Jessie Stephens was in Year 4 when she first felt like 'all the lights had gone out'.

Jessie Stephens can remember acutely what it felt like to experience depression for the first time. She was in Year 4. Aged nine.

She didn't have a word for it then. But one day, while sitting in a treehouse with her twin sister, Clare, she did her best to explain it; this strange new sensation that had dimmed her world.

"I said to her, 'It's like all the lights have gone off for six months,'" the Heartsick author told Mamamia's No Filter podcast. "The lights have gone off. The world is black and white, and I can't touch it."

Watch: Jessie opens up about her battle with anxiety and depression on No Filter podcast. Post continues after video.

Jessie, 32, describes it now as an almost dream-like state. She felt like she was existing in the world, but not part of it. Like everything unfolding around her was just out of reach. She could hear herself speaking, but had no sense that she had come up with the words.

There was no obvious trigger for her feelings — or rather, lack of.

"It was just dark. It was like everything got really, really muted for a long period of time," the Mamamia Out Loud co-host said.

Depression is among the most common mental health conditions in Australia, with an estimated one in six people experiencing it at some point in their lives. A global analysis of people with depressive disorders found that one quarter had symptoms before the age of 17.

Even at nine years old, Jessie's twin sister understood exactly what she was talking about. Depression is embedded throughout their family.

"I believe my pop was hospitalised in his 20s for severe depression," Jessie said. "And then my dad, around that age, also had what would probably be described as a breakdown."

Her brothers live with it, too.

"It's repetitive," she said. "It feels printed in your genes."

This idea inspired Jessie's forthcoming book, Something Bad Is About To Happen — a novel (sadly) unique in that it centres a young woman's experience of depression. 

Told through the eyes of Adella, a late-20-something who is in a psychiatric unit recovering from a mental-health crisis, it explores 'the weight young women bear through pressure, anxiety, rejection'.

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"It's about happiness, and what to do about those people in our lives who don't seem to have access to it," Jessie said. "And the lingering question of depression. Do we just have a point at which we're a four out of 10 [in terms of happiness], and we're never going to get higher? Is that just set? I think that that was my biggest question."

The book also addresses generational mental illness. In Adella's case, it's her mother who struggles. In Jessie's own story, it's her father. 

She recalls periods when he would seem to disconnect and go inward. She'd hear him moving around their northwest Sydney home throughout the night, unable to sleep. To her, he seemed unable to listen or fully engage.

"You could taste it. It was everywhere," she said of his depression.

"He would go out to work and come home. And it was like there was not one light left. Everything went out into the world, and then he came back and there was nothing."

Jessie didn't fully understand it at the time ("Mum and Dad didn't talk about it much"), and she felt helpless in the face of it.

"I'd get obsessed with vacuuming. And I'd [tell myself] if I just vacuum the floor, that will make him feel better. Or if I make him a cup of coffee, or tell a joke or something, then I'll cheer him up," she said. "And that's not on him. He never asked for that."

It wasn't until she was an adult, and armed with her own diagnosis, that she openly spoke to her father about his mental health. 

Having a shared understanding with him, as well as with her grandfather and her siblings, has proved grounding.

"You say something [about your depression] that if you said to anyone outside our family, you think they'd look at you like you had two heads," she said. "But in our family, you say it and it's like, 'Oh, yeah, I know that feeling.'"

More than two decades on from that conversation in the treehouse, Jessie still has depressive periods. Sometimes it's situational (like when she broke her leg during a hiking accident in 2022), but often not. She can usually go through the motions; she can work, sometimes even socialise, and crack jokes. But the familiar darkness and detachment, the hollowness and numbness, are there.

She manages her symptoms through a combination of medication, sessions with her psychologist, exercise, and mindfulness. She acknowledges the privilege in her ability to access quality care and her good fortune in having a partner — her husband, Luca Lavigne — who can help coordinate that care when her symptoms render her inert. 

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Together, it all helps her keep the lights on.

"The big theme of my book, without giving anything away, is that people also get better. I've seen that firsthand," she said. "And while there might be relapses, there are a lot of people who have had experiences of depression and anxiety, and they live very happy, healthy lives."

Listen to the full episode of No Filter where Jessie candidly opens up to Mia about her very real and personal battle with anxiety and depression.

If you or a loved one is struggling with depression, support is available via Beyond Blue. Call 1300 224 326 or visit the website for resources and to chat online.

Feature Image: Instagram @jessiestephens90.