Depression

Depression is a creeping thing. It slips under your doorframe and crawls into bed with you.

I have had moments of sadness that hit me like a semi-truck. But in general, depression for me has started as a quiet dissatisfaction with nothing in particular. Just a nagging feeling that something, somewhere, needs fixing.

My personal depression experience has a lot to do with guilt. I heap myself with it. I blame myself for things that could not possibly be my fault; I take things that ARE my fault and expand them out into holocaust-sized sins. I have a Catholic upbringing, and we're second only to the Jewish people in guilt mastery. My mother, (wonderful woman by the way, only ever really punished us through guilt. I wake up and feel crippled by it. Bills that I pay late make me feel guilty--"I'm not a functioning member of society!" Not answering texts and calls right away--"I'm neglecting my friends and family!"...I once stepped on the cat while walking down the steps and wept for nearly an hour.

Depression is an over the top experience. People witnessing it from the outside are usually appalled and embarrassed for the depressed person. THEY HAVE A POINT.

Depression is completely absurd! It takes your emotions and reactions and ramps them up to hyperbolic extremes. But depression is not that person's fault. We all have days of being melodramatic and feeling sorry for ourselves--don't lie, we all do it. But depression lasts for weeks and months. It effects mood, sleep, food intake, concentration, and other aspects of health. Depression is physically painful at times. Depression is not a personal failing or a choice, it is a series of unfortunate brain chemistry actions, and often, it takes serious work to get out of depression.

It can take months to get into a really deep and pervasive depressive state. Every aspect of your being is colored by it. Therefore, telling someone to "snap out of it," or "cheer up" is downright insulting. Trust me when I say that the majority of depressed people do not want to be depressed. It sucks. It hurts, and it completely destroys relationships and self esteem. Some of them don't even REALIZE that they're depressed.

Being supportive of these people is important. Getting them professional help is huge--but they have to make that decision for themselves. Another thing that is important is not to martyr yourself. The man I loved during my severe depressive episode brought himself very very low trying to drag me along. He tried to get me help, and I fought and ignored him. I took his well intentioned criticisms and heard them as a complete rejection of everything that I was. I very nearly dragged him down with me, because he loved me. Don't do that to yourself. Don't ask me how to avoid it...just...don't.

I personally believe that it is possible for most depressive episodes to be broken by a person without medication, if they are given the right tools. I believe that meditation, goal setting, strictly regimenting your day to include sleep and exercise, as well as balancing your diet and cutting out the alcohol can help pull you out of a depression.

I also know that for me, those things did not work on their own. I needed medication to help. And I am not alone. Many people find themselves in holes so black and deep that they cannot crawl out without a lamp and a bit of rope.

Medication is not a sign of weakness.

(I should have to write that on a board 9,000 times. "Medication is not a sign of weakness...medication is not a sign of weakness...Medication is not...")

I had a very hard time accepting the prospect of medications for my depression symptoms. Additionally, it never even occurred to me at the time that my hypomanic times might have benefited from a few little white pills. But hitting my personal rock bottom in a severe depressive episode taught me that sometimes, you just need more chemical help than you can pump into your brain through willpower alone.

I am a damn stubborn woman. To a FAULT. I can outargue most people, and have challenged myself in more ways than I can think of, and I generally come out at alright. But being stubborn about not getting medical help was not a good decision.

I barely remember the first 36 hours after I went into the inpatient psych facility. (yes, I have been inpatient, more on that later, I promise)

But around day 3...my world was completely different. Life still kinda sucked--I was still getting dumped, for example, but I could see the other side. I still had about 4 months of hard self-reflection and work to do to get to a healthy head-space, but I can tell you for certain that medication started me on the right path.

I didn't know where I was going with his post, and it shows. Sorry about that. But I felt the need to try and...process my depression experience. I am no longer depressed. I look back on that time and feel ashamed and embarrassed for past-me. I am angry and feel guilty about the time that was wasted, and the relationships that I damaged, some irreparably. But it is in the past. I am not the same person as I am when I am depressed. That guilt doesn't need to follow me every day.

It feels good to know that. Believing it is still hard. But I do KNOW it. And that's enough.








tl;dr version?

Depression is real, and it sucks. You can get better on your own sometimes, but other times, you may need medication to help you, and THAT IS OK. It will get better. One day, you'll look back and not even know how to imagine being this sad. It. Will. Pass.

Shiny Happy People Regimen

You know whats obnoxious? Your therapist/psychiatrist telling you to do things that make you feel like you're in the fourth grade. "Keep a journal, go to bed on time, make goals, get enough exercise, eat right,take your medications...and AVOID ALL STRESS. CALL ME if there is any change."

Pshhh. Seriously? I'm a grown-ass woman. I can do what I--

Oh. Wait. I can't, can I?

Because when I get stubborn, and try to pretend that these things don't make a difference, I DO get worse. I HATE IT. I hate that I now know that if I plan to go out, I can...but I can't drink much, and still need to go to bed at a somewhat reasonable time, so I can still get 7-9 hours of sleep. I hate that I HAVE A BEDTIME. Now, right now its all screwy because I am still coming down off of a bit of a sleep deprived state and my meds aren't quite right yet...but here soon, I'll have to hold myself to like a 10-11pm bedtime. UUGH.

And "avoid all stress"? Really? Has this woman ever seen my life? GAH!

Ok, enough whining.

So, I'm trying. I have a mood journal (the one I use I found here) and I generally remember to fill it out at least every 2 days. I have this blog to journal some of my thoughts, and I write the posts that I'm not sure I want to post yet in word and save them for later. I'm still terrible at actual "journaling"...but I think this is achieving the reflection that I need.

Goals-
a) be a good girl about my medication. if that means fighting TOOTH AND NAIL to pay for it, fighting with the insurance as I go than so be it. (there will be a long post about that in the future)
b) keep blogging or at least writing what could one day become posts
c) get the sleep I need, even if it means avoiding things I like (late night Dr Who marathons)
d) friggin get off my but and exercise at least 4 days a week, instead of my current 2.


Ok. See, I'm a good girl. I have my next appointment with my psych next week--Thursday @9:30 ("keep your appointments written somewhere you will remember to check")just to check and make sure the medication changes are going well. So far, so good.

I hate being treated like a child. But it would make ME childish if I didn't follow the advice. Especially when I see how well it works when I do follow it.

Ugh. Maturity sucks.

Stigma

Stigma is something that all people with mental illness have to face at some point or another. I am currently struggling with this in my own life from what some may consider to be an unlikely source.

Myself.

I still have days where I don't believe I'm bipolar, where I want to get off my medications and live my life like a "normal" person.

Then I have days like what happened last week. I am telling you this not to gain your pity, but to stress what I believe to be my main goal on this blog. To provide an honest account of what it feels like to be bipolar.

Last week, I had the flu. It completely sucked. I called off of work and stayed home. Now, two days into having the flu, I stopped sleeping and started feeling wired.

When I say wired, I don't mean "crackhead twitchy". I mean my thoughts were racing in my head a little more than normal, and I couldn't really lay down. I could sit and be still, but when I'd go to lie down, it just felt wrong somehow. I attributed it to the flu, and let it go.

That night, I'm barely not sleeping, and I'm going out of my way to talk to people. Texting, especially...I even joined twitter. Now, I never had a problem with twitter, but I never had the strange URGE to have more people available to converse with right-this-very-second.

I also started reading. I finished two of the Harry Dresden books in 2 days, without even noticing. That's fast even for me.

I also was getting sucked into deep documentaries about religion and physics. Hours of them. All hail Netflix!

The flu started on Tuesday. Over the week, I kept getting progressively less and less sleep. By Saturday night, things were getting weird in my brain, but I was able to keep myself looking normal on the outside. I had already decided to call my psych on monday to make an appointment, because I was recognizing my personal warning signs. (I am very proud of myself for that. I am known to be stubborn to absurd levels.)

Monday morning, 2am, I cant sleep. Its been just about 48 hours since I last slept, and I'm filled with anxiety. I'm not scared of anything specific, I'm just...racing. My body feels like I just narrowly missed getting hit by a car. I take a dose of xanax, which I did stubbornly avoid until I couldn't stand it anymore. Usually, a dose will take me down to a managable level with no problem. I have a very low dose perscribed to me.

Nothing.

It didn't even touch me. That is where things got stupid in my brain-parts. I started getting terrified that I was losing it, that I was headed for a huge psychiatric meltdown and I'd have to be flown somewhere for treatment and I couldn't afford it, and my family would worry, and blah blah blah blah blah. The thoughts came that quick. I couldn't even finish one paranoid thought before spiraling down to the next. So I did an extremely stupid thing.

I started driving around. This, my friends, was beyond stupid. I should never drive when upset. Many people have commented to this, and its true. Its not a good decision. The sad thing is, I KNOW this. I will tell people, I can't drive right now, I'm too upset. I have pulled over in the past to freak out, or cry, before continuing to drive. But in this moment, I...forgot? Forgot isn't really the right word, but I do not know how else to put it. It seemed like a small concern compared to the fact that I "had-to-get-out-of-this-house-right-now-or-something-in-me-will-explode."

So I drove around. For about 4 hours. Not straight. I would drive somewhere, then sit there for a bit. Drove to McDonalds, got a root beer. Drove out south end of the island, watched the sea. Back and forth.

At about 0830, I was at a loss. I didn't know what to do, and I felt completely unstable. I didn't have any more xanax after taking that last dose (I've been on the same perscription for 30 pills since August without a refill, don't start thinking I have a dependancy), and I didn't know what to do.

So I swallowed my pride and did the one thing I have always sworn I would NEVER do. I went to the ER. Even when I was suicidal, I didn't go this far--I had myself direct admitted. I do NOT go to the ER.

But go I did. I walked into a completely empty ER, and tried to tell my nurse what was wrong. I was so ashamed. I tried to poise myself to calmly tell her that I was bipolar, and I seemed to be having an anxiety attack that I couldn't break, or possibly the beginnings of a manic episode.

Instead, I stood there and cried. To her credit, she got me into a room right away, dimmed the lights just a little so they weren't in my face, and just waited. She didn't "Oh, HONEY, what's the matter?" she just waited patiently, and not unkindly. A minute or so later, I got myself together and explained that I was bipolar, and something wasn't right. She didn't let me babble on forever, though I would have in that state, just nodded, and left. An aide came in and got me registered and took my vital signs (elevated BP and heart rate, of course), and then the Doc came in.

Yes, you read those words right. A doctor saw me in the ER within 15 minutes of my feet hitting the door. God Bless small towns.

He asked me a bunch of questions, familiar to those of us with mental health history...to those who have not yet been diagnosed/are not effected, some of those are as follows:

-Are you thinking of hurting yourself or others?
-Are you pregnant?
-Have you been doing any drugs this evening? Pot, meth, crack, heroin?
-Have you been taking your medications as directed?
-Have you been sleeping?
-Are you hearing or seeing things that you suspect are not real?

Bipolar specific:
-Have you been spending a lot of moneyshopping, gambling, or giving large amounts of money away?
-Have you been having unprotected or unusually high amounts of sex?
-Have you been in any physical fights, or been irritable more than normal?
-Have you been having racing thoughts?
-Have you felt "high" or hyper with no explainable cause?


There are many more questions, but that about covers the basics. After I answered all of these, he suggested I have some xanax to see if we could break the cycle, and very kindly asked if there was anything he could get me to entertain myself with. I declined, deciding to focus on my breathing in some exercises I've been trying to learn.

I am so grateful that I could answer "no" to almost all of those questions. I fear one day I will have to say "yes" to some of those...and that completely kills me.

In the end, it took 2 doses of xanax, and a dose of Valium to bring me back to a "normal" level. Even with that, it was hard for me to sleep for the few hours before my appointment with my psychiatrist that had been set up in the ER for that afternoon.

We changed some drugs around in dosage, and she gave me a 4 day supply of Valium to get me through, as well as the Chloral Hydrate to knock me the heck out.

The first day I stayed home from the flu was Wednesday. I started going to a bad place mentally on Friday (that I noticed)...ER Monday. I came back to work yesterday, feeling much better. A little "off" in my head, but none the worse for wear. The side effects from increased dosage on my medications will fade soon, I hope.

The moral is this: Had I not gone to the ER to break the cycle, I could have hurt myself or someone else. I was driving while extremely agitated and afraid. I COULD not see what was wrong with my behavior. Trust me, I know how dangerous it was and I cannot understand why I did it at the time. Its like it wasn't me. And in many ways, it wasn't. But I am still responsible for my actions no matter what mental state I am in.

See, I'm learning. A year ago, I would never have done that. And despite the residual shame I still feel--despite still feeling weak in that mean part of my brain, I am really proud of myself.

To those who might be upset that I didn't call you or who I did call, but didn't really tell you what was going on, I am sorry. It is part of my pattern when I am manic or depressive. Part of that is shame, as well. I'm working through it. Please, don't think that it reflects on you, or that I didn't feel like I could trust you.

This isn't about you. Its the result of biochemistry and a lifetime of training myself that if it can be done at all, it can be done by me alone. I'm working on it.

Love you all,
Z

Jagged Little Pill (THROWBACK)

Lets take a moment to talk about my personal version of the boogieman, medications. My resistance to taking daily medications was very, very hard to work through. Dependance on something other than my own stubbornness just makes me cringe. I feel ashamed that in my mid-twenties, I have 6 medications...4 of which I am to take every single day, or potentially end up in a mental institution (again)(<---more on that later) or suicidal.

That being said, part of trying to reconcile myself with the reality of being bipolar is embracing my pills. Yes, I said embracing. Not tolerating, not grudgingly acquiescing...actually embracing my medications as a part of my life FOREVER.

Not that the pills themselves have helped their own case. Especially sleeping medications.

We'll start with Ambien. Ambien and I are NOT friends. The first time I took Ambien, I fell asleep, and didn't remember anything until the next morning. That sounds great, until you realize that I vomited repeatedly, wandered about for several hours, unable to be awakened, and apparently, I also screamed intermittently. That isn't exactly written on the bottle, folks. And the really funny part of it is, had I been alone when I took it, I wouldn't have known it wasn't working as directed. Besides waking up with a nasty taste in my mouth and a bit of what can only be described as a hangover, I was fine.

The next sleeping pill to fail miserably is Trazodone. This pill did put me to sleep, and didn't increase or decrease my sleepwalking in any noticeable fashion. However, I did lose all appetite. I lost about 15 pounds in 3 weeks. "Gosh, get me a pill like that!" You might foolishly exclaim. Losing 5 pounds a week isn't good, and feeling like a flaccid Christmas blow-up decoration for the first 3 hours you're awake isn't all that awesome either.

Doxepin made me itchy. I think that's enough said there. ITCHY.

Rozerem worked fine, but wasn't covered by my insurance. Steep prices, people. Steep. I had to let that one go.

So, now, I'm taking melatonin (herbal) and Seroquel XR. I also have a perscripton for Chloral Hydrate, which sounds suspiciously like a cause of death in an Agatha Cristie Novel...but its for those nights where my brain won't stop no matter what I do. Its in liquid form. Yes, its disgusting. And yes, I think of the magic liquid Mary Poppins gives out every time I have to take it, and wish in vain that it will taste better this time.

I have more to say on the subject of medications, but fittingly, I took my evening medications before starting this blog entry, and they are working already.

You have no idea how beautiful that really is. Tonight, at least, I can embrace one aspect of my medicated life...being able to fall asleep.

Goodnight.