El Paso woman hopes battle with depression and anxiety will inspire others to get help
EL PASO, Texas (KVIA) - Sharita Knobloch is as personable as she is inspirational.
When she's not teaching at Liberty University, she's raising two beautiful kids, and running an organization called 'Mission: Milspouse,' which connects military spouses with resources and support.
Knobloch knows what it's like to feel lonely in a new city, especially as someone living with depression and anxiety.
Knobloch said she met her husband while he was stationed at Fort Riley. The couple got married, and a deployment soon followed.
"We moved from Fort Riley to Fort Benning, Kansas, to Georgia, and I remember that first one was really scary because we were moving out of our apartment the first time we've ever had anyone professionally move our stuff."
Knobloch said it was probably 18 months since they had moved to Georgia, that she found herself lying on a gurney in the emergency room, staring up at the ceiling, just looking at all the dots in the tiles, just crying.
"I was by myself and my worst fear was coming true. I was having a miscarriage."
Isolated and despondent, Knobloch said she turned to food to cope, and would eventually develop an unhealthy relationship with food.
"I was very stressed constantly, constant stress. It was like there was a radio or a tv on in the back of my head all the time, broadcasting scary messages. So normally if someone hears sirens in the distance, they're like, oh, that's probably a fire truck and that's it. That's not how my brain worked. My brain immediately went to what if it's my husband?"
Knobloch said one day, she just couldn't keep it to herself anymore. It was during a visit to a family doctor, to treat bronchitis in her then 5-month old son.
"He looked at my son. He's like, this is awesome. Like, he didn't even have to have the steroids to clear his lungs. He's good. But then he just like shifted his gaze and looked over at me, kind of cocked his head and was like, how are you doing? And it was at that point that I felt so incredibly seen because he could read me like a book. And I broke down. I just started sobbing. And what he said next was not you should be stronger. You're a military spouse, you should be better than this. You pick yourself up by the bootstraps. He said, hey, you're not alone. A lot of people go through this. Let's get you some help."
Knobloch says the doctor eventually put her on some medications, and she began to feel better.
"Within 48 hours, the radio shifted off in my head like it stopped. And I just like I perked up and I was like, hang on a minute!"
Knobloch gives thanks for every day, and credits her faith in God coupled with counseling and medications for her newfound healing. She tells ABC-7 that exercise and meditation have also helped.
