Heather Armstrong's new book reveals the raw details of her battle with depression and the experimental treatment that made her 'die' to feel more alive
Heather Armstrong has a few claims to fame, but none stands out so much as the title of her new book: The Valedictorian of Dying: The True Story of Dying Ten Times to Live.
Armstrong, a 43-year-old mother-of-two, has died 10 times.
And as a result, she claims to feel more alive than ever.
She's been, 'the queen of the mommy bloggers' (a title bestowed on her by The New York Times Magazine), an influencer, a communications director and, for the last 15 years, a mother.
But Armstrong has also been depressed, through all of those stages. In fact, she's battled the mental illness since college, she told Vox.
That is, until a psychiatrist suggested she sign up for a clinical trial that uses propofol, an anesthetic, to silence the brain - making the patient effectively brain-dead - in a last ditch effort to treat her worsening depression.
Armstrong has ridden her fair share of waves of chaos.
She grew up in the Mormon church, making her an outcast in her hometown in Tennessee, then left her church (to her family's dismay) after college at the Mormon Brigham Young University (BYU).
From there, she taught herself to code, became a successful web developer and then a successful blogger only to lose her office job over her online writing.
Armstrong, 43, struggled with depression despite finding fame as the 'Queen of the Mommy Bloggers,' as the New York Times once called her
She's been married, pregnant and depressed, a new mother and depressed, divorced and depressed, and a fully single mother and depressed.
Even at the height of career in blogging/influential marketing, when she could be the sole breadwinner for her family of four by raking in $40,000 in advertising money a month, Armstrong was haunted by depression.
She is among the third of the estimated 300 million people around who struggle with depression have 'treatment resistant' forms of the disorder, meaning that their symptoms have not responded completely or at all to standard treatments, including therapy and antidepressants.
Armstrong felt she'd tried everything, including over 10 medications for her anxiety and a stint in an inpatient psychiatric facility in 2004, as she wrote on dooce.
'When Leta was born all these maternal instincts were slammed
