How to Function with Depression While Building a Beautiful Life: A Therapist's Honest TakeWe throw the parties, buy the dorm bedding, snap the smiling photos at move-in day — but what happens after the car ride home, when the silence in your house suddenly feels deafening?

What if I told you that some of the most successful, joyful, put-together people you know are fighting internal battles you'll never see? What if functioning with depression doesn't mean you're "not really depressed"—it means you're a warrior?

The Myth of What Depression "Looks Like"

Depression isn't always staying in bed for days (though sometimes it is). For many of us, it's getting up every morning when we don't want to, managing minds that tell us disturbing things on repeat, and showing up for our people while carrying invisible weight.

The reality: You can be an amazing mom, successful professional, and reliable friend while walking with depression. These aren't contradictions—they're proof of your strength.

My Unpopular Opinion: Medication Isn't the Enemy

As both a therapist and someone who's tried everything, let me be clear: there is nothing wrong with taking medication for your mental health. We don't question heart medication or diabetes medication, so why do we shame brain medication?

The truth about SSRIs: I've watched women with debilitating anxiety finally experience quiet minds. I've seen medication create the space for therapy tools to actually work. Stop blacklisting options that could save your life.

6 Things Actually Helping Me Function Right Now

1. Walking WITH It (Not Against It)

Instead of fighting my depression, I learned to walk with it. It's a part of me, not all of me. The moment I named it and accepted it, it got lighter.

2. The 20-Minute Walk Game-Changer

I don't care if you don't put shoes on—get outside and move for 20 minutes. The research is undeniable: it completes your stress cycle, births new brain cells, and releases hormones that make you feel better.

3. My Morning Ritual (The Unsexy Foundation)

Hot lemon water, meditation outside, gentle movement, connecting to the divine. It's not Instagram-pretty, but it's the foundation that helps me become the woman I want to be each day.

4. Living With Purpose

When I'm serving others—recording this podcast, sitting with clients, being present with my kids—I don't feel the depression. Purpose is medicine.

5. Boundaries (With Myself First)

What toxic things am I reaching for? News, social media, gossip, complaining? Life's too short to have a front row seat for the monsters that make us sick.

6. Talking About It

Therapy saves lives. Period. Sometimes just being witnessed in your truth by someone who won't judge you creates the opening for everything else to shift.

The Power of Riding the Waves

I've learned to sprint when I feel good and meet myself where I'm at when I feel low. Because here's what I know: there's always potential for a better day tomorrow.

For my mental health warriors: You are some of the biggest badasses on the planet. You hold what nobody knows, feel deeply, show tremendous compassion, and pull from an empty well of strength to keep showing up.

Don't you dare disqualify yourself from the love, success, abundance, and vitality you want because you struggle with this thing. Your mental health struggles don't disqualify you—they make you human.

The Bottom Line

We are not our thoughts. We are not our darkest moments. We are souls having a human experience, and sometimes that experience includes walking with heavy things.

But we get to build beautiful lives anyway. We get to dream big anyway. We get to show up for our magic anyway.

If you're struggling: Please don't suffer in silence. Find your people. Try the tools. Take the medication if it helps. Walk outside. Talk to someone. Keep going.

You're here for a reason, and your life is so much more valuable than you know.

Ready to stop suffering in silence and start building that beautiful life? Book a discovery call and let's talk about how therapy can support your journey. the truth no one wants to admit: nothing goes as planned. You can micromanage applications, dorm lists, and even high school GPAs, but the second your child steps into adulthood, you lose control. And that loss of control can make even the strongest mamas spiral.

We tell ourselves that if our kids succeed, we’ll be okay. If they’re safe, we’re safe. If they’re happy, we’re happy. But tying your worth as a mother to their choices is a trap. Your child’s journey is theirs to live. Your work is to loosen the grip, trust the process, and remember — nothing is permanent. They will stumble, they will shift, they will grow. So will you.

Another hidden layer of graduation grief is how it mirrors our own unhealed wounds. When your child faces rejection, it can trigger every time you’ve been rejected. When they struggle academically, it reopens your own old failures. This is why graduation can feel like more than just a milestone — it becomes an invitation to heal.

Old grief. Old trauma. Old perfectionism. It all bubbles up. And if you’re not intentional, you’ll project it onto your child instead of processing it for yourself. Therapy, sisterhood, and community are not luxuries during this season — they are lifelines.

Perhaps the hardest question of all comes after the boxes are unpacked and the silence settles in: Who am I now?

Motherhood has been your most sacred role, and suddenly it looks and feels different. This identity shift can feel disorienting, but it’s also an opening. What if this isn’t the end of your story but the beginning of a new one? What if the energy you once poured into keeping your kids alive and safe is now available for your own dreams, your own body, your own extraordinary life?

Mama, the grief behind graduation is not a sign of weakness. It’s a testament to how fiercely you’ve loved. Let yourself feel it. Let yourself grieve. And then ask yourself the bigger question: What would it look like to take this ache and turn it into power?

If you’re ready to explore that, I’ve extended the doors to LEGEND until September 3rd. This is the space where women like you reclaim their energy, rewrite their identity, and rise into a life that feels extraordinary, unperfected. Because you raised them to leave — now it’s your turn to learn how to stay.

Take care of yourself and there for each other!

XO, Brooke Jean