Post Punk Kitchen Forum

Thanks for all the support, everyone. I will keep everyone updated on what happens once I get put on medication(s).

I made an appointment with mental health services at my school.

Now I just have to twiddle my thumbs until the 19th.

I don't want to talk to people either. I haven't talked to either of my parents all week and now they are both super angry at me and if I do go upstairs, my mom just quickly leaves the room. I don't really even want Molly around because she expects stuff from me and I don't have the energy.

The friend that I have been talking to a lot since visiting him last month keeps IMing me to ask when I am coming to visit him (and he will take me to the Warhol museum), but I can't talk to him and tell him why I can't come visit now. Last month I promised to visit him after Thanksgiving. I can't maintain relationships with people either. This is exactly why I'm not really in touch with the friends I had from school. Too much crepe.

I can't tell if my new meds are working or not. I've definitely stopped stuttering, which is a huge bonus. I don't feel any more or less anxious with the Buspar. which is weird. I thought that I would just magically stop getting so worked up about things. One thing I have noticed is that my short temper is back. When I was on Zoloft, I was able to let the small annoyances go. I'm going to give these new meds an entire month before I make any decisions. But I don't feel like killing myself, and that has to be a good thing. That Zoloft nearly killed me, literally.

I'm still dealing with tough stuff at work (ringworm, calicivirus, URI's .... ugh) but I'm able to handle the bad news a lot easier than I used to be. It doesn't make the bad news any less bad or meaningless, it just doesn't destroy me like it did before. I can go home at the end of the day and not worry about things. A lot of that has to do with changes in management and a better staff backing me up, too.

And there's a new person in my life, which has brought me a lot of joy lately.

That sounds like, generally, it's all going pretty well. I'm really really pleased for you. I'm not sure about the short temper, but maybe if it's not a huge problem for you, and you no longer feel that you want to kill yourself, then it's something you could live with?

I felt the same when I first started on meds - I thought after a month everything would have magically gone away, but then I realised that instead it got me on track so that I could work through the problems more easily myself.

Swit swoo with the new person too. Hope you continue to enjoy that ;)

I've been waking up fully awake and upset and not being able to get back to sleep at any time from 3-5am.... it has something to do with my school work which I just can't really bring myself to do, its been piling up and I'm completely overwhelmed.

I know I need to summarize the most boring and asinine chapter of my textbook and present it for class, and my teacher actually gave me an unexpected extension on my deadline to present. But that almost makes it worse, because I need to now do the work I'd accepted not doing and receiving a failing mark...

I know I need to email some city officials and ask them to meet me and talk to me about our city's actions on homelessness and give me some maps and graphs but I can't bring myself to contact them and I don't know why.

I know know know I need to stop eating crepe food (and way too much crepe food at that) because in the past three weeks I've gained ten pounds, which is not good for a person who has been working on losing weight for years.

I know all this shiitake and yet I can't seem to act on my own good ideas.

Oh poor you. Try not to start blaming yourself for not doing what you think you should be doing (not that you were, that's just what I tend to do), and feel a bit more positive that you know what to do. Maybe try to take it in small steps, one thing at a time? Say, begin the school work on one day, and you may find that once you've started things seem a bit easier. If you've been working on losing weight, then this slip up won't make a difference in the long run. Once you're in a better frame of mind you're bound to get back on track. I hope you get on alright.

Hugs all around. How does one know if they are depressed? Go to my doctor? I don't really feel comfortable talking to her about this...does that mean I need a new doctor?

i also hate it when people say things like, "it's all in your head..."

why, yes IT IS. which is why i take meds, see a shrink, exercise, get good sleep, and try to eat whole foods. speaking of meds, i just had a change to a med i've never taken. effexor. anyone else on it? does it work for you? anything weird i should know? i am breast feeding on it. my prescribing practitioner and i have known each other very well for 8 or 9 years, so i don't think she'd put me on something that would not work.

I would say yes. You should be able to talk to any doctor about that sort of issue. It's always hard saying, "Um ... I'm depressed and I need some help" but once you get past that part it's easy peasy from there on out. Usually. :)

I've struggled with depression for most of my adult life. I had an especially bad patch about five years ago when my life sort of exploded. I got into therapy and on medication and it took a couple years but things got better.

I've since quit seeing my therapist and quit the medication I was on which felt right at the time, but might not have been the best choices. Right now I feel like I'm ok, but I think a lot of that is denial. I'm mostly on an even keel, but I feel pretty precariously balanced. I was unemployed last spring and I went downhill really fast, to the point that after a couple weeks I was having a hard time getting out of bed, suicidal thoughts, the whole mess. I managed to find a job and that sort of distracted me, but I think that episode was a real warning sign that I need to get a handle on my mental health.

I really want to get back into therapy but I have major trust issues so it's really hard for me to find someone I can build a positive relationship with. One of the reasons that I stopped seeing my last therapist is that she laughed at me in a session. It was a minor thing and she immediately apologized, but I felt embarrassed and judged and it shattered any trust I might have had.

Yes.

I'm sorry you've been feeling so bummed Walrus. Please take care of yourself.

I have also dealt with depression in the past, as well as bulimia. I have been feeling really shitty again. I can see some of the things that have triggered this and I see myself using ED behaviors this past week more than I had in almost two years now. Even when I got better, especially with the ED I thought, but the stuff that bothers me is still there. I still dont really have friends/support system, and feel shitty about myself, and I'm still not growing up. I did feel a lot better for a while and I seriously tried to socialize more. Lately I have had these pathetic attempts at dating that have left me feeling like a complete piece of shiitake. So these past months have sucked and I see myself isolating again, not wanting to be around people- yet wishing someone cared, angry as hell, eating horribly and crying everyday. I keep telling myself to call a therapist and delay it, because I can't use campus, counseling, because I'm broke.....I told myself I HAVE to attend a support group I used to go to again tomorrow. I have a really hard time actually asking for help from people I KNOW. I go to strangers. I have a clssmate who has been really nice to me and tells me to call whenever, and always compliments me and reassures me and yet I feel like I can't call and say" can I vent?" because I cant stand the thought of actually crying in front of someone.
blah...

Today I went to the psychiatrist and she seemed throughly puzzled about what to give me. This comes from a woman with 35 years experience who came very highly recommended by multiple people in the area including my psychologist. She says I have too many symptoms and that we have to tackle them one by one. She confirmed my diagnosis of depression, anxiety, ADHD-PI & many symptoms of PTSD. She said she would prescribe Wellbutrin but didn't want my anxiety to go through the roof, so she gave me Pristiq 50mg.

The bad thing is she said it may make me irritable and more prone to panic, as well as worsen my already very problematic inattentiveness. I made the mistake of Googling it and now am completely terrified to take my first dose, which I will be taking tonight. I almost want to wait until tomorrow night since I'm going for a 90 minute massage tomorrow as a treat to myself and don't want the side effects during it. She also told me to cut the pills in half for 2-3 days before taking a whole one in order to build up the dosage.

All in all, I'm freaking out guys. I am scared of this stupid little pink pill and don't know what to do about it. I want to feel better and the one pill I'm familiar with, Lexapro, only worked for 2-3 months before the effects were zero. I guess I just would like some words of encouragement/someone telling me this pill won't make me want to punch myself in the face after taking it.

If you want to wait a day, just do it! I totally understand being afraid of the medication, side effects and everything. It can be really scary to read all the potentially bad stuff that can happen, and almost every day I still wonder if I've made the right choice to go on the meds I'm on. I don't have any experience with Pristiq, but I just wanted to let you know that you are not alone in worrying about this kinds of stuff!

One of my medications is effecting my sleep, although I can't figure out which one. I tried not taking both of them, one at a time, but that didn't help. So I'm going to switch back to Symbyax and combine it with Buspar, and see how that goes.

I've always wondered if I might be bipolar, or have bipolar depression, and after doing some research I'm almost convinced I do. I'm going to talk to my doctor about it. It's concerning.

I have suffered from depression and anxiety since my early teens. It got so bad when I hit 19/20 that I was seriously considering suicide, abusing drugs and alcohol and doing a lot of other things that I am definitely not proud of. I was also diagnosed with bulimia.

I was seeing a psychologist from 2005 until the beginning of this year, I have been to anxiety management groups and am on cipralex for depression/anxiety and beta-blockers for panic attacks. I was on prozac but found it completely useless.

Mostly I can deal with things but I don't ever think I was diagnosed properly and I have completely given up hope of that happening because the mental health services here are generally shiitake. I tend to cycle between being so depressed that I sleep hours and hours on end and have no energy or motivation, I isolate myself from everyone and I get crippling panic attacks that mean I cannot leave the house so instead I eat and eat and eat. I am feeling like this at the minute but I am doing everything I can to keep going, even though it is so exhausting that I have actually fallen asleep at my desk in work despite sleeping ten hours at night. Other times I am completely different, I can't sleep, don't need to eat and am always on the go and my brain just doesn't stop.

I dunno, it's like I feel like it is ok because I am not as "crazy" as I was 4/5 years ago and it isn't visible to people like it used to be when I was acting forked up and stupid. And I am not suicidal or anything and I know that this will pass and I will be ok for a while, but it is frustrating and tiring and feels never ending.

Sorry for the giant rant.

I'm sorry that you're frustrated Sarah-Jane, not because you shouldn't feel that way, but for what is making you feel that way. *hugs*

An update.

On the night of my birthday, Sunday night, I feel into a deep depression. It was definitely not helped by my drinking. I know this will be hard for some of you to hear, and may not seem surprising to some of you, but I wanted to take my own life that night. I started to think of how I would do it, and what I would write in my goodbye letter, or whether or not I would even write one. For the first time in my long history of depression and suicidal ideation, not even the thought of my cats would pull me out of it. With that, I knew that I needed help. I drove myself to the hospital and checked myself into the ER. They transferred me to their Behavioral Health Center, and at 4:30am Monday morning, I was officially a patient of their unit. That morning, I was seen by their psyciatrist who diagnosed me with bipolar disorder II. This was no shock to me, as I had suspected I had this illness for many years now. I was just too afraid to find out for sure. I'm not sure why; it really isn't anything to be ashamed of.

Over the course of the three days that I was there, I attended group meetings with the other patients that were there (all voluntarily admitted for suicidal ideation). I was able to let go of the thoughts I had, learn some coping skills, and meet other people who were in the same boat as I was. I cannot tell you how much it helped to just talk to people who knew what I was going through. Wednesday morning, I asked if I could go home, and they agreed that it was OK for me to go. Most patients stay in the unit for 5-7 days, but once I knew my diagnosis, and knew how to receive treatment, I knew that I was OK to go out into the real world again.

They have put me on disability until I am able to feel like myself again. I am to undergo intensive therapy 3 hours a day, 3 times per week for at least 3 weeks, maybe more. In addition, in order to take part in that therapy they are requiring me to attend AA meetings. I am still having a hard time admitting I had a drinking problem, but ... I did. I will be on medication for the rest of my life, but if that enables me to function like a "normal" human being, I am all for it.

I hope that my openness might give you the strength to ask for help if you need it. I had always believed that I was a burden to those around me, but I've learned that although it may seem that way, they would rather have me around than not. That goes for you, too.

Oh, Walrus, I'm sorry things got so low for you, but I'm really glad to hear you're starting to get back up on your feet. Much love to you (and the cats).

good on you for seeking help! things can only improve from here and I really think time away from your job will help, especially since youll be spending that time in therapy. who cares if youll be on meds the rest of your life, most people have some kind of pill they take every day. give it time and I'm sure youll find the right combo to allow you to live the life you want. just remember that you are still going to have low days, and some very low days--but there will always be good days to come.

Its so great that you were able to seek treatment. Sounds like the hospital was positive for you. Glad things are better! Very happy for you.

I'm so, so glad you went for treatment Walrus.


(michelleg)

I'm on 100mg now, and I haven't been regularly checking this thread because I don't even think about depression anymore.

Good luck with your treatment Walrus, I really hope it works out ok.

Also,
being on meds for the rest of your life > not being alive.

walrus, you are incredibly brave. Courage to you as you begin recovery! The hardest part can be reaching out for help--not just that first time, but whenever in the process you need it. Lots of love.