By Heather

Last week there was a segment on a round the clock news station. I was only half listening while typing away with the dog in my lap. I looked up quickly and noticed the caption at the bottom. It referenced the correlation between some medications and weight gain. I stopped nuzzling the dog and stared at the screen, not necessarily absorbing what was being said but instead furrowing my brown and nodding my head in agreement.

There warnings on the back of my medication all proclaim insomnia and drowsiness. Use caution when operating heavy machinery is written in bold. Before starting on my medications – given the rarity that I took anything stronger than midol for years – I looked them up. Thank God for Google, because it’s through there I found a number of warnings that not only included how Lithium might affect my ability to drive but how it also might cause weight gain. In fact all but one medication that I’m currently on for my bipolar disorder all claim to cause a change in weight as well as a possible change in appetite.

I’m almost ashamed to admit that at one point I wavered upon whether or not to take these medications because I am just slightly obsessed with the size of my ass, mostly in reference to it one day requiring its own zip code. Obviously it would have been irrational and irresponsible to base my need to fit into cute jeans over my need to not want to become violent towards someone who made the mistake of cutting me off. And yet for a moment I thought about those words “Weight Gain” and how it would be impossible to stave off the gain.

Of course in three months, the only weight gain there has been is due to my patetened combination of burritos and zero time at the gym, not because of a little bit of Lexapro.

It just keeps me thinking that even though I feel fine and better, sometimes it’s the side effects that get you. The weight gain, the complete relaxation turned exhaustion in the middle of the day, feeling like a camel and needing to drink 14 glasses of water a day, the way I sometimes speak very slowly and deliberately while walking around in a complete fog because of an anti-anxiety drug.

Today, I walked through the office immediately after taking something. Someone said hi to me and I said a quiet hi back. She then stopped me again and said Hello more forcefully. I apologized for my unintentional rudeness and mumbled something about being on meds.

“Do you have allergies?” She asked. “They always put me in a complete fog.”

I smiled. “Yes”, I replied “something like that.”