After you’ve been taking, and alternating among, the different psychoactive drugs for a while, you forget which side effects go with which drugs– and they take you by surprise all over again, when you resume a prior course, abandoned for whatever side effect became intolerable for a time. I’ve been from lamictal to lamictal plus effexor to lithium and back to lamictal again, this time just pushing the lamictal dose and leaving out the SSRI adjuncts, I’ve gone through a hell of a cycle since May ’05, when I started this medication journey. After two months of titrating up on the lamictal, I am feeling more myself again than I ever did on the lithium. But I’d forgotten the horrible dry mouth, which receded on the lithium. And I’d forgotten the horrible headache I’d get, if I went more than twelve hours between doses. I rediscovered that yesterday, after forgetting my morning dose before leaving the house for day’s worth of activities outside. I’d forgotten the second-day-after-titration inability to form a sentence, or process others’ conversation, while retaining the ability to read, write, and email– but gone the third day, ephemeral as a puff of air.

But those bads are balanced against, outweighed by the goods. I’d forgotten how good the sleep is. I’d forgotten the calmness, the lack of anxiety, the energy to push through and get things done, the mental clarity and ability to concentrate. I’d forgotten contentment, creativity, and spontaneous joking and laughter. And suddenly, I’m remembering as all these things come back. It’s more than la recherche du temps perdus— a remembrance of mental health past– but a recollection, a resumption, a re-tasting of my mental health madeleine, melting on my tongue, filling my senses, not evanescent, but ever-present.  At least until the next round of side effects.