I have talked about mental health in previous blog posts, but because of what I was thinking about today, I think it's important to have multiple approaches and unbiased opinions.
When we speak or read about topics such as depression, anxiety, and various mental illnesses or their counterparts, we talk about the cure, we talk about coping, we talk about what you can do to make yourself feel better or push past it. Like a workout trainer just screaming and hollering at you to push yourself, but every three seconds they add another set of reps. You're almost there! You're there! Okay now do 5 more! Although that may be a good approach to growth and perseverance, there is no way in hell that works for everyone. So they have different types of therapy, you try your rounds of counseling, they switch you off and on your meds trying to find out what's best suited for you. Self-needed selfishness, a form of self care.
The first antidepressant I was on made me so cold and numb to everything, I almost forgot what it was like to feel anything, but at least I wasn't sad anymore. One day I just stopped, and I suddenly I went back to exactly how things were before, laying in the dark and thinking with no release or end.
But there's one thing I don't remember I was ever taught- and that would be the concept of finding out what happens when you don't follow through. My mother, who works as a nurse would always badger and threaten me during my episodes with these horror stories of people like me, who had stopped taking their antidepressants because they felt as if they were working. These people quit cold turkey, fall so hard into a depressive state, and very many attempt or commit suicide. Hearing that everyday when you feel like your medicine is finally working and you're ready to stop, sets you back so incredibly far.
I had written a letter today to a friend who had asked me why I was such a pessimist. I explained it sort of like this, "Knowing everyday that yes, your life gets better, but it's not even because of what you do, it's because of your medicine," Basically, my question is how can I have a positive outlook when the only reason I'm even remotely positive is because of these chemicals some doctor discovered to counteract with mine?
Two days ago I missed a dosage for the first time I can recall. I felt amazing the first day, I was so full of energy, I remembered how much my medicine had numbed out the thoughts that constantly fired off in my brain. I was able to think so clearly, to have insanely deep thoughts, to elaborate on them, to dance up until at least three in the morning. I had a friend of mine tell me they wish I was off my medicine so I acted like that all the time. People think ADHD is entertaining. I get that, it's amusing to watch somebody rant about things for 40 minutes and then suddenly get distracted by a popcorn ceiling or an old pipe sound. However, today was absolute hell. I always hum song lyrics in my head, but as I did that so normally, they felt rushed and loud. Everything in my head was chaotic and filled with the irritating buzz of TV static.
During pickleball this morning when I was running through drills, I felt myself fall into an almost panic attack, the people behind me were yelling, the balls were flying cross court, my father was giving me tips on serves, I wasn't hitting it over the net, I literally felt like crawling into a fetal position and waiting for someone to get me. I thought back to when I was younger, the way we'd all pretend to fall asleep in the car and wait patiently for someone to pick us up and carefully place us somewhere safe. In the real world, there are real consequences, there are real everyday problems, and no one; I repeat- absolutely no one is going to take you to a safe secluded place where you can think. Unless you pay them.
I had my second day of work today, a six hour shift. I found talking to my coworkers incredibly easy because I can make a conversation last an hour long if I need it too, when I have time to think. When lunch rush picked up, I found myself freezing, staring blankly at the walls with no direction, until someone shook me from it. I know that doesn't happen to me normally. By the end of the week, I will have only missed one dosage of my meds but will have gone through an entire cycle of emotions and trauma just caused by these silly little chemicals the doctors prescribe you. I wonder how many of them are truly placebo?
Either way, this blog really had no purpose but to shed the light and honest truth of what antidepressants can be like. No one ever told me any of these things could happen before I was on them, I found out in my own time when I was taking them earlier in my life. But, if someone was clueless and lacked the education on the topic and quit suddenly- there is no telling what the thoughts in that person's mind could be. I just don't want to have to watch anyone go through that because it is genuinely terrifying. ok bye bye the end
Comments