So when I was in my early 20’s my doctor started me on Paxil to deal with my depression. The idea at the time was I probably just needed it to correct a chemical brain imbalance and after about 6-9 months I wouldn’t need it any more. If I remember correctly I stayed on it for just over a year when I lost my health insurance and couldn’t afford the medication anymore. I went through HORRIBLE withdraws. But once that was over I was great. I seemed to have gone back to my “usual self” (whoever that is).
Shortly after getting married I started to feel depressed again. I had health insurance again, so after a few months I went back to the doc and got put back on an antidepressant. For the life of me I can’t remember which one. I stayed on it for about a year before deciding to stop again. My thinking at the time is 1. I was thinking it must be that damn brain chemical imbalance again and 2. We wanted to start trying to get pregnant, and I didn’t want to be on antidepressants while pregnant.
Well after the horrible withdraws, this time I wasn’t as great. I was better, but not great. And though there are definitely times since then where I feel more in control and actually happy, things have grown steadily worse. Obviously when life gets more stressed it gets worse. And I just can’t avoid stressful life moments. And seeing them through the eyes of depression just makes them so much worse.
So last week when I was sitting at my desk unable to do any work and bursting into tears because just the idea of walking to the microwave to cook my lunch seemed equivalent to laying on the ground as someone kicks me in the stomach for 5 days, I made a phone call to my doctor to start the medication again. It finally hit me. If I didn’t have to live this way, then why am I?
This was significant for a couple of reasons. One being I’ve finally come to the conclusion, after dealing with depression for 12 years, that I’m not one of the individuals that just has a chemical imbalance that can be corrected with brief treatment. This will be forever for me. And can I just say how incredible angry and sad that idea makes me? I will most likely need to take something for my depression and anxiety for the rest of my life. And where I know as far as lifetime medications go, this is by far not as bad as it could be and it’s easily workable, it just makes me sad to think that I’ll never be whole without it.
Also I’ve learned that depression is one of the symptoms of PCOS. So that’s another clue that it’s not going to go away anytime soon. Which is ironic too because the in ability to have a baby also only contributes to the depression that the PCOS is probably causing to begin with. One of the reasons I stopped the meds to begin with was to try and be “healthy” if I got pregnant. But I’ve come to realize that I owe it to myself, my husband and that mythical future child to be on the medication. If I’m this bad now, how would it be if I were pregnant or postpartum? (I’m laughing as I write this because really I feel pretty stupid writing that like I’ll ever be in that situation.)
This is all pretty funny also because I’m going to school for Psychology. I part of me feels like what good would I ever be as a therapist anyway? Who would want to go see a therapist that is broken? And what’s really funny, is that damn stigma. I HATE the stigma that’s attached to mental disorders and the lack of understanding and the fears that people have. And I’ll be one of the first to argue against anyone who says that mental disabilities should be looked at and treated differently than a physical disorder (And of course I mean socially, not medically). And yet, here I am scared of my own stigma that I know is wrong. Aren’t internal conflicts just awesome!!! But this whole thing has made me question my chosen path. I love Psychology, I really do, but maybe it’s not what I should be going into.
Overall this week I’m feeling better, but life is calmer this week than it was last week. So though I feel better I know that it really hasn’t gone away, it’s just waiting for life to get a little crazier again and then it’ll paralyze me all over again.
But that’s pretty much how I’m dealing right now. I saw the doctor on Tuesday and he prescribed Celexa. Which I'm happy with since its side effects seem minimal. It takes about 2-3 weeks for an SSRI to start being effective, so now I wait. He wants to see me in a couple of weeks and in a month to see how I'm doing. I appreciate that he's not just throwing pills at me and sending me on my way. I may seek therapy as well, but I think I need to get my mind in some kind of balance first before I can handle that. So we'll see I guess.
