Indefinite Changes
I have been waiting to say this until it was significant, or at least until it looked like it might stick. I started taking medicine for Major Depressive Disorder in March and have continued to take it (on almost a daily basis) since. I am really bad with medicine. I tend to take it for two weeks and then just stop. I remember that I should take it but can never come up with the motivation to actually take it. It's like getting out of bed some days. I know that I need to. Part of me really, really wants to. I know that I have to do it if I am going to be dependable and if people I work with are going to respect and trust me. Yet, I just can't physically do it. It's as if I have no control over my body. Batteries are dead and there is nothing I can do to move myself, even in a dead, mechanistic sort of way.
So now that I am in graduate school and have a big girl job, I have been doing my best to take them. Sometimes I just forget and don't take them or don't want to take them. They prevent me from sleeping deeply. They change my responses to things. I don't really have moments where I don't feel pleasure at thing I generally like but I also am more likely to feel anger, intense anger. It's not irrational anger or anything potentially dangerous to myself or others. I value life and respect others and would never, ever do anything to another person. But I have the energy, the courage, to feel what I normally prevent myself from feeling. That is a good thing in the respect that I should feel anger when somebody wrongs me. On the other hand, after twenty three years of depression spent largely without medicine, I am not accustomed to giving myself the privilege of feeling anger and therefore do not know how to process it. But, all in all, this medicine stops anxiety from torturing me. Without it, I am torn apart by the fear that I have not held my weight or that I have let somebody down or disappointed somebody. I started seeing a counselor in March as well and he says that this comes from my upbringing and the immense amount of guilt employed by my parents.
I still feel all of these things but not to as great of a degree. I feel better. I notice my feelings change when I don't take them. I am like one of the characters on Mario Kart who drew the black cloud and is constantly stung by it. So to avoid all of that, I take them and am proud of myself for doing it (I am rarely able to be truly proud of myself so that is evidence that I have taken them today). On the other hand, that part of me, the part I send away with medicine every day, is the person that I have grown up being. She is the person I think I am. My issues are so tied to me, as they are to everybody, that I feel as if I am sending myself away. Andrew Solomon explains this perfectly in his novel, The Noonday Demon; I recommend that you read it if you ever have a chance.
Anyways, I don't want to take on the negative stigma of being "emo" as people without Depression might consider these last few paragraphs. I work hard and I am very passionate. I attempt not to pity myself and that is my biggest problem. All of these things I have said have taken a lot of soul-searching. I never noticed them before. I have many, many things for which I should be thankful and in some twisted ways my Depression is one of them. But I am very glad that I am taking medicine. Part of my doesn't approve but she can sit in the corner and disapprove. That's ok. You are never going to please all of everybody, least of all yourself.
So now that I am in graduate school and have a big girl job, I have been doing my best to take them. Sometimes I just forget and don't take them or don't want to take them. They prevent me from sleeping deeply. They change my responses to things. I don't really have moments where I don't feel pleasure at thing I generally like but I also am more likely to feel anger, intense anger. It's not irrational anger or anything potentially dangerous to myself or others. I value life and respect others and would never, ever do anything to another person. But I have the energy, the courage, to feel what I normally prevent myself from feeling. That is a good thing in the respect that I should feel anger when somebody wrongs me. On the other hand, after twenty three years of depression spent largely without medicine, I am not accustomed to giving myself the privilege of feeling anger and therefore do not know how to process it. But, all in all, this medicine stops anxiety from torturing me. Without it, I am torn apart by the fear that I have not held my weight or that I have let somebody down or disappointed somebody. I started seeing a counselor in March as well and he says that this comes from my upbringing and the immense amount of guilt employed by my parents.
I still feel all of these things but not to as great of a degree. I feel better. I notice my feelings change when I don't take them. I am like one of the characters on Mario Kart who drew the black cloud and is constantly stung by it. So to avoid all of that, I take them and am proud of myself for doing it (I am rarely able to be truly proud of myself so that is evidence that I have taken them today). On the other hand, that part of me, the part I send away with medicine every day, is the person that I have grown up being. She is the person I think I am. My issues are so tied to me, as they are to everybody, that I feel as if I am sending myself away. Andrew Solomon explains this perfectly in his novel, The Noonday Demon; I recommend that you read it if you ever have a chance.
Anyways, I don't want to take on the negative stigma of being "emo" as people without Depression might consider these last few paragraphs. I work hard and I am very passionate. I attempt not to pity myself and that is my biggest problem. All of these things I have said have taken a lot of soul-searching. I never noticed them before. I have many, many things for which I should be thankful and in some twisted ways my Depression is one of them. But I am very glad that I am taking medicine. Part of my doesn't approve but she can sit in the corner and disapprove. That's ok. You are never going to please all of everybody, least of all yourself.