28

343

Print

Email

Posted in: Depression

5 Comments

By Everyday Health Guest Contributor

A Lawyer Breaks the Silence About Depression Among Lawyers

By Everyday Health Guest Contributor

Published May 14, 2014

YOUR REACTION?

I Like It

So So

Inspiring

Intriguing

Important

By Dan Lukasik, Special to Everyday Health
When I turned 40 over 12 years ago, I was a busy lawyer working at a blistering pace at a law firm. Stress, anxiety, and caffeine were my daily fuel. While my life before this time had been punctuated by long periods of pensive sadness, nothing could have prepared me for the dark storm that was about to descend on my life.
I wasn’t sad just some of the time now. I was sad all of the time. I was crying quite a bit, but never in front of anyone. My sleep became fragmented, disjointed. I couldn’t concentrate or get things done at the office – and given all of my looming deadlines, you would think that I would be panicking…but nothing. I was lost in a deep sadness and emptiness.
I related to my therapist that I felt my life just wasn’t worth living. “Dan, it’s the depression talking.” He referred me to a psychiatrist, who diagnosed me with major depression and recommended that I take three months off to rest and let the medication kick in. I was relieved that a doctor had finally diagnosed my illness. I felt soothed when he told me it wasn’t my fault, that I needed medical attention. But I also felt troubled.
I was one of four owners of my law firm, so I could delegate work to more junior members. But as the managing partner of the firm, I was expected to be the leader and was responsible for some of the firm’s largest cases. These couldn’t be handed off. My three partners noticed that I wasn’t moving business like I used to. How were they going to react to my taking so much time off from work? A lot happens in a law firm in a week, let alone three months.

Breaking the Silence About Depression

The day after I saw the psychiatrist, I met with my partners. As I spoke, it was as if something were pushing the air back down my throat into my lungs.
“I need to tell you guys that I have been pretty sick lately. I’ve been seeing a psychiatrist and he put me on some medications for depression. He said I needed to take off some time from work to get better.”
“How much time?” one partner snapped. It felt accusatory rather than caring. The moment he said it, I braced for what was to follow.
“Three months,” I replied.
“You’ve got so much going well for you in your life. Why the hell don’t you go on a vacation?”
The subtext was clear: If I’d only snap out of my funk and be more grateful, I wouldn’t be so depressed. Little did he know that I was depressed even when on vacation.
“Dan, you at 95 percent is better than most lawyers I know,” another partner said confidently.
“I’m not at 95 percent. I am at 5 percent,” I replied.
A worried look seemed to overtake him. Perhaps he was troubled that I hadn’t replied appropriately to his compliment. I also thought that his words were meant to diminish the problem. How could it be true? I looked the same as I had all along. There was just my representation that I had depression.

Freeing Myself to Heal Myself

I did end up taking three months off from work. It was a difficult time. I felt untethered from the reality I had once known. I didn’t know who I was anymore: Was I a lawyer, a husband, a father, or my depression? I felt consumed by melancholy. I wasn’t walking in the darkness. I had become the darkness. I felt deeply ashamed. “What’s wrong with me?” I asked myself.
The first round of medications blunted the depression, but left me numbed out. Was this to be my new “normal”? My psychiatrist tried different combinations of antidepressants and mood stabilizers over a period of time. At some point, we found the right combination and I began to feel better. While my depression hadn’t been cured, I found that I could deal with it more effectively.
I returned to my law practice and decided that I wanted to write an article about my experiences with depression while practicing law. I discussed the idea with a good friend, who had become a federal judge.
“Dan, this is a very bad idea,” he said. “There are a lot of great people out there who will be supportive. But, there are also a lot of other lawyers out there who will try to hurt you with this. Remember, this is a competitive business. You’re a very successful guy. Why not write the article anonymously?”
“If I had been sick with cancer or suffered a heart attack, would I write it anonymously?” I asked. He listened, but seemed worried. “There’s nothing anyone can do to me that’s worse than what depression did to me.”
I wrote the article and it appeared in Trial magazine, a publication of the trial lawyers group American Association for Justice. It felt freeing to write about my depression and not hide anymore. My partners were upset by the article and felt betrayed. “Who is going to hire you now, Dan? A mentally ill lawyer?” But something funny happened inside of me. I felt stung by those comments, yes. But I also felt angry. I began to wonder how many other lawyers were out there with depression – others who suffered in silence just like I had.

Using My Experience to Support Other Lawyers

I learned that lawyers suffer from depression at twice the rate of the general population –  meaning that 240,000 of this country’s 1.2 million lawyers have depression.
I went looking for a Web site for depressed lawyers where I could contribute more articles. But, to my amazement, given the statistics, there wasn’t one.
So, in 2007, I launched the Lawyers With Depression Web site, which has since been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, CNN, and many other national and international publications. What had begun as a small project has mushroomed into something far beyond my effort to begin a conversation on this topic. I went on to create a support group for lawyers in my community as well as produce a documentary, “A Terrible Melancholy: Depression in the Legal Profession.”
I still deal with depression. And I will for the rest of my life. It isn’t the 500-hundred pound beast that it used to be. It’s manageable when I take of myself. But I’ve found that just as important as the medication, therapy, and exercise is the sense of meaning and purpose I’ve found in helping others.
I started a life-coaching practice to help other struggling lawyers. I wanted them to have the support that I didn’t have, to let them know that they’re my heroes. They need to hear that it takes a tremendous amount of courage and strength to battle, often daily, with such a powerful foe as depression. They don’t need to hear that they’re weak-willed, broken people.
I have found that working with and for these people, while still practicing law, brings out the best in me – what President Abraham Lincoln, also a lawyer who struggled with depression his whole life, called “the better angels of our nature.”
Dan Lukasik is the managing partner at the law firm of Bernhardi Lukasik PLLC in Buffalo, N.Y., and is listed in the publication “The Best Lawyers in America.”