a lot of fear related to my relationships. My friendships of these people know me, the depressed person, and now I'm a different person. Will they like her? Do I like her? Like all these different things? One thing that really helped me with that process was I met my wife, and so when I got married, I took her last name because to me, my maiden name was Beeman. 00;23;39;13 - 00;24;08;28 Kiah Penfield So to me, Kaia Beeman was the girl who had all that depression and all that baggage and went through all those terrible things. And I met my wife right at the same time that I finished up TMS. So it was like the person that I was with her became associated with this new personality. So I kind of think of it in my head as Beaman was the one who had depression, and Kaya Penfield is the one who, you know, is happy and in love and successful and is able to do all these things that she couldn't do before because of that baggage. 00;24;08;29 - 00;24;10;28 J.R. Jamison Jamison: It's a fresh start, right? 00;24;10;29 - 00;24;11;23 Kiah Penfield Penfield: It is. 00;24;11;25 - 00;24;40;06 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Yeah. And now you're a 12th grade English teacher. I imagine you encounter students who are facing depression and anxiety. And so having been down that road yourself, do you spot the signs in your students? How do you reach out? Are you able to reach out? Can you talk a bit about navigating that with a classroom full of students, and are there any stories or success stories you would like to share? 00;24;40;09 - 00;25;01;03 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Oh, absolutely. So the first thing I do before I even, you know, try and figure out if they have anything going on, is I tell them about my story and I say, you know, this is who I am. This is what I went through, especially with my, my homeroom students specifically, and then with my English students when we get to the poetry unit, because poetry is always super emotional, right? 00;25;01;04 - 00;25;18;05 Kiah Penfield So I tell them, I say I have example poems for everything, and you're going to learn so much more about me than you ever wanted to know. And I'll be honest, you're going to see some sides of me that I don't like about myself. And I talk to them about. I say, you know, when I was 14, I was diagnosed with depression, and I've had Ms.. 00;25;18;06 - 00;25;34;15 Kiah Penfield I actually had a student last year who also had had TMS. Oh, and had never met another person. So that was really crazy. And then I had another student who was interested and who asked, you know, can you just give me a place to get started on learning about it? So that's been cool to kind of share about that treatment. 00;25;34;15 - 00;25;56;02 Kiah Penfield But also just I think we think about representation. We think about representation with queer individuals, and we think about representation with people of color. But I don't think we've really talked a lot about representation with people with mental illnesses. And a lot of that is because it's invisible. So I try to make it as visible as I can or as audible as I can. 00;25;56;05 - 00;26;18;29 Kiah Penfield And I found that a lot of students who maybe wouldn't have told someone that they had a mental illness are willing to tell me, because I'm open. I had, you know, a student who said to me, we were talking in the chat pod and you said, you know, I, I'm going to write my poetry, but I want you to know that, like, it's going to be a little bit dark, and it's stuff that my mom's not comfortable with. 00;26;18;29 - 00;26;45;28 Kiah Penfield And I was like, okay, like, how dark are we talking? And I always tell them, I say, you're not going to write anything that's darker than anything my own brain has ever showed me. So you're good. And so we started web mailing back and forth, which is our version of email within the classroom that's secure. And I figured out that he was talking about depression and he said, you know, I stopped my medication and I haven't been in therapy for a while because it just wasn't working. 00;26;46;03 - 00;27;11;03 Kiah Penfield And we talked for a while about different coping techniques and what I had been through, and how the first therapist isn't always the best therapist. And he actually graduated two weeks ago and he's back in therapy. Oh that's great. So that was fantastic. And then I also have had like, I had a student who sent me a message and said, before you read my poems, I want you to know I'm already in therapy for this, and I know that they look concerning. 00;27;11;03 - 00;27;26;12 Kiah Penfield I went a little bit dark, and I figured that was okay, because you went a little bit dark, and that was one of the most beautiful things that I think a student has ever said to me, because I did go dark, and I want it to be okay to go dark, because when we don't share these feelings, we don't share that we need help. 00;27;26;12 - 00;27;28;18 Kiah Penfield Nothing happens. No one gets help. 00;27;28;23 - 00;27;36;11 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Yeah. And what a great way to role model. Because mental health, middle illness is still so stigmatized. 00;27;36;12 - 00;27;37;05 Kiah Penfield Penfield: It is. 00;27;37;06 - 00;27;56;02 J.R. Jamison Jamison: Not just in our country but around the world. And so what a great way to show teenagers that their voice matters, their story matters, and we love and accept them for who they are. And there is a brighter path forward. Kaya Pinfield, thank you so much for sharing your story and for joining me. 00;27;56;04 - 00;27;57;28 Kiah Penfield Penfield: Thank you. 00;27;58;00 - 00;28;23;06 J.R. Jamison Jamison: If you or someone you know is facing depression or suicide, it's never too late to reach out for help. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is available 24 hours a day at one 802 73 8255 or online at Suicide Prevention Lifeline. 00;28;23;09 - 00;28;50;16 J.R. Jamison We want to thank Dr. Adam Kuban for organizing Facing Depression in Delaware County, Indiana, and Nelda Ault-Dyslin (diz-lynn) and Jenni Allred for organizing Facing Depression in Cache (cash) Valley, Utah. Bailie Sage’s story was written in collaboration with Jon Toronto and was performed by Amy Leffingwell. Kiah (Ky-uh) Penfield’s (pen-field’s) story was written in collaboration with Chris Bavendar and was performed by Melinda Messineo. To listen to past episodes of this program is Indiana Public Radio Project. 00;28;50;18 - 00;29;10;20 J.R. Jamison From there, you can subscribe to the podcast where you'll get episodes of the Facing project delivered to your device each month, or just ask your smart speaker to play the facing project on NPR. Listeners can contribute stories or volunteer to share the stories of others with the facing project that may appear on the show. More information at Facing Project. 00;29;10;23 - 00;29;34;05 J.R. Jamison Action. To continue the conversation about this episode. Find us on Facebook at The Facing Project. The Facing project is recorded at Indiana Public Radio at Ball State University, and Beautiful and Wonderful Muncie, Indiana is produced by the amazing producer and sound engineer extraordinaire, Sean Ashcraft. The show is distributed nationally through PR. We are your host, Kelsey Timmerman and J.R. Jamison. 00;29;34;05 - 00;29;40;15 J.R. Jamison And until next time, we wish you the courage to share your own story and the empathy to listen to others.