RealMental

You know, I ain’t right. And I don’t really know where first to turn to try and find out why not. All I know for sure is that the last several years (let’s review: Got married, new husband went into full-blown manic episodes, no one knew what was going on, but he was disappearing for days on end, engaging in substance abuse, and emptying our bank account. Then I got pregnant, and Husband went floridly manic again, got hospitalized against his will, was released to rehab, got ninny psychiatrist who totally mismanaged his treatment for bipolar disorder, stayed a month in a rehab facility then moved into an apartment, because I could not have him come home just then. Later, he moved back home, we had our beautiful daughter, and before you could say “relapse,” he disappeared when she was just 4 days old. Manic episodes continued until spring when he finally went off the deep end and wound up forcibly hospitalized again, this time landing in a GOOD psychiatric facility and securing a GOOD doctor who prescribed a GOOD treatment and had him participate in a GOOD outpatient rehab program, the result of which has been sobriety and relative stability with NO manic episodes since May of 2004) have been hard, emotionally, and then the last three years (let’s review: My father suddenly and tragically died, ripping a hole out of my very heart and changing the fabric of WHO I AM, I miraculously got pregnant for the second time, and then seven weeks later lost that precious baby to a miscarriage…grief compounded by grief) have been…tragic, desperate, and then this past year since the hysterectomy has just been bizarre. I’ve dealt with depression and anxiety, grief over the definitive end of my childbearing potential, which seem to come and go whimsically, and catch me off-guard. I took one anti-depressant after another over these years, and suffered side effects galore without ever really feeling significantly better. Anti-anxiety meds (read: benzos) helped me through some tough spots, and then I’d go several months without any before needing them again.

The only sure thing is that my moods and anxiety/panic attacks always corresponded with something going on externally. You know, like lying awake at 4:00 AM wondering where my husband was, or lying awake sobbing for my lost child, or lying awake crying into my pillow because I NEED MY DADDY BACK. In other words, if things were going okay, I was fine. But somewhere along the line, especially since Dad died, something had gone KABLOOEY with the coping mechanisms that had served me for the first 35 years of my life. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around this, that some external event(s) could occur that could trigger a weakness, a malfunction, in my brain.

One day this spring, while I was discussing this with a wonderful friend–a friend who just happens to have been, for the last few years, a MUCH better friend to me than I’ve been to her, or to anyone else–who happens to be a doctor of pharmacy, not to mention having much personal experience with clinical depression and the meds that go along with it. I listed to her all the anti-depressants I’d tried, told her how none of them had worked, and asked her, “What (meaning what drug) can I try next?” She looked at me, and after just a moment’s consideration, said, “You know, Belinda, even though you’re depressed, you may not have an actual chemical imbalance. I mean, you’ve been through some pretty horrible, awful stuff, just year after year recently, and you have every right to feel despondent without it meaning that your brain is all wonky…like mine.” And then she laughed. And I saw a light. And I loved her like she was part of me, because she got it. And then she told me the hard part.

She said, “Sometimes, you can’t even live life ‘one day at a time.’ Sometimes, you have to live it in 30-minute increments. You can do almost anything for half an hour, no matter how badly you don’t want to. So on days when I just want to stay in bed with the blinds drawn, I make a deal with myself to go out to the barn and groom one horse. By the time that’s done, I might look over at YOUR horse” (she’s been keeping Misha for me for way longer than I meant for her to) “and decide that his mane needs detangling, so I brush Misha’s mane. Then I might want to clip his bridle path, and before you know it, I’ve spent half the day out in the sunshine, DOING something, instead of wallowing.”

Just when I had decided that Kerri was the most brilliant, insightful woman on the face of the planet, she confessed to having developed this coping mechanism after hearing a version of it in the film, “About A Boy.” She said, “Yep. 10 years of therapy and I finally learn something useful from a Hugh Grant monologue in a movie. Not the book–the MOVIE.”

She IS brilliant, my friend, and she’s definitely onto something. I can’t help but think that, since no AD has helped me feel better–not really–that whatever is wrong with my brain, it’s not something that an AD can “fix.” I’ve been off the most recent AD, Wellbutrin, since early March, with no noticeable effect at all. I don’t feel better, I don’t feel worse. Just the same. The anxiety symptoms have abated (I’m not having falling-down panic-attacks in Wal-Mart any more), but are still present to some degree, in proportion to what’s going on in my life. Every once in a while, I suddenly get HOT all over, start sweating from head to toe, my nose runs like a faucet, my heart pounds, and I just need to be HOME.

Something is particularly difficult about mornings, about just getting out the door. Once I’m out, I’m pretty good for a few hours, but my calm seems to have a shelf-life, and I need to get back home in the afternoon. I like to plan things pretty far in advance, but I have trouble committing to things in advance. Anti-anxiety meds help. I’m not wild about how they make me feel, i.e. slightly dopey, but I do use them when I need them.

And then there’s the hormone angle, which I don’t even know for sure how to approach. Something has GOT to be going on there, since the weirdness has escalated by, um, a bunch, since my hysterectomy last fall. When I first came out of surgery, on estrogen deprivation, I literally felt, for the first and only time in my life, that I had lost my mind. It’s like nothing I can describe–the misery, despair, agony, anxiety–the certainty that it’s never going to be better, ever. After a couple of weeks, I was able to start estrogen replacement therapy, and it was like a miracle…at least to a point. It made the extreme crazy go away, but like I said at the beginning of this post, I still ain’t quite right. But then, I’ve never had the dosage checked or adjusted, so there’s a thought…

And I can’t help but think that a large part of what keeps me “down” and anxious is the disarray of my lifestyle–I keep Bella clean, fed, loved, dressed well, entertained, cared for…and that’s almost (but not quite) the limit of my motivation…and THAT is my motivation for this effort. I don’t know yet if it will work, but I know that to have peace and calm, I must first have order. I need it, Bella needs it, Alex needs it. And I need to provide it. I’m on my way, I hope…the house is still a mess, but I’ve done certain chores more regularly this week, and my family has had a hot, homemade, nutritious meal on the table every night this week, with NO takeout. That’s got to be a start. And Alex, bless his ever-loving-heart, cleaned the living room today, which lifted my mood unbelievably.

I’d love to hear from anyone who’s been through, or is going through anything similar, especially from the hysterectomy angle. Or not. Just whatever. Can you just have bad things happen to you and suffer a shift in actual brain function? (Yes, these are questions for my shrink, but my next appointment’s a couple weeks off. Humor me.)

Adapted and significantly augmented from a nearly simultaneous post at www.ninjapoodles.com

By Violet

Autumn is a mixed-bag of emotion and memory and experience for me.

On the one hand, it (in theory, at least) marks the start of cooler weather and less yard work and the opportunity to eat thick hearty stews and homemade oatmeal bread without breaking a sweat.

I can wear my sweet, precious hoodies again and dig out some of my soft fluffy socks to wear inside my combat boots. There’s an anticipated trip to the Rockton Fair and that unmistakable smell of decaying leaves and, quite often, beautiful sunsets. Good things.

There are many good things about autumn and winter. I can see them and name them and touch them.

But the flip side, of course, is the Seasonal Affective Disorder creeping into my mood and my energy levels. And the depression that lurks.

The anniversaries and memories of death and dying and funerals and sadness – my parents, grandparents, best friend.. From September to February, my world is full of anniversaries of loss.

And let’s not forget the November anniversary of my month-long panic attack and the diagnosis of my panic disorder.

The skies grow darker, earlier, and I find myself wishing that I could curl up in a duvet until spring arrives. My beloved reminds me not to dwell on the memories. To acknowledge them and let them go. I’ve been getting better at it but it’s not good enough yet. Letting go. Letting go of the past.

At this point in autumn – the late days of September – I can already feel the tendrils of an impending collapse of my happiness. I try very hard to put it out of my mind. I remind myself that dwelling – on any of the aforementioned subjects – will not help me get through this. It will not make things better.

Dwelling is one of those things I do very, very well. I could win a gold medal in dwelling.

I dwell on conversations and images that are stuck in my head. I dwell on moments – pivotal moments – when my life shifted. I stack these memories up, together, and try to make sense of how I got to be this way. How did I become so afraid of the changing seasons?

The truth, of course, is that it wasn’t just one event or one circumstance that pushed me over the edge. And, perhaps, the cumulative effect of those experiences isn’t to blame either. There are too many possibilities – from the food I eat to the sleep I get – to try to make a neat, tidy package of explanation.

I realize I need to fight this. I realize that, if I don’t fight it, things will crash around me. But fighting is hard – I am an instant gratification junky. If it doesn’t impact on me immediately – a rush of adrenaline or a sugar-induced laughing fit – I can’t seem to make myself follow the rituals and routines. And yet, I know the only way to make it through the coming months is to fight.

If I don’t fight my hardest, my husband will come home from work and find me weeping about my life, my world, my existence. Weeping and blowing my nose and uttering absolutely useless phrases like, “I miss.. I miss.. EVERYBODY.” or “Everybody hates me and I have no friends and I am so alone.” Trying to expel a build-up of emotion that encompasses sadness and mourning and grief and fear is impossible. And, oh, god, there is so much fear.

This morning, my beloved dragged my SAD light out of the closet, dusted it off, and moved it upstairs to the bedroom. The idea is that I will bask in that light every morning from now until, well, next spring. I do not particularly enjoy the basking – try as I might – but I will do my best to sit patiently in the incredibly bright light for 30 minutes each day. Some days, I know, I will cheat and sneak downstairs earlier than I should.

I am back to my vitamins, my precious B12 and D and assorted omegas. I swallow them with my lunch – taking them at breakfast makes me nauseated for hours and hurts my stomach – and, if I believed in God, this is when I would pray. Please let the vitamins soar through my veins and adjust my chemistry and trick my cells into believing it is still summer and I am happy. Please let the B12 boost my sagging energy levels. Please, please, please. Please make it all okay.

I’m trying to motivate myself to get more intentional exercise – reportedly one of the best antidepressants available. I hate being sweaty and tired and out of breath but, as winter sneaks around me, I find myself tired and out of breath anyway. It’s as if my muscles are disintegrating in order to keep me motionless under a duvet all day.

I plod my feet along the treadmill in the darkened basement, trying to focus on recorded episodes of CSI – happily edited of commercials. I take advantage of the cooler days, when they come, and I walk the dogs to the park. I don’t feel any different.

Evidence that diet can impact majorly on depression makes me begin to read the various literature on the subject. Fresh vegetables. Omega-filled fish. Low fat, complex carbs. I know all of this and still I fight my body’s increased cravings for sugar and simple carbs.

I fight the instant gratification of junk food. Sometimes that makes me cry, too, as my body screams for cookies that will immediately soothe the anxiety and my brain shouts that I’m making it all worse if I indulge. It’s like those cartoons with a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other – except, in this case, they’re both angry and hostile and glaring and I can’t win.

Everything makes me melancholy. Everything makes me question myself. Everything – everything – makes me feel guilty. For being alive, I suppose. I am incredibly uncomfortable about everything – the screaming cravings, the urge to hibernate, the grief, my own body.

I struggle and I fight and I do the very best that I can but, so many times, I fear that I can’t do enough.

Am I fighting biology and chemistry or am I fighting memories that are embedded into the very core of who I am? Where does my past and those experiences end and where does the seratonin begin? How can I keep myself afloat when I am so very, very tired?

I take my daily antidepressant – the prescribed kind, I mean – and I resist increasing the dose. It sounds dramatic to say that it takes away my personality in higher doses but I’m pretty sure it does. Even my husband, who loves me and wants me to be happy, will agree that I am not myself when I am on higher doses.

And some days I am okay – more than okay – and I fool myself into thinking that every day will be like this. I will smile and laugh and enthusiastically work on a project at the dining room table. I start to think that I’ve finally won out over the sadness – I’ve won the war. I feel alive and healthy and happy. Grateful. I feel like myself.

Then I wake – the very next day – and my body feels like lead. I run the previous day through my mind and wonder what I did wrong. Was it the sandwich for lunch or did I not get enough sunshine? Or maybe it was the day before that? How did I drain all the happiness out of my world while I was sleeping?

Autumn arrives and the fight begins and I am already tired of dragging myself up the endless mountain ahead of me. And I am afraid, no matter what I say. I am afraid of the months ahead of me but I will fight.