Out of the Breach

I've been feeling okay for the last two weeks. Not great, but I don't have thoughts about killing myself several times an hour every day. Only a couple of times a day. And in between those time there were periods where I may have been grasping at normal; a finger on a ledge and maybe it's possible to get a second and third up until I can get a firm grip. I'm pretty sure it's due to the additional medication my new brain doctor gave to me about eight weeks ago.

Before today, the worst day was a week ago, the 23rd. I was a my brother's in Los Angeles with my parents. My brother and his wife threw a baby shower. Their son is expected in about six weeks. About thirty people were there. Thirty people. That I didn't know. My brain kept shorting out. I would be listening to someone and then I heard everything in the room all at once and couldn't focus. It was awful. After it happened a few time I went to a bedroom and just stayed there for a while. Eventually I could focus again and went back to the party, but I acted the same way as I did before I lost focus: I sat in a chair and didn't say a word to anyone.

This afternoon is a going away/early birthday party for one of my cousin's. He just graduated from high school in June and will be shouting "Semper Fi" in a week or so. But that's beside the point. Today was much harder than last week. Almost as soon as I walked through the door I had trouble focusing on a single conversation without the other babble leak into my ears. So, it was hard to begin with and then I made a mistake of getting involved in a discussion about the presidential election.

It started out fairly innocently. There was a question about the delegate rules and I knew the answer. There was more talk about rules and then some talk about the conventions. (I mentioned how much I liked parts of Ted Cruz's speech and wished that Bernie Sanders had been as brave in his speech.) And then the dreaded question was asked. Who am I voting for in the fall? I gave my true answer, which is I think I know, but I'm not happy with either candidate. My uncle (who said he can't seem to ever vote Democrat because they don't seem to represent white males anymore) asked if the one I'm leaning toward starts with an "H"? And I had to answer yes. My grandpa (who said he doesn't understand the people who simply vote the party line without any thought and is also married to my grandma who has only ever voted Republican, even down ticket, because she won't ever vote for someone who supports "hand-outs") asked why? So I had to talk about Trump not being presidential and that if he's gets angry at internet nobodies who make fun of him online, then how is he going to take criticism, legitimate and not, from world leaders. I don't think he'll handle it well. My grandma said that he's already worked with all of those people, which I assumed meant the world leaders. I said he hadn't, that he worked with people who want to make money off of him and then I ranted about all the people overseas who seem to hate the man, including employees at his resorts and the town-folk who live near the resorts, I then got into his lies about his fortune, his use of bankruptcies to hurt employees and investors to save himself (I acknowledged he used the law to do it legally), and his self-made man crap when he got a million dollars from his father to start his business. My grandma said that she's read about these criticisms, too, but that I have to read stories from the other side.

I was baffled. What other side when you're stating stuff that happened? Were these not things that happened? Were they not facts?

Then Grandma moved on to how people who are on Social Security earn too much money, more than she and my grandpa, and that they constantly whine about not having enough. This is where she always goes. She hates Social Security, for those that didn't pay into it, especially those who aren't of retirement age (even though that was kind of the point when the program was created). She hates food stamps. She hates that people who don't work/pay get medical and dental and vision insurance. I didn't get into it with her over this. We've gone through it before, but she told me what she has always said. She and my grandpa have never taken anything. They've never earned much money. They do what they can to help people through their church and that's the way everyone should be and blah, blah, blah. (In the past she didn't like it when I brought up the uncle who used food stamps to keep his daughters, her granddaughters, fed. So I didn't bring it up again.) She then started in on a story about how her parents would invite people to their farm for dinners and there were sometimes up to 60 people and they all got fed and ... I didn't understand what the point of the story was.

That's when I hit my limit. That's when I had to leave. More was said, but I did my best to turn my brain off and simply look like I was listening. I hope she doesn't think I understood or agreed with her.

Of course I waited the appropriate time before I left so it didn't look like she set me over the edge.

This is why I avoid politics when talking to people. Most everyone, I include myself in this statement, aren't flexible enough to want to hear differences in thought and even is they hear the difference they don't discuss, they go on attack arguing why the other side is wrong rather than arguing why they are right. And attacking is no way to discuss anything.

The Medication

The pills have complete control over what little life I want to live.

My Brain

It's not at its best, my brain. It's been fuzzy. Tired.

The brain doctor didn't increase the dosage when I saw him a couple of weeks ago. He said what I'm at is the max. I decided, and he concurred, to continue on the way I am, for a while. The only other choice would have been a new drug and after six month (I think it was that long) of trying to find something that didn't hurt me while it helped me I need a break to just settle down.

Not to say that I'm doing well, though. I'm just existing. If I didn't have a job to go to five days a week, I wouldn't leave the house. At least I'd leave as rarely as possible.

At work, I've had a couple of major screw-ups that could lead to some future problems, although I doubt it. I've also made lots of minor ones. Most I've caught before the next step and no one knows about them. Some went on but came back to me to correct. Rarely have they gone past that state, but if they keep going, they're gone.

I'd like to quit my job. Not because I dislike it, but more because I'm "meh" about it. The great manager has moved on, for at least a year, but I expect she'll fit in the position permanently. The current acting manager is a good guy, but we only have him for a couple more months and then who knows. The biggest problem is I can't see this job leading anywhere that I'd like to end up. Even as I look out across the virtual 160,000 square miles of the state for a different job I see nothing that I want to do. I don't want to arrange contracts or spend my day in meetings or arranging travel plans or track expenditures or write reports or work with the public. That's all that I see available to me.

When I look out at other places, away from the public sector, I get lost in not knowing what I can do. There are a lot of things that I can't do or haven't learned to do and most of the time when I see a job that I might like I think I can't do it. When I see things that I can do and would like to do, I have no experience and would have to start at the bottom.

One of the best things about working for the state is knowing that every 12 months I'll get a step raise until I hit the top of the pay scale as long as I have performed my duties well. I don't beg to get that little bit more. I don't have to dance around convincing some asshole that what I do is valuable and that I do it well like people do in the private world. That kind of thing is especially hard because I don't believe it myself. Never have.

Sometimes I think I'd know what I'd like to do for a living. It would require a lot of work, though. A lot of time and learning to do things that I can actually do. Worst of all it doesn't really pay enough for a person to live. And then there's all the rest "social" "media" bullshit that you have to do just to stay "connected" with "people."

Unintended Consequences

About two weeks ago, when I stopped for some sleep while driving up to my brother's house, I ran up one flight of stairs and walked to the door of my hotel room. As I slid the card into the lock my breathing got heavy, my heart began to race, and my stomach churned. I opened the door and I started to heave, but I kept my mouth shut. My backpack was hurled to the floor and I headed into the bathroom and hovered over the toilet bowl. If I was going to lose my dinner, so be it. I didn't, though. My breathing and heart-rate evened out and my stomach settled. I wondered if I was getting sick. Wouldn't that be fun -- getting sick just as I show up at my brother's house where he lives with a teacher and two children under five?

The next morning, after a longer than expected sleep, I hurried down the stairs and through the hall for the free breakfast. About halfway down the hall I had to slow down because my breathing got heavy, my heart began to race, and my stomach churned. I hadn't eaten anything for at least 12 hours and hadn't felt sick all night long. I continued on more slowly and by the time I found a table I could claim with my book, I felt okay again.

When I finished eating I hurried up the stairs again and guess what happened? If you thought I thought I was about to color the world with hardly digested food, your right!

Could this be a coincidence?

I figured not. It had been just over a week since I had been on the 80mg dose of the new drug the brain doctor had prescribed. Just long enough for everything to kick in.

I had already been getting the sweats. That was a side effect of the old pills, but these sweats were stronger, sweatier. Pretty sure that's the new stuff forcing it's way in. This has continued. At night, especially since this week has been so cool here, I go from extremely hot, sweat pouring from my pores to freezing because my body's covered in a layer of moisture and my body's not hot anymore. This happens if I'm under covers, or not, in sleepy pants, or not, in a shirt, or not. With the old med my sleep didn't get interrupted and it wasn't fun, but it didn't feel disgusting like this new sweating thing does.

I'd been having these muscle shock sort of things. They lasted as long as it usually takes to pop your ears, but they raced through all my body, head to toe, and made me dizzy. This happened several times a day and I was glad they were short because it's scary to have it happen while driving. There's no way for me to know if this was because of the new drug or a withdrawal thing. I still get them, but not nearly as often. At this point I'm saying withdrawal.

There was also this low- to mid-grade headache. It's just kind of there. Usually it's not anything to worry about because it doesn't HURT-hurt; it's just annoying. But it is always there. The rare times it has HURT-hurt the asprinolfrin has helped tamp it down to a mild enough level that I notice the headache, but it doesn't disturb my concentration or keep me from sleeping. Didn't have this problem before the new med.

All of that is to say that if this new drug made me feel better, which it doesn't, I probably would have stuck with it until this nausea thing started. I can live with the sweat and the mild, but permanent, headache. I can't deal with this nausea, though.

While visiting my brother I had to stop us going on a walk because I thought I was going to blow chunks and we were maybe 100 feet from his house. It kinda put a damper on the visit, for me, at least. My brother and his kids like going on walks, lots of walks, and I couldn't do it.

My brother and I went to a comic convention that weekend. I kept pausing and asking him to stop because I felt sick. I know he understood, but I didn't. I don't understand.

Thursday I see the brain doctor again and I have to convince him that we need to go with something that's generic. I can't be sick and sweaty and headachey anymore.

I'd rather be dead.

When I Grow Up

I went to the brain doctor on Monday without any good news and the bad news was old news.

After a year of seeing him I've finally made him understand that more people in my life isn't the way to increase my happiness for the long term. In short visits I can, and often do, feel better spending time with people I know well and like and trust. Once those visits hit a certain point, I start getting uncomfortable and feeling icky. Long term is never good.

The thing is, he said, that for people with my level of depression having them go out with people and visiting friends and family all the time would be his first suggestion. For most people it works and he's pretty much been pushing this idea on me for a year. Monday, he didn't.

Instead of focusing on a social life he switched gears to my work life. It started with how I feel about my current job, which is okay. I don't LOVE or really like my job, but I don't dislike or HATE it, either. It just is. The people are nice enough and seem to be here more to work than make others look like fools. My boss is great and trusts me. The actual work is mostly mind-numbing and repetitive, but sometimes there're things that require real brain power. The pay's okay. It's not going to buy me the house and land I'd like, but I can rent comfortably and not worry about shopping or going to plays or visiting people to the North or to the South. It's not a bad job, but if offered full pay I'd rather not come each day.

He then asked me what I wanted to be when I grow up and the honest answer I gave him is I don't know. Everything I've said in the past -- engineer, lawyer, writer, WWE Superstar, astronaut-fireman-president, etc. -- aren't wrong answers, but they were answers to get people to stop asking me about the future. I told him that there isn't one job I can think of that I wouldn't be happy to retire from or forced to stop doing because of some horrible physical problem. I look at my parents as they approach retirement and I can see them missing things.

My dad loves working with the students at the community college. He loves helping them put together an education plan to help guide them through their years at the school. I think he'll be glad to leave the daily grind of his job when he retires, but I think he'll miss the students. I've told him that he's going to go back and help out a few times a year and it won't be about the money, but the time he gets to spend helping people.

My mom, on the other hand, won't miss her job at all. She won't miss the kids or the teachers or the administration. When she retires she plans on doing her art and selling it and her art is the thing she will miss if she can't do it. Hell, I've seen it for years. Because of the high stress levels at school she doesn't art off and it makes her sad. On those few weekends when she does art off she's rejuvenated, at least in the moment. When she gets to the point that she can art off most of the week and then she gets to a point where she can't art off anymore she'll be crushed.

I don't have anything like that. Yeah, if I have my eyes pecked out by a canary I'll miss reading, but there are still books and tapes (anachronistic) and television to listen to for stories.

What do I like doing besides read? he asked. I like to cook and bake, I said. So the brain doctor tried to come up with something I could do in that area, as if I hadn't thought about it before. I'd go nuts working a line, just flipping burgers or putting on the condiments or taking orders. So many people to deal with. At my own place it would be even harder because I'd have to depend on and trust other people. There's no way I could do everything. If I wanted to be in the back and never come out then I'd need people to wait and take orders and handle the cash and do the books and I don't have it in me to trust **anyone** that much. The only way I could see me being happy is if I had a window and I could make whatever I wanted to make and sell it and when the food is gone it's gone, too bad for the next person.

He suggested getting into publishing. To which I replied that I'd have to move to a big city, a place I don't want to be, and start at the bottom and push to make quotas and harass people who are running late. Then he tried to suggest doing something with publishing online and I explained that most online publishing are vanity presses and not real publishers.

He then asked what I'd really like to do. I said I'd like to be paid to lay on a couch all day reading. I'd like to be an eccentric billionaire, I said. He asked if that would make me happy and I said that I don't know, but I'd feel safe. We bounced around on this for a while, discussing things that I like to do and how to feel safe in my life. Nothing was resolved. And in the end he told me to keep thinking about what I like to do so that I can find a job that will make me happy. I said okay, but I don't believe anything'll happen.

There and Back Again

My accidental experiment with the generic version of my medication was a failure. But a relatively cheap failure.

Twice I have ordered 90-day supplies of the meds. Twice I have shelled out more than $400 dollars because I nearly did the s-word on the generics. The name brand didn't work as well at it should have, though. When I found myself thinking a lot about the s-word and had to remind myself not to do or to do certain things because of the s-word, I went, right away, to the brain doctor to talk about it. His decision was to supplement my medication.

This new medication is also a brand name. Unfortunately, the new med is causing some problems. Not with my brain setting, not that I've noticed, at least. In fact, it's helped me feel better. The problem is that even though this medication has been shown to help people who are depressed, the FDA hasn't classified it (or has refused to) for use with major depression. Therefore, my insurance won't cover any part of the cost.

Oh, sure, the first bottle was free because the brain doctor gave me a coupon and I can cut the pills into thirds because he prescribed the big ones, but how much will the next one cost? I'm afraid to find out, even though I have to. I'm betting it'll be at least $500 for the 30 pills that I cut into thirds. That about $1000 every three months. $4000 a year. About 15% of my current net pay. So much for putting anything extra aside for retirement!

I'm sure that some people are saying that I should just stick with the generics. The thing is that I'm taking something that currently works for a problem that is unlikely to go away. This isn't strep throat or pink-eye where you get the medication, take it for however long to make the problem go away. This is a problem that's there all the time and the medication helps to mitigate what's happening. If it takes the full dose to make things better, it takes the full dose every day. Generic medications only have to be within (plus or minus) 20% of the original brand. (Look up bioequivalence.) That means, on the low end you're losing a fifth of the medication. (Sure, it's possible to get above the mark, but isn't it usually cheaper to have more filler than the actual stuff?)

Losing the potency is more or less okay for something like antibiotics because that's usually built into the prescription, even if the doctor doesn't actually think about it. That's why you're supposed to finish your damn antibiotics. You take them until the infection is gone and then take some more to make sure the infection is actually gone.

If you get on the low end of the spectrum with generic pain pills and they're not working for you, you can probably ask for something stronger and your doctor will probably give it to you. (What do you mean there's prescription pain medication abuse?)

With anti-depressants, though, you’re taking them to help regulate your mood. If you need the full dose and you’re not getting it, you change. You sink back into that pit; creep back into the shadow; curl up into a quivering ball.

At the time I accidently went on the generics I was getting my meds at the local pharmacy every thirty days. It cost a bit more, but it felt like I had some control. By the end of those thirty days, I wasn't the person I had been at the beginning. Even my family saw how much I had changed, how hopeless I had become.

I did get back to the name brand stuff and I did start to feel better, but because I had been on a dose that didn't help me much, I had started to build a tolerance to the active parts. I may have felt better, but I didn't feel good and I knew I was never going to reach where I had been before the generics.

Even with the supplimental meds, I still don't feel as well as I did way back when.

Sometimes I'm not sure it's worth trying to get there again.

"S" Word

The name brand medication is working. Well, it's working better than the generic did, at least. The brain doctor said that it could take up to two weeks for the full effect to come back and it's only been nine days. Give it time. Give it time.

The thing is that the "S" word has been pretty forfront in my thoughts for the past month or so and that hasn't gone away. If the meds work like they did the last time they won't go away totally, but they won't always be on the surface.

It's the "S" word that really freaked the brain doctor out last week. I went in wanting to start the appointmet off with the med thing, but he interupted me and we got into topics that had more to do with me living my life. That's how he gave me an out for thirty or so minutes so I didn't have to talk about the thing that was important to me. Eventually we got there though and I gave him the story about why I was on generics and we blah-blahed about that before he asked me about the changes in me. That's when I got to the "S" word and he practically hopped out of his chair. It made me wonder if I somehow convinced him that I had stopped thinking that even though I'm pretty sure I told him it was always there, just burried enough that I didn't see it all the time. Or maybe it's because that was the first time I ever said the actual "S" word to him. I was very careful not to say the "S" word to him for so long and this last time it just came out.

Now that I'm thinking about it, I hardly ever even think the "S" word. I wonder why that is?

I mean, just sitting and thinking right now there are several words that I know that I hardly ever use or think, but that's because I rarly think about the topics those words are related to. But I've been thinking about this for a very long time (years and years) and I don't use that word to myself. Odd.

Sitdep

I see the brain doctor in a little less than two hours.

If the world is less against me, non-generic medication should be waiting for me when I get back this evening.

A few months ago, six at the most, I probably would have felt that how I feel now, how I've felt for a month, is an improvement. I guess it shows how much mind altering chemicals can change a person.

After I got back from Oregon in November, I saw the brain doctor and he was impressed with how changed I was. He started talking about how he thought that a, not small, portion of the deep depression I felt was, maybe, situational because not only did I just have a successful vacation, but during that vacation I found out that I would be changing jobs to the one I currently have by the end of November. And yes, knowing I wouldn't have to put up with my old boss made me feel a bit better, but by that point I had also been on the maximum dose of my medication for six-ish weeks. I'm sure that had a large effect on me, too.

Now that I've been on the generics for a while and have watched the dawning grey turn back into a starless night, I don't think that the situation has as much to do with this as he hoped.

I am not looking forward to today's appointment.

Here's something to know about me and doctors: When I see a doctor I try to learn how I can manipulate them so that the focus is not on me. Insane, right? Still it's who I am and what I do, but not exactly on purpose. This brain doctor was a tough one, though. He was very good at ignoring my attempts as evasion and distraction, which is something I needed from him, probably still do. (The brain doctor I saw several years ago did nothing for me because he was easy to nudge off on tangents into things he was interested in; it only sometimes had to do with psychiatry.) The unfortunate thing is that during our last visit I think I needled my way through and found his distraction and that's not good because I don't help me if I push him off course. Of course, that begs the question of do I want to help me? Because even when I was on the name brand stuff, and started to really feel, I didn't want to get better and now that feel even worse the desire to just be and become so that I no longer am has grown.

I Once Described It As A Bowl

The last time I posted anything on a February 19th I posted about how much water waterless urinals are supposed to save.

I wish I had something like that to write about now.

Instead, I'll continue with the downward-ness.

The last time I saw the brain doctor, in December, I was feeling okay. And I mean actually okay, not the general answer "okay" I give all the time. I didn't hate my job. I was looking for somewhere to live. The future was growing brighter, to a point where I could almost imagine myself having a future. He was glad for me and decided that I wouldn't need to seem him for a couple of months. He also told me that my meds had finally passed the time and a generic version was available. He warned me against taking generics, though, because there had been no research done to show how well they actually work versus the name brand. I said okay and went home.

When I picked up my meds the next week, they gave me the name brand because that's what I'd been getting and my perscription said not to substitute. And things were coolish.

When I next picked up my meds they were generic. When I asked why, the pharmacist assitant or pharm tech or cashier said that my insurance no longer covered the name brand at the pharmacy level. I took the generics and researched it online. Sure enough, the pharmacy insurance would help with generics at the store ($10 per perscription) or I could get the name brand through the insurance, online ($100 per perscription). I figured I would try the generic stuff and if everything was okay just stick with it.

Being me, full of the luck that I have, the generics aren't as good. Pretty soon after starting the generics I was no longer okay, but back to "okay." I didn't want to respond to my e-mails anymore. I had a place that I was going to be renting, but I really didn't care about that. My temper's short. And all I want to do is crawl in bed and eat fattening food that's salty, sweet, or both. And sleep.

Oh, how I long to sleep so much. To not have to wake up except for the short visit to the unrination station. To open my eyes breifly then roll over and fall back into the insanity of dreams and the nothingness inbetween. To never have to have a clock scream into my ear to wake me up.

Anyway, this weekend I sent my perscription to my medication insurance so I can get the name brand stuff. I can only hope that it'll make me feel better again. I never felt great, but I felt different in a better sort of way.

Here's to hope and the preparations for disappointment.

Grunt

I don't think that the generic version of my medication works as well as the name brand stuff. I seem to be thinking the things that I'm not supposed to think all of the time again.

Fuck.

Is it?

When I saw the brain doctor last week, he said that he was really glad that I went and saw the play of It's a Wonderful Life performed at a radio show. He said that the moral (my word) of the play is so very important for a person like me. A person with my... mood. (I don't remember the words he used.)

The thing is, I've thought about this for years. It's a Wonderful Life is a great movie. Great cast that carries off a very earnest script with ease and believability. The direction is competent and the moral is very strong: a person with friends is always rich.

Although I think the brain doctor was more interested in the fact that life is worth living and we don't know how we have effected the world around us.

Again, I've thought about this for years. The only truly horrible thing that I can think of happening if I hadn't been born is that I don't think my brothers would have been born, either, because I doubt that my parents would have gotten married if my mother hadn't been pregnant with me. (Hell, on several occasions, and in less vulgar terms, my father has told me that he offered to pull out because he thought she would get pregnant that time and she told him to keep going. I could have been a smear on my mother's stomach. Or back.) The fact that my brothers wouldn't be born bothers me because I don't think anyone should have the right to take another person's life. Other than that, though, I haven't led a life that has drastically affected anyone. George Baily lived in a small city and gave out home loans to people; he was in position to touch many live in an important way and that's not even counting his family. I've only done work that anyone could do just as well as I do.

Then there's the thoughts about friends. If they're reading this, I'm sorry, but I don't know if I really have any friends anymore. I don't think I understand what friendship is. Did I ever? Is a friend someone who doesn't answer your letters or calls or ask questions even when you try to? Is a friend someone you used to spend time with, but don't anymore? Is a friend someone who you always have to go to, but he or she never comes your direction? I'm not sure anymore. And since I know I haven't made any friends since I left high school... well that leave me pretty screwed in that department.

Still, I do know that my meds are working. Thursday I found myself planning for the future. Not like when do I think I'd like to take vacation next year, but planning for years from now. I am going to quit my job and go back to school for an MFA. It will take me at least two years to get there, but probably three. I have to take the GRE and the subject specific GRE. I need to create a network so I can get references from people that are related to the MFA I want. I have to start writing fiction. And for the first time in I don't know how long this decision feels really real. I know what program I'd really like to get into for a Ph.D., but it only takes five students a year. Most of the MFA programs take more students and there are several out there that could pay my way through school. At the shortest it'll take me four years to be finished. If I go all the way it could take up to 10 years. And I'm okay with that. I really don't know the last time I was willing or able to make plans so far in advance and feel okay about it.

One more thing before I check out, probably for the year, these are decent in explaining how I have felt for more than a decade: Adventure in Depression and Depression Part 2. They're not perfect, seeing as how I'm a different person, but for the most part it's close enough. Especially the first one.

I don't see any stars.

The brain doctor keeps saying that my life seems depressing. Every time he says it I wonder what's the point.

He wants me to go out and do thing with people around. A class, maybe. Something where my mind is occupied on thoughts and things outside of myself and, he believes, eventually I will come to strike up conversations with the people around me and make friends and then start going out and doing things with people and eventually I'll be happy and I won't think how I currently think. He also says that this will take time and will be hard for me; he has no idea how hard.

The thought doctor jacked up my medication to the highest approved dose a few weeks ago. I didn't notice any positive difference. He doesn't want to put me on another drug because he's afraid of generics and what may be in the pill. (Generic drugs have to be + or - 20% the brand name levels of the active chemical and the FDA doesn't monitor what else goes into them.I looked it up.) I'd like something else, though, I've been on this drug for three months and while it has helped a little, it doesn't feel like much change.

A friend who is on a different medication said that she thinks more clearly and more purely herself. I envy her both. Over the last couple of days my brain has felt muddied and slow and sometimes I feel like I have to pull really hard to get thoughts out and then have concentrate even harder to make sure that I'm understood by others. As for feeling more like myself, I've been down so long that the only self I know is the one in a dark pit, so deep I can't even see the stars at night. I don't know if the medication she's on would do the same for me, but I'd like to spend a day feeling like she feels.

The doctor also said that if I am as depressed as I say I am he finds it to be incredible that I can function as well as I do at work. I tried to explain to him that if I couldn't get out of bed and make an effort to get to work and do my job that I may as well end it all and I can't do that because I made a promise about 25 years ago that I wouldn't. So I haven't. So I don't plan to. So I won't.

It's strange to be talking with someone about these things and being very specific, not vague like here. What's stranger is knowing that he's been doing this job for longer than I've been alive and he can still be surprised and shocked by some of the things I say. I assumed that someone who's been in the brain doctor business for this long has pretty much heard it all. He did tell me that he hasn't hospitalized one of his patients in 20 years, which, of course, sent my brain into overreact mode and I wonder if he's considering hospitalizing me. If he does I may just let that be the end; stop there.

I feel like I should apologize for putting this out there. I know that very few people read this and I've heard that getting your thoughts and feelings out is a good idea, but I don't want the few that read my thoughts to worry or think that there's something that they should do or something that they can do.

In time I'm supposed to enjoy the things that "normal" people enjoy. In time I'm supposed to be able to find a reason or reasons like "normal" people do. In time certain thoughts are supposed to fade away and I'm supposed to start thinking more closely to how "normal" people think. In time.

Increase Without Increase

Last week, with great hope, the brain doctor upped my dosage. The idea is that since there have been some positive effects with the lower dose the higher dose would, hopefully, give my brain a push to the next step and I could really start getting better.

Tomorrow I get to tell the brain doctor that it's not working. I don't feel any different this week than I did last week or the two weeks before that. Which isn't so bad because my insurance won't cover this drug.

Besides what I wrote on Tuesday about how those okay moments make me hate my job they also make me really want to get better. Having those moments of okay make some of the horrible times hurt, really hurt. I don't remember a time when I really wanted to be better. It's kind of scary.

*sigh*

Every breath I take feels like a sigh. It's uncomfortable.

I've been feeling flu-ish since Monday afternoon. Part of me wonders if it's a side effect of the meds or a small summertime flu.

I honestly don't know what I hope it is.

Friday I see the brain doctor again. Maybe he'll tell me.

Ka-BOOM!

A few years ago, I was taking medication for depression. I was on it for about six months. Then I quit. The explanation I gave was only part of the reason and since I can't sleep, due to thinking about it, I figured that two years off the meds was enough time to really be honest about it.

I've describes myself as fluctuating between a 2 and 6 on the "how you feelin'" scale. I figure I should better describe that scale:
1 -- Your brain is in total shut down. It's trapped in this dark loop that's no thoughts, just horrible, horrible feelings. You can't do anything that requires a little thought. You don't walk. You don't eat. You can't sleep. And you don't care if you piss yourself.
2 -- Your brain is trapped in a loop of darkness, but there's enough extra there so you can function on autopilot. You can use the toilet. You can eat. You can do your mindless bits at work. Hell, you can even drive. You can't, however, do anything that requires even a little critical thinking. Even something relatively simple, but that you don't do all the time, is impossible. Speaking with people is also very hard to do.
3 -- Now there's room in your brain for thinking along with all the darkness. You can pass yourself off as being in just a "bad mood," so people don't worry about you. You can lie to others, but not to yourself about what's going on in your head. The horrible things in your head seem possible to do.
4 -- A lot like 3, but you can see the stupidity in some of the things you thought about/are thinking about.
5 -- You don't give a shit either way, but there's still a weight on you shoulders or chest pushing you down.
6 -- The weight is gone, but you don't feel light. You have trouble empathizing with those who feel good, but it's easy to fall in with those who aren't.
7 -- You start to feel light. You feel the emotions of others and you start to want to share the way you feel with the world.
8 -- The world is rosy. Sure, you might see some problems and you can empathize with the guy whose dad just died, but it's not going to ruin your mood.
9 -- You feel pretty great and you can think critically about everything around you. You can learn. You can talk. You are probably the best version of you that you can be.
10 -- You feel really damn good. You function mostly on autopilot going around doing the things you normally do and knowing everything is right.

(I'm pretty sure there's a stage where you're so blissed out that you can't even function, but I doubt people can reach it without the help of some pretty heavy drugs.)

(Also, I realize that this system isn't the same for everyone. These are my numbers. I'm sorry about how short the higher numbers are, but it's been a long time since I've soared to any of those heights.)

When I was on my medication and it started to even me out, I stayed near a three or four. Those are the most dangerous numbers because you feel bad, but you can think and, during that time, you think you're thinking clearly about things.

To be more specific (and yet vague): The day I decided I had to get off that medication was the day I was going to buy a garden hose. I had it my arms and was carrying it to the cashier when I stopped and realized that maybe going for a drive out into the woods where it would be just me, my car, a full-ish tank of gas, and a garden hose wasn't such a smart idea for my family and friends.

When you are at a 2 for short or long periods of time, you think about garden hoses, among other things, but it's beyond your capacity to do anything about it. Garden hoses aren't something that you've used everyday, or even once a week, for years and years so while the thought might be there, you don't have the ability to use a garden hose, assuming that you have one.

Short forays into 3 and 4 also lead to thoughts about garden hoses, but you're not in that state of mind long enough to do anything with a garden hose. When you're evened out and spend ten, fifteen, thirty days at that level, garden hoses are all you think about and it seems like a good idea to buy one. Garden hoses seem like the best idea not just for you, but for everyone. And you convince yourself that everyone'll understand because you've been trapped in a dark place for a very long time. If they end up having a problem with it... well, fuck 'em.

And as tired as I was, "fuck 'em" just didn't seem like the correct answer.

So, I talked to my GP and the psychiatrist, at the time, and they bounced me back and forth for a couple of weeks, neither one wanting to put me on something different. I got tired of being what that med made me and convinced my GP to ween me off of it. I went back to being what I am without it and I started getting days back where the weight was lighter and my mind was more grayish than black.

Another One

An interview conducted by me with me.

JTI: It's been a week since you drove to Oregon, how was it?

JTA: Well, any fleeting fantasies I may have had about being a long-haul trucker are now gone.

JTI: Long drive.

JTA: Very long. More than ten hours long. Minus ten minutes to buy a burger and pee, I never exited my car on the way up. On the way back, I did get gas in Oregon and stop to pee in the woods, once.

JTI: Oh... Kay. So, why were you up there, again?

JTA: My brother got married on the first.

JTI: Nice wedding?

JTA: Yeah. It was at a lighthouse and there was a rock covered in puffins, and their poop. The temperature was nice when the wind wasn't blowing. The preacher/pastor guy did a good job and left religion out of it, which made me happy because shouldn't a marriage be between the people getting married and not the people and God?

The reception, well, it seemed a little muddled to me, though.

JTI: What does that mean?

JTA: My brother and his wife aren't really "traditional" people, but they bought a book (or looked it up online or something) about traditions at weddings and then got into the mode that they had to do certain things.

JTI: Like what?

JTA: First dance. Dance with opposite gendered parents. (Although my brother didn't do his.) Isolated table. Speeches by only certain people. Cake cutting ceremony. Wedding party table set way far away from guests. Nothing that was a big deal, but things that didn't strike me as in character for the two who got married.

Things that were in character was the mimosas at breakfast. The tarts instead of a cake. A tray full of dry salami. The music. (How often do you hear Donovan, James Darren, They Might Be Giants, and The Traveling Wilburys at a wedding?) The time the wedding took place. The speeches given by the bestmen.

JTI: So, how was it?

JTA: People seemed to enjoy it quite a bit.

JTI: You?

JTA: I enjoyed it as much as I've enjoyed any wedding.

JTI: And that means?

JTA: Look, I'm already not so comfortable in social situations that involve more than 5 people, and in general I'm not sure what I'm supposed to feel at a wedding.

I looked around at the ceremony and saw some tears and many smiles. All I wanted to do was crack jokes during the vows. (Which I did.) It's not appropriate, but, to me, knowing my brother and my sister-in-law, the vows were generic and, well, silly. They made those sorts of vows to each other a year ago, are they more special -- or important -- because they said them in front of some guy and their families and friends? I don't think so. Other probably disagree with me, though.

At the reception, I saw my dad get red faced and teary while he talked to my brother, alone, off in a corner. I wondered if I was supposed to feel that bitter-sweet mix of emotions, too. I didn't, though, To me, they've been essentially married for a year, other than getting some really great gifts and wearing rings, what's changed?

JTI: Christ, you must suck at parties.

JTA: I do. I really do.

JTI: ...

JTA: Still, the wedding wasn't about me. It was about the couple and they seemed to have a good time, as did their parents and grandparents and friends and family.

JTI: Anything else interesting happen while you were up there?

JTA: My brother, sort of joking, asked me to move up there and become his partner in a coffee roasting company.

JTI: Really?

JTA: Yeah. He said that his boss is looking to sell and to get the equipment and the stock would probably be $60000 to $80000, plus we'd get the customer base that's already built up.

JTI: Did you consider it?

JTA: For about 30 seconds.

JTI: 30 seconds? Why so short?

JTA: Well, my immediate thought was could I earn a living wage, but with Oregon being so much more cheap than California, that'd be possible. Second thought was HOORAY! Third thought was what would we do? Fourth, brother would roast and talk to people and design labels and blends. Fifth, I'd end up doing a lot of the business stuff. And that's where the thoughts ended.

JTI: You don't think you'd be good at the business stuff?

JTA: I think I'd be fine. I've looked into starting small businesses as a lark, so I know some of the basics. (Even now I'm thinking about the things that I'd have to start doing to get going.) I know how to start creating an internet presence, which is needed. And I can handle any sort of math that'd be thrown at me.

JTI: So...?

JTA: I'm not passionate about coffee. I don't really like the stuff, and if you're going to run a business, it should be a business that involves something you like, right? How long would it take me to be miserable taking care of a thing, after having sunk $30000 to $40000 into it, that I don't even like? Not long at all.

JTI: Oh.

JTA: So, it was never brought up again.

JTI: Anything else?

JTA: I got the feeling that I was more disturbing to people than usual.

JTI: What do you mean?

JTA: I was uncomfortable a lot of the time and I glowered in a sullen/discontented manner. I was called on it a couple of times and my now-married brother felt the need, several times, to reiterate how happy he was that I made it to Oregon, earlier than originally planned, even.

Maybe I didn't disturb them so much as it was more noticed or they were more wanting to talk about it with me, or something. Not that I really let anyone actually talk to me about how I was feeling at any given moment.

JTI: On that note, how's the fluoxetine treatment going?

JTA: Um... well... I'm sort of not taking it anymore.

JTI: What!?

JTA: Yeah, I stopped taking it, with my doctor's knowledge, about three-and-a-half months ago.

JTI: Why?

JTA: Because it evened me out in a not-so-good way.

JTI: Please explain.

JTA: Okay, let's put our days on a scale of 1 to 10:

A 1 is a day where you feel so down that you don't want to get out of bed. You're so miserable that you're willing to wallow in your own piss and shit rather than roll out of bed and walk ten feet to the toilet. A day where the only thoughts in your head are horrible ones.

A 10 is a day where you feel like your in a never ending orgasm. You know you'll succeed at everything. Everything you do feels good and right and wonderful. It just all goes your way.

Got it?

JTI: Yeah.

JTA: Most people live somewhere in between those two extremes.

JTI: Right.

JTA: From the way it looks to me, and I may be wrong, the average person's life fluctuates between 4 and 8, occasionally dropping to a 3 and having a few times at a 9.

JTI: Okay.

JTA: On that scale, I figure that my life floats between 2 and 6. I can't even remember the last day that I'd give a 7 to and I think I spend most of my time below a 5.

JTI: And the meds?

JTA: They evened me out, like they're supposed to, but I was hovering between a 3 and a 4 with dips and spikes going, maybe, a point either way. Just this side of feeling like nothing is good. Sure I spent less time thinking horrible things, but suddenly there were never any good days. Not a single day when I felt a moment of happy. Just days I got through and that made me feel even worse.

JTI: And that's why you quit the pills?

JTA: Yeah.

JTI: Now you think you feel more of a range?

JTA: Yeah.

JTI: Do you still have "horrible" thoughts.

JTA: Everyday.

JTI: Ever afraid you'll act those thoughts out?

JTA: No.

JTI: Why?

JTA: I'm not ready to go into that here.

JTI: Okay... okay, then why didn't you get moved to a different medication? There are tons of different antidepressant medications out there, why not a different one?

JTA: I don't know.

JTI: Did you ask?

JTA: Of course I asked.

JTI: What happened?

JTA: The first time I asked my GP told me to talk to the psychiatrist I was seeing then. When I asked him about it he told me it was between me and my GP. When I asked her about it she weened me off the ones that I was taking.

JTI: And?

JTA: And I went back to feeling like I felt before the pills.

JTI: Did you tell her that?

JTA: Yeah, I e-mailed her asking about other medication and she asked me how I was feeling and I wrote that I felt about the same as before and she said great and told me to talk to the psychiatrist.

JTI: Did you?

JTA: I asked him about meds and he said it was up to my GP, again.

JTI: Then?

JTA: I quit.

JTI: Quit?

JTA: Quit trying. Being pushed around in circles while being confused and depressed and wholly uncomfortable is worse than just... being what I'm feeling.

They tell you that when you're depressed, you don't have to feel the way you feel because it's not normal, and I believe that's true, but when trying to feel better makes you feel worse... well, what the fuck, right?

JTI: *sigh* Sure. Anything else you'd like to say.

JTA: No.

JTI: Okay. Thanks.

JTA: Thank you.

*sigh*

So, remember a couple of months ago when I said that I was going on some antidepressant medication?

Well, let me say that if this is how I feel with the meds working, I must have been in horrible shape before I started taking them.

Can't talk to my doctor about it 'cause she's gone until next week.

Cripes.

Anxious

I am anxious about my appointment to see the psychiatrist on Thursday.

Why am I seeing a psychiatrist? Well, when I went to speak to my general practitioner about getting on an anti-depressant, I freaked her out by being honest. Not my normal sort of honest where I leave more scary bits out to make me sound like I'm better off than I think I am, but totally honest. Like I wrote before, it freaked her out.

After our talk, she left the room to call the psychiatric department to get me an appointment the next day and then gave me a number to call as soon as I got to my apartment. I called the number and it turned out to be the emergency psychiatric help line and the woman I talked to started out by trying to convince me to head up to the psychiatric center and getting a room, there, for the night. After explaining myself to her, by telling her the same things I told the GP earlier just more slowly, she agreed that I could stay in my apartment as long as I'd go and see the psychiatrist the next day, which I had already told the GP I'd do.

I went. I told him the same stuff that I told the other people the day before. He wanted me in a group situation. (I went to a class the next week. I signed up for a group that starts in January.) He set up an appointment for me with him for this Thursday.

This time, I have no idea what we're going to talk about.

I have nothing new to say.

I don't feel or think anything different after four weeks of it.

Will it just be a waste of a co-pay?

I know, it'll be what I make of it, right? It's up to me to turn this into something positive for me, right? It's a fucking choice that I have to fucking make, right?

Well, shit.

I'll see what comes.

It's what I do.

I go to sleep. I wake up. I go to work. I leave work. I go to sleep. And I see what it was.

And the Answer is...

Fluoxetine.

Starting Today

By the time this gets posted, I'll have left work for the day.

Today, I am going to speak with my doctor. She will want to speak to me about being too fat, having high blood pressure, and the fact that although my bad cholesterol is at a decent level my good cholesterol is low despite the pill she put me on. I, however, set up the appointment so I could get her to put me on some form of an antidepressant.

My original plan for this post was a history of my depression, but once I got near word 1000 and I hadn't written even a quarter of what I wanted, I decided shorter was better.

I don't know what I'll be put on and I don't know how I'll react to it, but I'm pretty sure that this is the right step.