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If you have not heard the sad news Mandisa passed away at 47 years old. She was such a bright light that radiated Jesus. You could not be in a room with her without catching some of her joy. The difficult thing to reconcile is she battled depression and anxiety silently and alone. I am not saying this had anything to do with her death at all. I want to be very clear about that, but six years ago we had a very honest conversation with her about her depression and this interview even got put into an article on TMZ about her death.

Again, I am NOT saying that depression had anything to do with her death. I just wanted to highlight this conversation since TMZ posted it, because despite being sad about losing Mandisa, if this interview comes to light again and helps someone who is struggling with depression and suicide, that is a good thing to come from this pain.

Mandisa 2018

We love Mandisa and how infectiously happy she is–in both her songs and in person. But what a lot of people don’t know is that her song “Overcomer” began a downward spiral into a deep depression that even led to thoughts of taking her own life.

Overcomer was inspired by Mandisa’s friend Kisha who was diagnosed with breast cancer. Kisha lost her battle and went to be with Jesus which hit Mandisa hard:

“It shook the foundation underneath me in a way that I was not ready for and really did not expect. And so for 3 years….I was in a deep pit of despair.”

For those 3 years, Mandisa barely left her house and dealt with dark thoughts and lies that satan tried to tell her about committing suicide.

“The enemy  wanted me to take my life right then….and if I continued on that path, I would not be sitting here today.”

While she was in that pit, her friends desperately tried to intervene. They would pound on her door, but she would just go upstairs and put headphones in.

Finally they got through to her when they camped outside a movie theater she was in. They had put sticky notes all over her car with messages of love and held an intervention for her:

“Essentially, their message was, ‘We love you just as you are, but we love you too much to leave you there.’ They forced me to get counseling–I was not happy….but I did go and get some counseling, and that helped me to finally deal with the grief that I had been shoving down.”

We’re so thankful for Mandisa and that she shared her story of depression with us and in her new music!

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