Antidepressants: MY Opinion

 When I was in high school I struggled with your usual teenage problems.  I felt foreign in my own skin, completely alone, and useless.  I also worked myself into a nice little eating disorder too- which was pretty ugly and did not help my teenage angst at all.  It wasn’t like I had a horrible life or anything, I was just a depressed girl with no one to talk to and terribly low self-esteem.

Anyway, as my eating disorder spiraled out of control (like they always do) my poor mother did her best to try and help me.  I refused and refused for the longest time, I loved being at my low weight and had found comfort in the isolated life that eating disorders encourage you to create. 

After an especially scary episode, however, I finally decided to take my mom’s advice (mainly because I couldn’t take the turmoil that was being caused by me at home any more) and went to see a doctor.  My doctor was really nice, she was Scottish and really pretty and skinny so of course I liked her.  I was also under the impression, due to several comments she made during our first visit, that she struggled with an eating disorder at one time or another as well.  Anyway, after some blood tests and all that I was told that if I didn’t improve my nutrition I was going to end up in the emergency room and that I should probably seek treatment.  So I did, and along with treatment guess what else I got?  Anti-depressants.

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*Disclaimer* Antidepressants can really help some people, they could perhaps even save someone’s life.  This is a telling of MY experience with those types of drugs, however, which was horrible, and I personally believe that along with having the potential to do good, anti-depressants can also have the complete opposite effect on some people.  I am in no way saying that no one should take them, my point with this post is that you should always listen to your body, and don’t assume that anti-depressants are your only option.  Please don’t post an assload of comments about how great they worked for you and I don’t know anything/ I’m an asshole for saying they’re bad/You hate me because I am badmouthing prozac/etc.  This is my telling of my reaction. 

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Anyway, off I went to treatment, a semester off school and a full time job of talking about my feelings and my relationship with food, blah blah blah.  I completed treatment, became healed of my eating disorder (well, not really, but I could at least once again function in society), and went back to complete my final year in high school.  One thing that I had to hang onto, along with the mental tools I gained from my stay in the hospital, were those pesky pills that I never liked taking in the first place. 

The first drug I was prescribed is, I believe, what really caused me to crack.  I was messed up before, but after my visit with the Scottish doctor and right before I entered treatment (a span of about 2 weeks), I pretty much went bananas.  I went from counting calories and over exercising (anorexia) to eating 4,000- 5,000 calories a day (sometimes in one or two sittings) and throwing up after each ‘meal’ (bulimia) almost overnight.  I felt like I was going to jump out of my skin, and even felt the need to scratch and scratch myself- one time causing myself to bleed.  I felt like a zombie, hated everyone, and remember laying on the floor numb telling my father that I just hated existing.  After taking this medication for a few weeks, and then being in treatment for a few weeks, I talked to a different doctor and told him I did not like taking anti-depressants because of how they made me feel.  He switched me to a different drug.  Time went by, and like I said, I completed treatment and went back to school. 

I continued taking my prescribed medication for another year, yet still struggled with horrible ‘black moods,’ feeling as though nothing could fix me, and just wanting to cease to exist- a numbness and feeling of hopelessness that I can’t even begin to describe accurately.  I felt like I was just wrong!  Even though I was on this pill that was supposed to keep me from getting in my horrible states, it seemed as though they were worse now than they were before I was taking anything!  I continued to live this way, okay for a few weeks or maybe a month, then would be hit with a feeling of despair so deep I’m amazed I never tried to kill myself (the only thing that kept me from attempting this is the thought of how much it would hurt my mother). 

So I began college, still occassionally struggling with ‘food issues’ (i.e. making myself puke) and began to despise taking my medicine.  I would quit taking it (which is a BAD idea) and would feel even worse, but I knew that I was not myself when I was on it either.  So I would go crazy if I stopped taking it, and would go crazy when I did take it.  I would ask my doctors (three different doctors who I had been seeing since high school) to help me ween myself off (which is what you’re supposed to do when you quit) and they would just switch me to a different pill, which I would then not take because I was pissed.  I would argue with my doctors about whether or not I even needed it, telling them that I was 16 when I started taking it, surely I was different now and maybe no longer needed it.  Maybe my depression was a result of outside factors, not a chemical imbalance.  Their answer to this was: a diabetic can’t just not take insulin anymore- this is something you will have to take the rest of your life.

What a horrible thing to tell a young, thoughtful girl who just happened to have a hard time during her teenage years!!  What I heard when they told me this was:  there is something wrong with you that cannot be fixed, it can only be treated.  The phrase ’situational depression’ was not in their vocabulary, so I finally bit the bullet and threw out all my pills and quit cold turkey.  I do not recommend this, because when you quit abruptly like that it makes your ‘levels’ go totally wacky- leaving you temporarily bat-shit crazy, even if you weren’t that bad to begin with.  But I did it anyway because I figured anything would be better than constantly not feeling like myself and suffering from my ‘black moods.’  Luckily, thanks to smoking pot (I believe- because it got my mind off the bad thoughts I was having as a result of quitting my medicine instead of weening myself off) I managed to survive the following few weeks. 

To this day (4 years later) I have not suffered any ‘black moods,’ have not wanted to kill myself, have not had any urges to return to my old eating disorder habits, and have managed to deal with life’s obstacles.  Sometimes I still get in a bad mood, and feel like I have the weight of the world on my shoulders- but I can still go about my day and don’t feel paralyzed by sadness. 

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I think there are a lot of cases where anti-depressants can be very helpful to people.  But I firmly believe that you cannot just put someone on a pill and forget about them, it’s important to work through whatever is making you depressed, everyone needs coping skills.  And if you are taking medicine and don’t feel like yourself after giving your body a few weeks to adjust, then something is wrong.  You need to establish a working relationship with your doctor and they should listen to you, not brush you off simply because you’re young or you don’t have a medical degree.  If you are taking something and feel weird or feel like something isn’t right or feel like it just isn’t helping you, then you should really talk to someone and perhaps plan a different path for yourself (with the help of a professional of course- don’t do what I did).

Anyway, this is my story of eating disorders, teenage turnmoil, anti-depressants, and doctor’s who maybe need to work on listening to their patients.  During my experience I took varying levels of Paxil, Prozac, Lexapro, Cymbalta, Xanax (which isn’t an anti-depressant), and Fluoxetine (which I was told by my doctor is different than Prozac, but later found out it is just generic Prozac); I was not prescribed Wellbutrin because it can cause people to lose weight, and because of my eating disorder the doctors didn’t want to start anything.

Respect for Heath Anyone?

We all know Heath Ledger died the other day, but I’m really sickened that the details of his death that are being repeatedly shared on the news, internet, talk shows, etc.  Is nothing sacred?  Can’t they just say he died, and when the autopsy comes back tell us either yes or no to the drug overdose suspicions?  Why are they sharing information about how they found him, who found him, what was found in his room, etc.?!  Does that strike anyone else as wrong and disrespectful to him and his family?  I wont even bother repeating all the details, because I’m sure everyone has heard them already.  I just think that some things are personal, and your physical state and placement when you are found dead is one of them. 

A Question

This is what my Search Terms thing on my Dashboard looks like:

drugs	18
kat von d	12
recycle	7
miami ink	3
marilyn monroe	3
Weed Women And Wine	2
miami ink face tattoo	2
John Pilger Book/Movie 2007	2
stupid recycling quotes	1
celebrities getting high

Maybe I should start writing about something else.  Every day it’s mainly “drugs” and “kat von d.”  This is not the direction I wanted my blog to go in!  This is what I have become on the internet- drugs, Kat Von D, and Marilyn Monroe.  Oh well, I just hope the people searching for Kat Von Grease Crotch hate her as much as I do.  And I’m not a drug addict, I swear.  I don’t think drug addicts have blogs. 

Maternal Instincts

I get this sick feeling in my stomach whenever I hear that someone I know is pregnant/ had a baby.  In the past year 7 people I know have had babies- and I don’t know why but I almost get pissed about it!  The same thing happens when I meet the babies, an ill feeling followed by guilt and discomfort.  Can an antacid cure that…?

I’ve always been that way, I remember when my cousin had a baby when I was around 10 or so, and while we were visiting her parents I went to spend the night at her house with her and her new baby.  It was awful!  I hate the sound of lullabies, and she breast fed in front of me which I also found disturbing- I just remember hearing that sucking sound with rock-a-bye baby playing in the background.  I remember eventually having a breakdown saying I missed my mom and wanted to go home, I did NOT want to sleep over.  I don’t remember if my mom came to get me or if I stayed but ever since then I get the same feeling whenever I’m around a pregnant person or find out someone I know/knew is having a baby.

Two years ago I became friends with a girl who was pregnant when we met, and she was fun to hang out with when she was pregnant- she was really funny and goofy, I think it was the pregnancy hormones or something because she was just so fucking hilarious.  Then the baby came and she was so cute and I loved her but I was just generally uncomfortable being around them and dealing with all the baby stuff- and she also breast fed in front of me all the time!  Why!?  Isn’t that personal?  What do I have to do with it- I should have no involvement in that bonding time.  We eventually lost touch because she drove me nuts (the mom, not the baby) with all the stressful baby visits.  She would bring her infant over to my house and stay for like, eight hours.  I’m not kidding.  That is too long to have a baby and your milk-boobs around me, I’m sorry.

Then I found out that I friend I had lost touch with after college had a baby, and was weirded out then too.  Then a girl from high school I kind of knew, then a cousin, then another cousin!, then my husband’s cousin, and now I just found out that a friend from high school had a baby in November. 

So I have to visit these people (especially the cousins), and they make me hold their babies even though I tell them I don’t want to because I make them cry.  Then they force me to anyway and, right on cue, the baby senses my disgust and starts bawling.  Then we have to visit and stare at the baby while he or she does whatever it is that is so entertaining (they’re cute and all but a month old baby doesn’t really have the same entertainment abilities as someone who can talk and use the potty), and then I leave and have to deal with this sick feeling for the rest of the night.

I don’t know why babies and people who have them weird me out so much, but there is nothing that makes me more uncomfortable than baby supplies, people who think all I want to hear about and/or see is breastfeeding, stomach-touching, and the baby smell.  Maybe it’s because people change so much after they become parents, or maybe because the whole sentimental part disturbs me (just like any other kind of sentimental moment).

I feel like a monster for feeling like this!  I’m a woman so I should automatically be a baby lover right?  Well newsflash, I’m sorry but I don’t want to hear about your udders, and I don’t want to hold your baby.  Congratulations but just let me sit there quietly while everyone else fusses, I feel ill.

I would probably like to have kids some day, and I wont be afraid to hold my own baby I’m sure, but at this point in my life I honestly want nothing to do with babies- almost like I’m afraid I’m going to ‘catch it’ or something, I don’t know.  I can’t help it, I’m not impressed that women are doing what women have been doing since the beginning of time, and I am really not interested in having people breastfeed in front of me, I don’t care if you have a blanket over yourself, I can still hear it!  Give me a warning and I will leave, you stay there and do your thing.

So my apologies to all you new parents out there, I can’t help the way I feel- which is grossed out.  Maybe I’m immature, maybe I have some kind of emotional issue (what else is new!), or maybe I just don’t like breastfeeding.  I haven’t figured it out yet but until I do would you please just treat me like a teenage boy and not expose me to that kind of thing.

Thank you.