MEDINA - The darkness in Kim Rettig's life is gone.

"It's like magic," says Rettig.

Her depression is history, and that's saying a lot for a woman who tried to kill herself to end her pain.

"It's like I'm coming out of the dirt. I'm coming out of the darkness. It's life again. But it's been so long it's like a new life."

Kim wants you to know that her new life began with an implant on April 15. The FDA-approved Vagus Nerve Stimulation therapy (VNS therapy) involves an implanted pacemaker-like device that delivers mild signals to the patients vagus nerve, which is near the voice box.

So when it stimulates the area, it stimulates the central nervous system which controls one's mood and depression. Kim was bipolar and she'd tried everything, even electro-convulsive shock therapy.

"I've been on 31 different medications since '89," says Kim, who is 39 years old. Nothing worked.
Now? "It's taken off that dark shell I carried around for so many years," says Kim.

She wonders what if: What if this therapy existed for her sister Caroline?

"In 2001, my sister who had bipolar disorder committed suicide. So we lost her," says Kim. "Had she lived through the years of Treatment Resistant Depression, this device may have given her
the hope needed to survive. "

Kim keeps a mood chart. Every day, she marks if she's been feeling lonely, or depressed, or in misery. Last month she didn't feel any of those emotions.

And today?

"It's a great day," she says with a smile.

Kim's mom Suzanne Fleming doesn't need to look at a chart to know: "I have my daughter back," she says.

Can you ask for anything better?

Kim says her VNS therapy cost her $25,000. Medicare covered her cost. The procedure takes no more than two hours.

For more information about VNS Therapy and the company that produces it, go to:

www.vnstherapy.com and www.cyberonics.com