When I start to blog, I always look back at the last entry. To my consternation, I see that the last blog I wrote on March 30, was titled "Heading to Overload." All of a sudden, I am hit with a blinding dose of clarity. My recent feelings of "overload" aren't recent. They've been advancing slowly over months.
This is good information because, you see, I had a "meltdown" last week. Thanks to a kind friend and a half-box of Kleenex, I finally recognize the fact that my trusty anti-depressant--the one I've been taking for the past 22 years--doesn't work any more. My March 30 blog entry demonstrates to me that it probably wasn't working on March 30, either, but it has taken an entire stressed, frustrated, and exhausted summer to realize it.
Depression manifests itself differently in different people, and I am pleased to say that I once again recognize my own very personal form of depression. I don't stop living, but I become an observer, not an actor. I no longer concentrate well, so reading is pointless. Friends tell me I appear to be under stress. I no longer focus on tasks, so nothing gets completed. Only the most immediate actions are important, which means that the dust kittens are now beginning to take over my home. If the cat didn't meow, she probably wouldn't get fed. My food intake is unruly, at best: spaghetti and ice cream, with something green thrown in to relieve my guilt. I went to the gym last week and exercised, but I don't feel a call to return.
More than anything, I crave sleep. I sleep for nine hours at night, three during the day, and if it weren't for the plaintive, angry urging of the cat, I'd still be there. But more sleep would not make me feel better.
Being the smart cookie that I like to think I am, I proclaimed my problems to my doctor. He laid before me the multitude of new antidepressants and suggested one with both serotonin and norepinephrine--a little more "get up and go," as he explained it, but still an SSRI. Tomorrow I begin my new pill, and if it works, in a week I can double it.
But please, can I sleep until then?
This is good information because, you see, I had a "meltdown" last week. Thanks to a kind friend and a half-box of Kleenex, I finally recognize the fact that my trusty anti-depressant--the one I've been taking for the past 22 years--doesn't work any more. My March 30 blog entry demonstrates to me that it probably wasn't working on March 30, either, but it has taken an entire stressed, frustrated, and exhausted summer to realize it.
Depression manifests itself differently in different people, and I am pleased to say that I once again recognize my own very personal form of depression. I don't stop living, but I become an observer, not an actor. I no longer concentrate well, so reading is pointless. Friends tell me I appear to be under stress. I no longer focus on tasks, so nothing gets completed. Only the most immediate actions are important, which means that the dust kittens are now beginning to take over my home. If the cat didn't meow, she probably wouldn't get fed. My food intake is unruly, at best: spaghetti and ice cream, with something green thrown in to relieve my guilt. I went to the gym last week and exercised, but I don't feel a call to return.
More than anything, I crave sleep. I sleep for nine hours at night, three during the day, and if it weren't for the plaintive, angry urging of the cat, I'd still be there. But more sleep would not make me feel better.
Being the smart cookie that I like to think I am, I proclaimed my problems to my doctor. He laid before me the multitude of new antidepressants and suggested one with both serotonin and norepinephrine--a little more "get up and go," as he explained it, but still an SSRI. Tomorrow I begin my new pill, and if it works, in a week I can double it.
But please, can I sleep until then?
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