3,000 Pulses Later: A Memoir of Surviving Depression Without Medication

I suffer from med resistant sever depression, which is relentless. I started the process of applying for the treatment and was accepted into the program, which is quite a commitment of 36 sessions (m-f) every week. Her memoir was easy to read and I could relate to her hospitalizations and feeling hopeless, helpless and having no control. Unfortunately for me the treatment did not work. It has a 65-70% chance of working. So I was even more depressed after, knowing another option did not work. I was grateful that someone took the time and wrote about there deep, dark struggle with depression, hospitalization, stigma and aloneness. So in the end that is what helped me tremendously. There is really no other book out there like this. She is an amazingly strong woman and I would highly recommend this book to anyone suffering from depression, looking for other treatment options. The only slightly deceptive part of the title is without medications. Where I got treatment, more than 90% of people needed medication, lower dose maybe. But this treatment is covered by the insurance because the depression is med resistant. After the treatment, the meds have the chance to work. That is my only complaint, is that it can be deceiving, although I knew meds would always be a part of my treatment.

I was attracted to this book because… I have been a TMS patient for 2 years and have been treated for depression for almost 18 years.This book was about Martha Rhodes’s open and honest experience with depression. She describes her struggle to find an alternative to medications that faked to work for her. She pursued TMS, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation - at the time it was the newest, safest, proven-effective alternative to ineffective drugs. This story shows how TMS has returned her to an even better place than where she started. This is an important message because TMS as commonly known treatment as it should be.Things I liked about this book It was encouraging to read of someone else’s journey. Especially someone who was successful in her family and career and seemed to have everything going for her, and yet. Even though many physical elements are different in our journeys, I was amazed at how how her mental beliefs and results were the same as mine. Even more encouraging was how her results resonated with mine. She has several years of treatment more than mine. Her story also help me to come with a better grip on my own situation.Why you should read this book If you are experiencing depression, or you are close to someone who is experiencing treatment for depression, please read this book. If you work in the mental health world, you should read this book.If you are interested in learning about more about alternative treatments for mental illness, I encourage you to read this book.This book lived up to the back cover copy The back of the book describes the book exactly and gives important information about Martha Rhodes.Martha Rhodes

The author has taken great risks in writing this memoir, but she has likely helped many people. I'm a psychiatrist looking to add TMS to the services offered at my clinic, and this book helped to persuade me to do so. The author had a serious depression -- and she downplays her alcoholism and childhood trauma. However, the TMS experience that she writes about helped her become her functional self again. This is important -- she didn't need to completely resolve her childhood trauma in order to be helped. (She did give up drinking.) Her experience in having to stick with the treatment in order to be helped -- hanging in there for weeks when nothing seemed to be happening, was also useful to understand. I'm sorry that she had such problematic psychopharmacology prior to her TMS. Her medication trials were too short and likely with doses that were too low.

This book was much more about the author’s fight to get insurance to cover TMS rather than about the treatment itself. I started reading it when I began my own TMS treatments, and I sadly didn’t find it helpful or even encouraging. TMS worked for Ms. Rhodes, which is great, but that was all I really knew after finishing the book. I wouldn’t recommend this to other patients.

There's so little literature about the groundbreaking treatment of TMS for resistant depression, so I encourage everyone to read this book if you're thinking of trying TMS. The author was instrumental in getting insurance coverage for the treatment back in 2009, for which we should all be profoundly grateful. I'm on my last week of treatment, and hope it sticks. It's not painful and well worth trying. Make sure you tell the provider that you've tried at least 4 antidepressants to get insurance coverage, and get authorization before starting. Otherwise it's very expensive - 12-15K.The early part of the book was heartbreaking and terrifying. Her forced stay in a substandard mental hospital chilled my blood, and caused me to research local hospitals in case of emergency. I gave a list of acceptable hospitals to my husband and told him to make sure any holds are completely voluntary. I wish the book had been more about TMS than the early horror.

At age 77 and life long major depression disorder diagnosis it is hard to explain how good I feel. As I left the TMS office today I realized how grateful I am to feel like I am walking in sushine . It is raining today, I live in the NW! Martha Rhodes clearly describes the illness and treatment and life with the depression cloud lifted. Although her life as described is 180 degrees from my poverty level, it was easy to see our parallel mental illness/health.All readers should read it to the end.