Here’s the thing – it’s not that I don’t realize how many
things I have to be thankful for and how much more I have than say, someone
living in poverty in a third world nation.
It’s that it doesn’t change that sickening feeling of despair and
loneliness that just won’t go away. It’s
hopelessness. It’s looking into the
future and seeing that even though everything changes, nothing changes. I will still be me. My brain will still be broken. I will still have to wake up every morning
and face the same crushing depression. I
will still open my eyes, weep silently, and dread getting of bed. Because what’s the point? The sun will rise, the day will go on, the
sun will set, and nothing will have changed.
So I take the damn pills.
For the record, depression is embarrassing and humiliating. It erodes what little self-esteem you had
before going crazy. The prevailing
attitude seems to be that if you’re depressed, it’s because you haven’t tried
hard enough not to be depressed. I’ve been called selfish, mopey, “a downer”. I’ve been told if I just “change my attitude”
I can find “true happiness”. I’ve been
told that if I improve my diet, exercise daily, take B vitamins, get out into
the sunshine, volunteer, make friends, that all will be repaired! I’ve been referred to therapists who have
tried to help me find my “personal power”.
And, of course, I just haven’t tried the “right” kind of yoga. And it’s all said with sincerity. These folks really think that they’ve got
it. The have the Answer™. They
think I’m misguided (a word I’ve heard far too often) for being a pawn of the
billion dollar pharmaceutical industry and relying on medicine to help my bad
attitude. Depression, after all, they
tell me, is a Western concept. They don’t
have depression in non-Western countries, so it must be due to my excessive
life style and reliance on medical intervention. Because nothing helps more than hearing that
it’s all my fault. So I take the damn
pills.
What I can’t seem to explain are the chemicals raging in my
brain that make it nearly impossible to leave the house without bursting into
tears. Or the unrelenting anger that
makes me want to throw things. And break
them. Or that everything – every inch of
me hurts. Or that I spend hours fighting
the urge to take a razor to my arms just to let the pain surge and feel alive
for a few minutes. Because, seriously, who wants to have to explain away scar
after scar after scar? Who wants to be
the woman in her 30s who cuts, because everyone will happily tell you that only
adolescent girls to do that. So I take
the damn pills.
Anti-depressants, aka SSRIs, are not happy pills. You do not take them and see rainbows and
unicorns (that’s a different set of drugs altogether). You take them and face a myriad of side
effects in order to numb the searing pain and sorrow. Among the side effects of my medication are:
memory loss; anxiety; sexual dysfunction; inability to find correct words when speaking;
nausea; diarrhea; sleeping too much; sleeping too little; vertigo; lightheadedness; dry
mouth; clenched jaw; muscle tremors. If
the depression doesn’t kill you, the side effects will come close. But I take the damn pills anyway.
In August, I decided after four years on the pills that I’d
go off of them. Because I felt
good. I felt strong. I was feeling my “personal power”. I read up on the process and slowly tapered
off the drug over the course of three months.
I was extremely impressed with how well I was doing. Until I went off them completely. And hit rock bottom. And I tried to drive my car into a tree. To kill myself. Because I couldn’t conceive of not driving my
car into that tree.
Shortly after, I went back on the pills.
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