Was in a darker place than I'd ever been. ECT was my only hope': how Ted Scheinman finally broke through his depression

Ted Scheinman, a senior editor at Smithsonian magazine, traces his depression to a childhood moment at a fair in upstate New York, when a Batman toy he dunked under a bathroom tap triggered the thought “I am going to die.” By age 35, therapy and drugs hadn’t helped, and he described himself as “the lowest piece of dirt on the Earth.” In 2020, he sought electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), calling it his “only hope.” In his memoir, Jolt: My Electric Journey Out of Darkness, he explains the treatment and how he worried it “wouldn’t do shit,” while linking his recovery journey to his lifelong literary interests.