Carmel Question

[oftheholyface]

Hey everyone! This is my first post on the phorum, but I've been lurking for about a year. Also for a year, I've been discerning becoming a Carmelite nun. I've tried to put the call to the back of my mind, or even look at other communities, but I keep coming back to Carmel. I feel that, if it is God's will, I want nothing more than to constantly serve him in Carmel. I've been reading Carmelite literature, such as The Interior Castle, Story of a Soul, and My Beloved by Mother Catherine Thomas. I also started a correspondance with the Carmel of Loretto and the Carmel of Santa Fe. 

However, I have a small problem. Back in the end of middle school and the very start of high school (I'm a Junior now) I suffered from minor depression and took medication for it. I have been in complete remission for around a year now, and I am moving towards being completely off the medication. I don't plan to enter Carmel, if I can with this past challenge, until I am finished with college. If all goes well, I will have been in remission from depression for around 6 years. 

My question is: am I completely disqualified from entering Carmel because I had a minor depression when I was an adolescent?

[JHFamily]

No, I wouldn't think so.   In this day and age, I don't know how anyone gets past that age without going through depression!  It seems like it was a momentary stage in your life, not an ongoing problem.  I'm not even sure that it would need to be mentioned at all.

[oftheholyface]

Thanks for the reply! It's quite relieving. 

 

[Lou]

oftheholyface,

Welcome to Phatmass. I would also recommend reading St John of the Cross if you can get round to it! A great and deeply faithful Saint. 

Talk to the vocations director and a spiritual director about the meds and mental health. If it's been in remission for so long, it probably won't be an issue but noone can answer but you (knowing that you can thrive without) and them- them coming to know you, your state of mind and how you would live religious life!

Also, all communities require you to do a psychological assessment before entering. Don't let this information scare you- it's a technicality and it's to help YOU. It's for your discernment and so that the community can get information that will help them give you a solid and holy formation. This too helps with the discernment period and will help you know your needs. It's all in good faith and done usually with a psychologist known and trusted by the community, so they and you know what to expect before you even receive the results!

All this discernment, sharing and mutual understanding serves you to ultimately best serve God. It's a healthy and love fueled growth in him who is our all. It's unlikely that a minor bout of teenage depression would hinder you from entering carmelite monasteries across the bored, but it's about learning what and where the right path for you may lie. Some communities, superiors and novice directors have more understanding of depression than others, due to personal experiences or experiences with novices or discerners in the past. Try seek these out- those who will come to know how you've been effected and how you've grown and how you will continue to grow.

Well done for posting, keep it up! Forgive my disjointed response, currently studying for a Final tomorrow! Anyway, keep the faith, keep asking questions and most importantly, turn your eyes towards Jesus!

Prayers,

L. 

[Egeria]

These sorts of cases really can't be answered by people on the internet, but only by the community concerned. And, at least for many communities, they can't be answered in an abstract way (Would xyz be accpeted?), but only in relation to you and your own history as they get to know you.

Oh, I see I cross-posted with Lou. Very good advice!

Edited May 10, 2018 by Egeria

[oftheholyface]

Thanks for the advice, guys! It really helps. And, yeah, I knew going in that specifics wouldn't be answered, but I was so nervous about the prospect that I wouldn't be able to enter because of my past that I just had to ask someone somewhere. I heard someone say that a "good health record" doesn't necessarily mean a "perfect health record". And I will definitely look at St. John of the Cross. Thanks again!

[Guest]

If it is God's Will for you, you will be a Carmelite nun for sure.  A very big welcome to Phatmass and blessings on your discernment.  May The Good Lord fulfill your hope for Carmel.

7 hours ago, JHFamily said:

No, I wouldn't think so.   In this day and age, I don't know how anyone gets past that age without going through depression!  It seems like it was a momentary stage in your life, not an ongoing problem.  I'm not even sure that it would need to be mentioned at all.

I agree

[Sister Leticia]

23 hours ago, JHFamily said:

I'm not even sure that it would need to be mentioned at all.

Errr... speaking as a sister with experience of vocations ministry, as well as the intensity of initial formation (my on and others'), I'd say you do need to tell the prioress/novice mistress/whoever you are primarily discerning with about it. It doesn't need to be the first thing you tell them about yourself, but at some point you do need to tell them. 

Carmel is a very intense and austere way of life, and religious formation (in any setting) is also intense. Not surprisingly, our vulnerabilities do surface, however hard we try to keep them down and hidden, and however resilient and robust we might feel ourselves to be. The novitiate is a graced and privileged time of deep encounter with God - but it can also be a time of pain, and experiencing our humanity only too well. This can sound wonderful and thrilling, but the reality is usually a certain amount of weepy and woebegone days/weeks, and all sorts of anxieties, insecurities, emotional responses, homesickness etc. A healthy, robust community needs to be able to provide whatever support the novice needs, to enable her to grow, personally and in her relationship with God. If a candidate withholds information about her possible vulnerabilities, this decreases the community's/formator's ability to understand and help her.

You may never be depressed again, but the fact that you were once is sufficiently significant for you to come onto this forum and ask about it. If you decide not to "mention" this, what will you do if you're then told the application process includes writing a short "auto biography" with significant events and situations? You'd have to not only omit the depression, but also any event or illness which triggered it - and you'd have to be very careful not to refer to any of this during your psychological assessment.

 Or what if there's the chance that others might disclose this for you, eg if your family doctor is asked to provide a reference? Or your parish priest, who might make a casual remark that "X has recovered well from the depression she experienced six years ago"? Applying to enter can be tense enough in itself, without worrying about whether your referees might inadvertently reveal something you're trying to keep hidden. 

As you get to know a community they will get to know you. Over time, they will see you grow and develop. You too will come to know them better, and have the chance to ask questions and suss them out - and their attitudes to mental health - before the time feels right and natural to tell them about your own past depression. 

Blessings on your ongoing journey with God and your discernment

 

[Egeria]

9 minutes ago, Sister Leticia said:

Errr... speaking as a sister with experience of vocations ministry, as well as the intensity of initial formation (my on and others'), I'd say you do need to tell the prioress/novice mistress/whoever you are primarily discerning with about it. It doesn't need to be the first thing you tell them about yourself, but at some point you do need to tell them. 

Carmel is a very intense and austere way of life, and religious formation (in any setting) is also intense. Not surprisingly, our vulnerabilities do surface, however hard we try to keep them down and hidden, and however resilient and robust we might feel ourselves to be. The novitiate is a graced and privileged time of deep encounter with God - but it can also be a time of pain, and experiencing our humanity only too well. This can sound wonderful and thrilling, but the reality is usually a certain amount of weepy and woebegone days/weeks, and all sorts of anxieties, insecurities, emotional responses, homesickness etc. A healthy, robust community needs to be able to provide whatever support the novice needs, to enable her to grow, personally and in her relationship with God. If a candidate withholds information about her possible vulnerabilities, this decreases the community's/formator's ability to understand and help her.

You may never be depressed again, but the fact that you were once is sufficiently significant for you to come onto this forum and ask about it. If you decide not to "mention" this, what will you do if you're then told the application process includes writing a short "auto biography" with significant events and situations? You'd have to not only omit the depression, but also any event or illness which triggered it - and you'd have to be very careful not to refer to any of this during your psychological assessment.

 Or what if there's the chance that others might disclose this for you, eg if your family doctor is asked to provide a reference? Or your parish priest, who might make a casual remark that "X has recovered well from the depression she experienced six years ago"? Applying to enter can be tense enough in itself, without worrying about whether your referees might inadvertently reveal something you're trying to keep hidden. 

As you get to know a community they will get to know you. Over time, they will see you grow and develop. You too will come to know them better, and have the chance to ask questions and suss them out - and their attitudes to mental health - before the time feels right and natural to tell them about your own past depression. 

Blessings on your ongoing journey with God and your discernment

 

Yes, this. One of the real dangers of discussing these things on the internet is that while advice may be well-intentioned, it can also be dangerous.

[beatitude]

I'm not a sister (yet), but I agree with Sister Leticia. I am a candidate with a religious community that leads a very physically and emotionally demanding life - they take low-paid jobs of the sort done by poorer people in the societies they inhabit, they live in the same sort of houses (so there is often a lack of personal space), and they have no formal ministry such as teaching or medicine, nothing beyond simply being present to the people around them and offering friendship. This is an extension of their deep daily prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, their trust in the Real Presence.

Their poverty and their unique apostolate means that they have nothing to give other than themselves. And when you have nothing to give other than yourself, you start to feel how weak and inadequate that self is. I am currently spending two weeks in one of their communities, and I'm really struggling with this. I have nothing to hide behind here, not the professional competence that carries me through my day as a university lecturer, not the monthly donations I make to various charities, which reassure me that I'm using my resources for good - nothing. It makes me feel shaky. If I were a postulant, I would have to confront it head-on, because I wouldn't have the same distractions I have as an outsider - my laptop waiting for me to go online and chat with friends before I turn in for the night, for example. And I can well imagine that this would be very difficult emotionally.

A few years ago I developed what I now know to be PTSD. For a couple of years I didn't register my symptoms as anything out of the ordinary, as they came on gradually and I just got used to them being there, and so it never occurred to me that it was something I could visit a doctor about - this was just my reality. I have spoken to the sister who has accompanied me on my journey about this, and she was very supportive and empathetic; a few sisters in their congregation have experienced trauma due to the often painful and conflict-ridden places in which they live, so they aren't naïve about its effects and they try to handle it in a compassionate and sensitive way. Obviously I had to tell her, because I couldn't possibly embark on formation without the sisters knowing that I have these problems. But even if I were fully recovered, I'd still want to tell them about it, because deliberately omitting a part of my past out of fear they'd reject me for it would feel like setting off on the wrong foot. If the Carmelites at the particular monastery you're writing to are going to be your sisters for all time, you don't want to start off by hiding things from them. That's not a good basis for a relationship. And if the sisters misjudge you once they hear you've had depression, or cling to stereotypical views about it - well, that's probably not the community you want to join anyway. You want somewhere you can be accepted in your totality, just like Jesus accepts us, not somewhere you will only be accepted with certain bits of your history lopped off. It pays to be open.

[JHFamily]

Great answers.  That is why I said, "I'm not sure..."   Obviously, it does need to be mentioned.

[Chiquitunga]

I think in our day and age, St. Therese would have been diagnosed with depression as a child. I hope communities wouldn’t hold that against someone! There are a lot of misunderstandings out there. Prayers for you JHF!

p.s. maybe you can add, if you need to discuss it with them, that it was a period at which you did not know God either, assuming maybe that was part of it too. Who can be happy without God anyway?!

Edited May 12, 2018 by Chiquitunga

[NadaTeTurbe]

3 hours ago, Chiquitunga said:

I think in our day and age, St. Therese would have been diagnosed with depression as a child.

It's hard to diagnosed someone from the past, but I have read on a text posted on the Lisieux Carmel Archive website that her mysterious illness (that was healed by the Virgin's smile), was PTSD from the death of her mom.

[oftheholyface]

Thanks again everyone! It was definitely in a period where I didn't know God. I did recently speak with a Carmel, and they said it would be alright on the condition that I had been off medication and had been in remission for a while. Now, all I have to do is get my non-Catholic parents on board...

[Guest]

Prayer for your parents and for all your hopes