I am a psychiatrist. I have worked in a variety of settings including a large university health center. Just my $0.02:
Depression can be disruptive if not disabling. I would not mess around. I would encourage her to attend a school in a large enough city that it has a full array of mental health services available outside of the university.
Colleges are not, and should not be, mental health institutions. They have rudimentary services which are fine for assessment, initiation of treatment, or tiding students over until they get home. But college mental health services should not be considered sufficient to be primary treatment centers.
Young people with depression often have decreased resiliency and a lower threshold for tolerating stress. Transition to college for a person with depression is often experienced as a negative stressor rather than a liberating delight. So no matter what your child says at the moment, I would low-ball the college in terms of predicted rigor (e.g. choose a match instead of a reach). Save reaching for grad school once she has demonstrated solid footing.
College location is a mixed bag. Distance might be healthier than you predict.
If she is too anxious or dependent then being close to home might reinforce dependency - but being too far might be overwhelming. In those cases, success is unlikely no matter the choice. I would not focus on location much so long as your child is not potentially stranded due to cost of travel.
I think a year off is generally a bad idea for dealing with depression if she is otherwise well enough to proceed.
I would not disclose too much to the school - not because of stigma (which is overblown) or perceived need for transparency, but because it is none of their business.
OP. Perhaps @WISdad23 is making the case for being in a metro area with a variety of mental health professionals so you can find a great fit.
Depression can be a fatal disease, as others have outlined, so I wouldn’t mess around worrying about prestige over fit. Definitely avoid environments with a “get over it, you are fine” attitude which always rears its ugly head in these conversations. (this thread being a case in point)
I was a little disappointed in your response. As a medical health professional I can tell you that depression can also be related to hormones (chemical changes) related to puberty.
Stress can exacerbate those feelings, and make it worse. Privilege has nothing to do with it.
Children of privilege feel all the some emotions of those that are not as privileged, but maybe you need to graduate college and live life to realize that.
A mother came here for advice, not to be chastised because she loves and cares about her daughters future.
@WISdad23 is very accurate. From Personal experience I can say it is very important to be in a large city so that you have a full array of mental health services. Also colleges even if they do have large hospitals and medical centers associated with them are not really able to be considered primary treatment centers.
My daughter has anxiety and is under a Dr’s care and she ended up going to a school an hour from home…close enough that it was easy for her to come home/us to go there. We checked out how she could get her Rx from campus. If she need Dr. appts during the semester we could do that easily enough. Also we made sure it had a good freshman orientation so that she would have the ability to get to know the campus and make friends. She chose a school that she was at about the 75% in SAT/GPA so she would not be the smartest nor at the bottom. It has worked out well the first year so far.
Excellent ideas. You are right, finding right therapist & medication takes time. We have no clue on this issue, she has support system now, we are scared what will happen she lives alone
@fallenchemist,
Thanks for your support. Her high school is very competitive. As she moved from elementary to middle - she was always 1/2% of the class. She is intelligent but procrastinator. when she came to high school , she had to complete with top student to stay at 1-2%, that , plus hormonal changes might have caused anxiety, leading to depression