Mind's Emotion

She was trained to be mentally tough. She grew up with sayings on the wall. Leaping off a two story high platform she was the perfect model of total control, with a world diving championship and a bronze medal from the 1988 Seoul Olympics to her credit. Yet she nearly lost the battle to depression three times. Over the past year, Wendy Williams has been a poster child for the illness, speaking throughout the US on behalf of the depression awareness campaign, Minds in Motion, with the same drive and determination she once devoted to sticking her landings. In August, those who attended the National Depressive and Manic- Depressive Association Conference held in Cleveland heard her compelling account of how, as a result of her dark and lonely journey, she found a new purpose in life:

At age three, Wendy started diving and one year later entered her first diving meet. At age 14 she moved to California without her family to train and pursue her Olympic quest "with tunnel vision." In high school she was moody and had trouble connecting to people and sought help from a psychologist. Off-season, she had the experience of "a wet blanket over my head dragging me down."

In 1989, following the death of her father, she walked away from the sport for a year. She was depressed, but considered her condition weak and shameful. Then, in 1992, as she stood on the 10-meter platform preparing to dive for the National Outdoor Championships, she heard a pop in her neck and felt her arm go numb. Her diving career was over. "I grieved my loss," she said, and in 1994 she started to rebuild her life as a massage therapist in Maui, but "nothing felt like paradise to me." Despite acupuncture, herbal remedies and a healthy diet, she felt herself slowly sliding down.

Still, she would not seek help. "I had become Miss Natural, Miss Organic," she confessed. Then came what she describes as her "kitchen floor episode." Faced with the overwhelming and insurmountable task of trying to figure out what to eat, she crumpled to the floor in front of the open refrigerator for three hours. Her boyfriend came home, decided enough was enough, and took her to the doctor.

There was no way as Miss Natural, however, she was going to take an antidepressant, but her doctor got though to her by using gallows logic: "You want to die, anyway, right?" he asked. "Then what do you care if you put a little drug in your body?"

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