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Matthew Villarreal

Professor Batty

English 101

May 9th, 2018

Effects of Depression

We learn many things from many different characters in Still Water Saints. One character

which I feel we learn most from is Perla. Perla is a strong independent woman however her

mental health is a result of something that has occurred in her life. Perla suffers from depression.

We learn from Perla that helping other people can be a result of depression. It seems as if Perla

cares more about other people than she does about herself. Perla is unable to have a child and I

feel that this plays a big role in her depression. Not only is she unable to have a child but she is

unable to have a child due to something that is not her fault. They say that depression is not a

real disease because we can’t see it, I say depression is as real of a disease as any other and, it is

killing our population just as rapidly as other diseases. If that’s the case I could only imagine the

situation being worse due to Perla’s inability to have a child is something that is not her fault.

For some reason people seem to think that because depression is not a disease that you

can see on the outside that it must not exist. Since it is a mental disease than it must not be real

right? That could not be any more wrong. It is important that we understand what an illness or

disease generally is. Both of these terms focus on one thing, and that thing is called suffering.

The word pathology plays a big role in depression, or any disease for that matter. Pathology

means the understanding of suffering. Sometimes health professionals who are supposed to

alleviate suffering often forget this and think of depression not as suffering, but a condition under
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it. They often think of this condition as something that is biological, or material. Thus, the

misunderstanding that depression is not an actual disease. “Mental diseases are likely to be

caused by culture, rather than biology, because the mind, or the mental process, while occurring

in the brain, is mostly processing intakes from the cultural, symbolic environment, in which it is

unlike digestion or breathing, which process intakes from the material, physical, and organic,

environment.” (Liah Greenfield, Is Depression A Real Disease? May 25, 2013.) Perla’s

environment was that of not being able to have a child due to something that was not her fault.

There is a difference between someone who is occasionally sad and someone who is depressed.

Being occasionally sad is not dysfunctional, but being depressed is dysfunctional. Depression

destroys relationships with some of the most important people in your life. Perla’s relationship

with her husband I felt was destroyed due to her depression. I also feel that her husband was

depressed as well because he could not give his wife what she wanted. This must have made him

feel weak, like less of a man. Depression makes you unable to perform mental and physical tasks

as does being paralyzed or handicap. One of the main characteristics of depression is the inability

to connect to specific life events. When a person suffering from depression is unable to connect

to specific life events this can in fact make their depression worse because the suspect madness

in oneself. The most common characteristic of someone that is suffering from depression is

suicidal thoughts. Twenty percent of people suffering from depression commit suicide. This

makes depression one of the deadliest diseases of today. It would be very wrong and

irresponsible for any health professional to say that depression is not a real disease. It would be

irresponsible for anyone to say that depression is not a real disease. It is just as real as cancer,

HIV, diabetes, etc.

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The urge to have a child is something that some women look forward in their adult life.

Perla never got to look forward to that. When Rodrigo comes into the story I feel that this excites

Perla. It excites her because it gives her a chance to care for someone as if they were her own

child. Most people might see Rodrigo as a trouble maker, or bad news. Since the 80’s, there has

been this worldwide phenomenon amongst psychologists that adults with children are less happy

than their adult peers who do not have children. It was until Chris Herbst of Arizona State

University and John Ifcher of Santa Carla University discovered that there was a flaw in this

study. The flaw was that people were only recognizing parents whose child was conceived with a

sperm and egg. They did not take adoptive parents, step-parents, and relatives who take in

children into account. So, these two psychologists conducted another study, and came to the

conclusion that parents remained as happy as they were in the 1980’s. However, non-parents

happiness had a substantial decrease. “This means that, today, parents are happier relative to

non-parents- a shift from previous evidence”-Tanya Basu. Adults as a whole are beginning to

grow grumpier than they were in the past, but parents are defying that general trend. Keep in

mind this study only applies to people that want children. This study does not apply to every

adult. Perla wanted a child, she always has wanted a child. Yet Perla didn’t realize that her

maternal desire did not have to be fulfilled by conceiving a child. She could have adopted a child

and been just as happy if not more. Herbst and Ifcher also found that it does not matter the age of

the child. No matter how old the child is, the parents are generally happier than non-parents who

want a child. This is why I say Perla would have been perfectly happy with an adopted child

because the age does not matter. Just the fact of her having someone she could call her son, or

daughter would make her happy. Which brings me back to my idea that Rodrigo makes Perla

happier than she was before she met him. She cares about him, and she even let him sleep inside
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the store while it was raining, and she worked all day. It seems as if she thinks of him in most

situations. When she went to the clinic she did not want to ask any questions regarding herself.

The only question that came to mind was to ask the doctor about the marks she saw on Rodrigo’s

arms. That is a common example of motherly instinct. Perla’s desire to have a child seemed to

have been fulfilled.

We learn a lot about Perla throughout Still Water Saints. It is not about what we learn about

Perla, it is what we learn from Perla and how we can take it and possibly apply it to our own lives.

We learn that if there is some sort of unfilled desire in your life, but you know you can’t have it,

then we should take a step back and look into how we can fix this problem. Perla could have

adopted a child and been just as happy as she would be if she conceived a child with her husband.

If you have tried everything and your problem is still not solved than maybe that is a sign that you

should not give up on those desires, but maybe begin letting go of them. Because once you start

putting most of your thought and time into this desire that you know you can never have you begin

to grow sad, or sometimes even angry. It is for the benefit of our own mental health that we do not

give into these temptations, and we do whatever it is that is best for us. You must take care of

yourself before you begin to even think about helping other people. Sure, helping other people

might help how you feel about yourself, but it is only a temporary help. It is a band-aid and band-

aids do not last forever. You’re going to have to keep replacing that band-aid with a new one. Perla

spent a good portion of her life constantly putting that band-aid on instead of fully healing. It is

said that her ability to help people is a blessing with a curse. The curse being her not able to have

a child. I do not feel this is the only curse, because her helping people is not allowing her to entirely

get over the fact that she has an unfulfilled desire. Each person she helps is just another band aid
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that she is putting on this wound. Perla is a strong independent woman however, she is not perfect.

No one in this world is perfect.

Works Cited

• Clinic , Mayo. “Depression in Women: Understanding the Gender Gap.” Mayo Clinic,

Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research, 16 Jan. 2016,

www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/depression/in-depth/depression/art-20047725

• Basu, Tanya. “Does Having Kids Make Parents Happy After All?” The Atlantic, Atlantic

Media Company, 8 May 2014, www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/do-kids-

make-parents-happy-after-all/361894/.

• Greenfield, Liah. “Is Depression A Real Disease?” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 25 May

2013, www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-modern-mind/201305/is-depression-real-disease.
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