After my first psychiatrist in my twenties, I spent 16 years searching for a new therapist, not solidly, because I went through years of discouragement, but nonetheless too long someone with severe depression should have to endure. This lagging hope explains part of the reason for the gap in treatment, but the main reason was because I couldn’t find a doctor who accepted Medicare. I don’t know why this is–probably many reasons–but I do know that it shouldn’t be this way for anyone in America. The government should give doctors some incentive for accepting Medicare OR SOMETHING, because no one deserves to have to jump through hoops to get medical treatment just because of the type of insurance he has. I wasted a third of my life under the imprisonment of depression. The discouragement became worse than the original depression, piling dire alienation on top of it. Ah well, I’m getting stellar treatment now, and frankly, I don’t want a doctor that lacks the compassion to offer treatment to everyone anyway.