I`m a 24 year old guy and i`ve suffered from depression since 1995, it was a delayed reaction to the death of my mother in 1991. Things had been improving over the last few years, i`ve been travelling across the world and enjoying it so very much, before I went last time i`d even managed to ween myself off my medication (sertraline)

in march 2003 I was in delhi and found out that my grandmother had passed away from cancer, I was upset although being occupied I believed I could handle it. I flew home as quickly as I could only to be met with more bad news, my grandfather also had cancer.

The hardest part for me was watching my father take the strain of looking after him over the next year, I shared the burden as much as I could handle it although watching someone I loved being taken from us by cancer is the hardest thing I have ever experienced. He died 3 months ago now, and I can`t stop thinking about how he must have felt as the cancer took over him, watching himself deteriorate and unable to do the simple things he loved, whilst missing his wife terribly.

I have felt so bad recently that I have had to go back onto my medication, I have had periods where I have managed to convince myself that I am dying, and that I have cancer myself. The list is endless. I used to sit up until 5am checking out medical websites, and self diagnosing myself with everything I could see. A headache would be a brain tumour, a back pain would be colon cancer, pains in my arms and knees would be bone cancer. I couldn`t stop thinking about dying and the pain people go through sometimes.

The pills are starting to kick in now and i`m feeling slightly better, although I am still having panic attacks, and moments of severe depression, a feeling of hopelessness and worry about nothing and everything all at once. Sometimes I get a little panicky and have trouble breathing. I`m familiar with the feelings that depression gives people, but I truly thought I had got rid of this feeling forever. It seems to have come back worse than before.

I`m not sure what i`m really asking for, I think I know the advice I would give myself. But its a help to me to write this down, maybe feel that i`m not the only person to feel this way. I know that i`ll get through this, I just feel that life keeps kicking me down again.