Ideally, this would already be over. Everything would have been tied up in a neat little parcel and sorted itself out. I would have had my epiphany, realised where things were going wrong, decided to change everything, then just become a better person. Then it all would have ended and I could have carried on with my everyday life in comfort, knowing that it was all going to be all right, and everything was going to be fine.
That's not the way it works. I didn't think it would be, of course. But you always harbour a glimmer in the back of your mind that perhaps everything is going to be easy with this, this time, somehow; that this time, things are going to be less complicated, more reliable, more kind to you - you've only got to want things to get better and they will do. That's the hope, isn't it; but I'm afraid to say that I can't report that's what's actually happening.
I'd love to. I'd love to sit here and say, well, it was a piece of piss to get rid of the Prozac, and since then, everything's just opened up for me - the job offers have flooded in, everything's going great guns and I've managed to crack those toughies in the deep dark unpleasant places in my brain about the stuff that's too painful to even think about.
That would be great, to be able to say that. But it's not going to happen. This isn't going to be some neat transition from one place in which I was under medication, and struggled a bit, into another place, where I'm not under medication, and everything's completely peachy. I didn't think it would be. I never thought it would be. But I had hoped that it might be, just a hope, not more than a wish, a dream, an idea that wouldn't involve more heartsearching, more struggle, more getting things wrong and then having to work out how, and why, and saying sorry, and then having to try and work out how to put together the broken bits before even bothering to start on the stuff that needs doing.
No. This next bit is going to be just as hard as it was when I was first trying to contemplate quitting the antidepressants. Because this is the bit where they're pretty much fading away, and where they're becoming an irrelevance. That leaves not so much a void as a question, or rather lots of questions. Such as: did they really help me? Or: did relying on them create a false impression that depression was the only problem I had? Or: was it just easier to deal with things when I could accept that I was depressed, and therefore broken and fucked, and that I couldn't make things right again, and was destined just to live life as a broken person? And: am I really going to achieve anything by doing this? You know, cheery questions like that.
The questions still come. Some from me, and some from other people. I don't take anything for granted and I don't assume I have some, or all, the answers. I just can only think what I think, full of contradictions and mistakes, but it is me, and I have to listen to that. I am challenged on everything I say, and think, and feel, in everyday life; this is the one place where I can at least have an attempt to say something decisive, to say "This is how I feel" and not instantly be told that's instantly wrong. I treasure that. I may well be wrong, of course, or think that I'm wrong, or know deep down that I'm wrong. But there needs to be a place where you can say what you want and be able to escape that, for a few seconds at least. For me, that place is here.
All there is, right now, is questions. How much longer will this go on? Will it get worse? What about all that other stuff, from real life, creeping in and making it all worse? What about all those other problems which are making you feel like you're suffocating? Is this depression returning? Or is it just a bad time? Questions, questions, questions. The answers will reveal themselves, eventually, in time. You can't just sit around waiting for them, though. You have to try and head off somewhere, to do something, to try and fight it.
I don't worry. Things seem bad now, but they may not be in an hour's time, or a day's time, or a week, or whenever. I can hold on, with patience, and see the changes arriving. It's not good now, but it needn't be that way tomorrow. Depression robs you of the ability to see that, so I don't think this is depression - a relief. This is just feeling like shit. And it'll go.
Friday, 20 November 2009
Thursday, 19 November 2009
Back to life
Back home, then, to the land of the ripoff, the grumbled conversation, the howling leaf-spattered wind... and the floor still feels like it's falling away beneath me, like an ever-descending plane, like the dream you have when you try to fall asleep but wake up instead. Everything's a bit hazy, a bit fuzzy, there's so little way of knowing what's real and what isn't - which is particularly the case when you're not feeling well either, which I'm not, though that has nothing to do with antidepressant discontinuation and everything to do with getting a nasty bug while being overseas enjoying myself. Ah well. We pay for these things in one way or another, or so it seems.
Not yet, though, back to life. Work must wait for a while until I can get better - better than how I am at the moment, which isn't good at all. But there's a stage you enter into when you've been ill for a few days - you kind of sink into it and accept it, and it doesn't feel as bad as it might if you were plunged straight into it. You begin to see the parameters of what's possible change, and you begin to see illness as being part of normality, even though you don't want it to be. But you can't help it - you don't have the energy to fight; you need to conserve everything you can in order to keep on going, just to be.
And I can't help likening this feeling to sinking into depression, or sinking into a life that's regulated and moderated by antidepressants. You wouldn't start here if you could, but you haven't started here; you've arrived here through a long and gradual path, with subtle changes taking place every day, so it doesn't seem at all unusual that you've ended up here. Everything that isn't normal can become normal, if you let it be that way, if it happens often enough, and if it seems like there isn't any other way, which sometimes there really isn't.
At least, when you're in the midst of some illness, with fairly obvious physical symptoms, you are under the impression that there is a pathway into this and a pathway out of it. You imagine there will be a finite amount of time that this horrible feeling will last; that these unpleasant symptoms will be hanging around and affecting your ability to do everything else. You imagine it because that's the way it is with illnesses - they come and they go, they have a beginning and an end, and after they're over you can pack them up and throw them away and think, well, that wasn't very nice for a while, but it's gone now.
It's not so easy to think of depression in that way. It's not an illness with obvious symptoms. It's not something whose beginning is easy to trace back to one significant event, or a series of events. There is quite often no 'cause' you can blame it on, so you can end up blaming yourself. Somehow you must have created this; somehow you must have made this, although you don't know how, but you suspect that someone must have, and in the absence of other information you can only conclude it was you.
That's why it's harder to kick, and why it's harder to see antidepressants as being a finite cure, like antibiotics or other medicines. It's difficult to see the outlines of depression, to know where it begins and where it ends; to know what is depression and what is merely you having a particularly good, or bad, or ordinary day - and knowing that your very perception of what is good or bad may have been altered by depression in the first place.
But, time goes on. I may be unwell in other ways, and may be taking all kinds of medication, but not antidepressants. They're still not part of my life, and it's been quite a while now. It's tempting to say that's it, that I have somehow won; but I don't think that would be entirely right of me. Even so, it's encouraging. To understand how I'm really feeling, I will have to wait until this other illness goes away, and see what it's left behind - hopefully just me, as I am, back to life.
Not yet, though, back to life. Work must wait for a while until I can get better - better than how I am at the moment, which isn't good at all. But there's a stage you enter into when you've been ill for a few days - you kind of sink into it and accept it, and it doesn't feel as bad as it might if you were plunged straight into it. You begin to see the parameters of what's possible change, and you begin to see illness as being part of normality, even though you don't want it to be. But you can't help it - you don't have the energy to fight; you need to conserve everything you can in order to keep on going, just to be.
And I can't help likening this feeling to sinking into depression, or sinking into a life that's regulated and moderated by antidepressants. You wouldn't start here if you could, but you haven't started here; you've arrived here through a long and gradual path, with subtle changes taking place every day, so it doesn't seem at all unusual that you've ended up here. Everything that isn't normal can become normal, if you let it be that way, if it happens often enough, and if it seems like there isn't any other way, which sometimes there really isn't.
At least, when you're in the midst of some illness, with fairly obvious physical symptoms, you are under the impression that there is a pathway into this and a pathway out of it. You imagine there will be a finite amount of time that this horrible feeling will last; that these unpleasant symptoms will be hanging around and affecting your ability to do everything else. You imagine it because that's the way it is with illnesses - they come and they go, they have a beginning and an end, and after they're over you can pack them up and throw them away and think, well, that wasn't very nice for a while, but it's gone now.
It's not so easy to think of depression in that way. It's not an illness with obvious symptoms. It's not something whose beginning is easy to trace back to one significant event, or a series of events. There is quite often no 'cause' you can blame it on, so you can end up blaming yourself. Somehow you must have created this; somehow you must have made this, although you don't know how, but you suspect that someone must have, and in the absence of other information you can only conclude it was you.
That's why it's harder to kick, and why it's harder to see antidepressants as being a finite cure, like antibiotics or other medicines. It's difficult to see the outlines of depression, to know where it begins and where it ends; to know what is depression and what is merely you having a particularly good, or bad, or ordinary day - and knowing that your very perception of what is good or bad may have been altered by depression in the first place.
But, time goes on. I may be unwell in other ways, and may be taking all kinds of medication, but not antidepressants. They're still not part of my life, and it's been quite a while now. It's tempting to say that's it, that I have somehow won; but I don't think that would be entirely right of me. Even so, it's encouraging. To understand how I'm really feeling, I will have to wait until this other illness goes away, and see what it's left behind - hopefully just me, as I am, back to life.
Thursday, 29 October 2009
Some things you just can't fix
It's good to be able to fix things. Good, but you can't always. In those moments of severe depression, and feeling low, it's easy to think that everything boils down to you being unable to fix things, and that you are powerless to change anything for the better. Powerful enough to make all the mistakes you made, of course, but powerless to decide everything else that might happen.
That's not the truth, though it's a convincing and convenient narrative when you can't understand why you're feeling so low. So much easier to blame it simultaneously on yourself and the world: I've made everything wrong; and everything is stacked up against me, and I can't do anything about it. The worst of all possible everything. But that's not how it is.
There are the minor things that go wrong - the annoyances, the irritations, the tiny mistakes, and they can add up of course. And then there are the things where your fate rests in someone else's hands - the job you didn't get, the promotion you missed out on, the people who don't really want to be your friends, the others who treat you unfairly, or unfavourably, and get away with it, and there's nothing you can do.
And of course there are, too, the things you remember, the things you couldn't fix, the things you couldn't do anything about, but which are ruined, and wrong, and which make you feel completely powerless and totally alone. An ambulance. A hospital corridor. The smell of the disinfectant. The whirr of the morphine. A face you recognise, but don't recognise, because it's so different, and because it will never be the same. A particular morning, cloudy, overcast. The clothes you were wearing. A phone call. You can't change these things. You can only experience them, and they will hurt you, and that will never change, and it's going to keep coming from now until forever.
A lot of my depression came, and still comes from time to time in those moments where it feels awful for a few seconds, where the heart sinks and the stomach kicks you, where you get transplanted to another time and another place, and you're on the wrong end of the telescope, and the world is unimaginably huge and bleak, from the frustration of not being able to change things.
But. And there is a but, before you think I'm dwelling in unhappiness. There are other things to remember too. That you were strong. That you managed to cope, despite everything, and that it made you bigger, and better. And that even the thing that hurt you the most, the one thing you wish you could change if you could change anything - that one defeat you can't ever forget about - didn't beat you. It didn't see you off. It tried. But you could take it on, and you won.
A few weeks on, things are still going okay for me. I thought I couldn't do it, and I didn't know if I could, but I could, and I am. And there have been times - many times - when I thought it might just be easier to forget about all this, and to carry on with the medication, and see how it went, and that wouldn't be so bad. And it wouldn't have been, and it's not necessarily the wrong thing to do, but I didn't do that; I've kept going, kept trying.
And things go wrong. A mistake here, a problem there, a failure or two. Things that don't go my way, and I have to try and look at them and think: I've seen off worse. And I have. Do I need medication? Not now. There was a time when I think I did, and I probably did, but not now. You don't need to be fixed, because some things don't fix, and some things can't be fixed. Sometimes you just have to be as fixed as you can be, not perfect, not undamaged, but still all right.
I'm still strong.
That's not the truth, though it's a convincing and convenient narrative when you can't understand why you're feeling so low. So much easier to blame it simultaneously on yourself and the world: I've made everything wrong; and everything is stacked up against me, and I can't do anything about it. The worst of all possible everything. But that's not how it is.
There are the minor things that go wrong - the annoyances, the irritations, the tiny mistakes, and they can add up of course. And then there are the things where your fate rests in someone else's hands - the job you didn't get, the promotion you missed out on, the people who don't really want to be your friends, the others who treat you unfairly, or unfavourably, and get away with it, and there's nothing you can do.
And of course there are, too, the things you remember, the things you couldn't fix, the things you couldn't do anything about, but which are ruined, and wrong, and which make you feel completely powerless and totally alone. An ambulance. A hospital corridor. The smell of the disinfectant. The whirr of the morphine. A face you recognise, but don't recognise, because it's so different, and because it will never be the same. A particular morning, cloudy, overcast. The clothes you were wearing. A phone call. You can't change these things. You can only experience them, and they will hurt you, and that will never change, and it's going to keep coming from now until forever.
A lot of my depression came, and still comes from time to time in those moments where it feels awful for a few seconds, where the heart sinks and the stomach kicks you, where you get transplanted to another time and another place, and you're on the wrong end of the telescope, and the world is unimaginably huge and bleak, from the frustration of not being able to change things.
But. And there is a but, before you think I'm dwelling in unhappiness. There are other things to remember too. That you were strong. That you managed to cope, despite everything, and that it made you bigger, and better. And that even the thing that hurt you the most, the one thing you wish you could change if you could change anything - that one defeat you can't ever forget about - didn't beat you. It didn't see you off. It tried. But you could take it on, and you won.
A few weeks on, things are still going okay for me. I thought I couldn't do it, and I didn't know if I could, but I could, and I am. And there have been times - many times - when I thought it might just be easier to forget about all this, and to carry on with the medication, and see how it went, and that wouldn't be so bad. And it wouldn't have been, and it's not necessarily the wrong thing to do, but I didn't do that; I've kept going, kept trying.
And things go wrong. A mistake here, a problem there, a failure or two. Things that don't go my way, and I have to try and look at them and think: I've seen off worse. And I have. Do I need medication? Not now. There was a time when I think I did, and I probably did, but not now. You don't need to be fixed, because some things don't fix, and some things can't be fixed. Sometimes you just have to be as fixed as you can be, not perfect, not undamaged, but still all right.
I'm still strong.
Sunday, 25 October 2009
It's not just me
When you go through something like depression, or the difficulties involved with coming off antidepressants and readjusting to life without medication, you don't do it on your own. There are all kinds of people who have subtle influences on you, who help you or trip you up, who encourage you or make you concerned - whether they know what you're going through or not. No-one lives their life in isolation of others, no matter how much it might seem, when you're depressed or when you're at a low, that you do.
It's another one of those temptations, those silent hands dragging you into the vortex, to imagine that you - and only you - can understand what's going on, or that you alone can do anything about it. The latter is largely true, to an extent, but I think we all make decisions with others in mind, and it's not possible - much less desirable - to set yourself on a train track to where you want to go, and go crashing through everything and everyone that's in the way.
As I've said before, there aren't many people who know me who know what I'm doing at the moment, the path that I've set ahead, the decision - which is the right one - to stop taking antidepressants and to attempt to live a life that's relatively normal, or at the very least untouched or uninfluenced by the behaviour of medication and its effects and side-effects. But it's not as if I live in isolation - whatever mood swings there are, are felt by those around me, the people who know me well and have to cope with me, and those who hardly know me, but have to deal with me, and those who don't know me at all, and who have to share the same space with me every now and then.
Whatever fury I feel, or whatever deep unpleasant turns towards unhappiness I have, they all create ripples that move outwards from me. There's no point in hoping that I can conceal it all, because I can't. People might not know exactly why, but they notice the subtle differences. Sometimes you think it might be best if they did know, and then they could understand; but other times you think, I just want to be treated like I'm any other person, who gets things wrong sometimes or who seems a little preoccupied sometimes, and not to get any special treatment or allowances.
So while it might seem that I'm alone, I'm not really. And I think this is something that needs to be born in mind at other times, at low times or even at times when things feel good. It's the thought that keeps, or has kept, many of us from doing serious harm to ourselves, when things have been too hard to bear: that there are others, and that it matters to them what happens to us, even if sometimes we feel like it might not matter to us - although when you look back on it, of course it did, and it does.
Some people link depression with selfishness. I'm not sure that's the case, but there's a self-involved characteristic about it, I think; a self-absorption, an introspection, which isn't healthy. Sometimes you can bee too busy looking at yourself to notice everything else that's about there; and sometimes, if you do, those things that nag away, and hurt, and damage you aren't so obvious, or can be dismissed, or ridiculed out of existence, or even just postponed, which isn't always a bad thing - not every problem can be sorted out right here, right now, and sometimes the harder you look, the more confusing it becomes, like when you stare at a word and it begins to appear ridiculous or gibberish, or when you look at a finger or a toe and it starts to take on an alien appearance.
Sometimes looking only inwards gives a false picture of yourself, because that twisted view you have of yourself, the view that can see you as a genius or a hero - or, more likely, as a failure or an idiot - is tainted with so many things, so many feelings, and when those feelings include depression, your view isn't quite right, or clear. Other people can see remarkable things in you that you don't even recognise; others can see the good in you that you thought was gone.
I say all this because, for the past few days, I've been for the first time in a couple of years virtually on my own, due to a particular set of circumstances, and it's brought me back to familiar ways of thinking, familiar ways of being, the repetitiveness, the lack of contact, the lack of interaction, and it's reminded me of how I felt before I began to take antidepressants - the caricature you make of yourself gets more and more grotesque, until each one of your perceived weaknesses becomes extreme, and disturbing, and horrific. That's how I remember it being.
But that's not how it's been these few days. It's not so bad now. The feeling of isolation is the same, but I feel that I'm looking outwards more. I don't see myself as a the figure of ridicule that the worst parts of my mind would like to draw me as; I don't see myself as magnificent or brilliant either. You need other people to provide that picture of yourself, because it gives you an idea how well you're communicating, and how you need to be in order to interact better, and be happier, and make other people happier.
And there is, of course, that other person in my life, whom I don't often mention here, not out of a desire to keep this focussed on me but because I can only write this from my point of view - at least I claim that it's so, but I know that's not the truth. People who have been through depression - and who have gone through the tricky transitional period of adjusting to life without medication - will know the impact it has on others, especially those who are closest, and loved. In a way it is harder for them, because they don't exactly know what we're going through, or how we're feeling, or how to make things better, and they can feel powerless, and very much alone themselves. And they are there when we hurt, when we don't want to communicate, when we are thoughtless, and hopeless, and stupid, and wrong. It's not a question of 'putting up with' - it's just what people do, even when it's not easy. Accepting that we can be testing, or trying, or difficult, or self-indulgent, or lost, or capricious, or angry, or whatever comes along. Accepting, not because they are weak, but because they are strong.
So it's not just me. It's not just me that's going through this rather difficult time - the symptoms, much as I would love them to disappear, are still clinging to me; I can sense the grip releasing, but not immediately, not instantly, and I am not strong enough to shake them off completely. It is just me - only I can make these decisions. But it isn't just me - whatever I feel, or do, impacts on others, those closest to me first, and those further away later. But I can't pretend it isn't there, or this is all about me. Because it isn't.
And I feel I owe it to those who are close to me, both near and far, but especially near, to go through all this, to try and achieve some kind of way out of the confusion of depression and medication; to try and get out and emerge into a place where I can just be. Where there will be problems, but ordinary problems, the problems that normal people have - houses, cars, money... and so on. Where real life is. I owe it to me too. But it's not just me.
It's another one of those temptations, those silent hands dragging you into the vortex, to imagine that you - and only you - can understand what's going on, or that you alone can do anything about it. The latter is largely true, to an extent, but I think we all make decisions with others in mind, and it's not possible - much less desirable - to set yourself on a train track to where you want to go, and go crashing through everything and everyone that's in the way.
As I've said before, there aren't many people who know me who know what I'm doing at the moment, the path that I've set ahead, the decision - which is the right one - to stop taking antidepressants and to attempt to live a life that's relatively normal, or at the very least untouched or uninfluenced by the behaviour of medication and its effects and side-effects. But it's not as if I live in isolation - whatever mood swings there are, are felt by those around me, the people who know me well and have to cope with me, and those who hardly know me, but have to deal with me, and those who don't know me at all, and who have to share the same space with me every now and then.
Whatever fury I feel, or whatever deep unpleasant turns towards unhappiness I have, they all create ripples that move outwards from me. There's no point in hoping that I can conceal it all, because I can't. People might not know exactly why, but they notice the subtle differences. Sometimes you think it might be best if they did know, and then they could understand; but other times you think, I just want to be treated like I'm any other person, who gets things wrong sometimes or who seems a little preoccupied sometimes, and not to get any special treatment or allowances.
So while it might seem that I'm alone, I'm not really. And I think this is something that needs to be born in mind at other times, at low times or even at times when things feel good. It's the thought that keeps, or has kept, many of us from doing serious harm to ourselves, when things have been too hard to bear: that there are others, and that it matters to them what happens to us, even if sometimes we feel like it might not matter to us - although when you look back on it, of course it did, and it does.
Some people link depression with selfishness. I'm not sure that's the case, but there's a self-involved characteristic about it, I think; a self-absorption, an introspection, which isn't healthy. Sometimes you can bee too busy looking at yourself to notice everything else that's about there; and sometimes, if you do, those things that nag away, and hurt, and damage you aren't so obvious, or can be dismissed, or ridiculed out of existence, or even just postponed, which isn't always a bad thing - not every problem can be sorted out right here, right now, and sometimes the harder you look, the more confusing it becomes, like when you stare at a word and it begins to appear ridiculous or gibberish, or when you look at a finger or a toe and it starts to take on an alien appearance.
Sometimes looking only inwards gives a false picture of yourself, because that twisted view you have of yourself, the view that can see you as a genius or a hero - or, more likely, as a failure or an idiot - is tainted with so many things, so many feelings, and when those feelings include depression, your view isn't quite right, or clear. Other people can see remarkable things in you that you don't even recognise; others can see the good in you that you thought was gone.
I say all this because, for the past few days, I've been for the first time in a couple of years virtually on my own, due to a particular set of circumstances, and it's brought me back to familiar ways of thinking, familiar ways of being, the repetitiveness, the lack of contact, the lack of interaction, and it's reminded me of how I felt before I began to take antidepressants - the caricature you make of yourself gets more and more grotesque, until each one of your perceived weaknesses becomes extreme, and disturbing, and horrific. That's how I remember it being.
But that's not how it's been these few days. It's not so bad now. The feeling of isolation is the same, but I feel that I'm looking outwards more. I don't see myself as a the figure of ridicule that the worst parts of my mind would like to draw me as; I don't see myself as magnificent or brilliant either. You need other people to provide that picture of yourself, because it gives you an idea how well you're communicating, and how you need to be in order to interact better, and be happier, and make other people happier.
And there is, of course, that other person in my life, whom I don't often mention here, not out of a desire to keep this focussed on me but because I can only write this from my point of view - at least I claim that it's so, but I know that's not the truth. People who have been through depression - and who have gone through the tricky transitional period of adjusting to life without medication - will know the impact it has on others, especially those who are closest, and loved. In a way it is harder for them, because they don't exactly know what we're going through, or how we're feeling, or how to make things better, and they can feel powerless, and very much alone themselves. And they are there when we hurt, when we don't want to communicate, when we are thoughtless, and hopeless, and stupid, and wrong. It's not a question of 'putting up with' - it's just what people do, even when it's not easy. Accepting that we can be testing, or trying, or difficult, or self-indulgent, or lost, or capricious, or angry, or whatever comes along. Accepting, not because they are weak, but because they are strong.
So it's not just me. It's not just me that's going through this rather difficult time - the symptoms, much as I would love them to disappear, are still clinging to me; I can sense the grip releasing, but not immediately, not instantly, and I am not strong enough to shake them off completely. It is just me - only I can make these decisions. But it isn't just me - whatever I feel, or do, impacts on others, those closest to me first, and those further away later. But I can't pretend it isn't there, or this is all about me. Because it isn't.
And I feel I owe it to those who are close to me, both near and far, but especially near, to go through all this, to try and achieve some kind of way out of the confusion of depression and medication; to try and get out and emerge into a place where I can just be. Where there will be problems, but ordinary problems, the problems that normal people have - houses, cars, money... and so on. Where real life is. I owe it to me too. But it's not just me.
Thursday, 22 October 2009
Little sod
Sometimes I feel like I'm becoming a fictional character - not the Anton Vowl of my allonym, although the missing man part of that is quite apt as I've said previously, but Frank Bascombe, from my favourite books by Richard Ford. There's a bit at the start of Independence Day where he gets bonged on the back of the head by some kids wielding a bottle of Pepsi and it immediately clouds his view of the idyllic place where he's decided to settle down.
I felt a bit like that last night when some little bastard lobbed a clod of soil at the back of my head while I was leaving work, and then scampered off giggling with his scabby little mates. What I was thinking was: Why pick me? What was it about me that made you think you could chuck a big lump of mud at me, and get away with it? Is there something about my face that leads people to believe I'm deserving of a giant chunk of loam being flung in my general direction?
These incidents lead to a bit of soul-searching, and they're the kind of thing that - if you're depressed - can make everything be part of a wider pattern to drag you down. There you are, the sadsack walking target man being attacked by cackling kids, and you can't do a thing about it, because they run faster than you, and they're going to get away with it, and even if you did manage to catch up with them, one of them would probably pull a knife, or you'd end up being convicted of something, and it would all go against you, and, and...
I think that's one of the biggest differences between being depressed and not being depressed. When you're depressed you see yourself as simultaneously the epicentre of all that's dark and painful in the world, yet also a complete nobody, a nothing, a zilch, a zero. You see yourself as, at the same time, everything and nothing: you stand out as the biggest target of all to all who would humiliate you, or upset you, or make you miserable, yet you believe that no-one sees you when it comes to handing out praise, or good thoughts, or kindness.
The truth, of course, is somewhere in between. But it's hard to rationalise the evidence and be empirical about your experiences when you feel so low, all the time; the natural conclusion is to suppose that somehow, you are the cause of all this, that you are the agent that is making this all go wrong. There must be something about me, you think, which is making all of this happen; I must attract the attentions of people who would seek to harm me, while at the same time repelling those who might offer me friendship, or happiness. And that's not true either. But how can you see when you can't see, when there is something preventing you from seeing all this?
I think, looking at it all now from the point of someone who has been depressed, who knows that way of thinking, and who is almost on the verge of escaping the ties of medication, that for me it's always been a question of perception. What causes what is the hard part to work out. Do you think that way because you're depressed, or does being depressed make you think that way? Or do they encourage each other in a self-defeating whirlpool sucking you down?
Perhaps it doesn't matter. Perhaps what's really important is working out how to cope with it. Antidepressants are a way of coping, but I don't think you can just sit still on them and hope that they'll make you bulletproof. A lot of other things need to be worked out and changed, so that if it starts heading downwards again, you're strong enough to ride it out. And then of course there is a time when you might feel you want to live without antidepressants, as I do, and you need to be ready. And some little bastard with a clump of earth isn't going to drag me down.
I felt a bit like that last night when some little bastard lobbed a clod of soil at the back of my head while I was leaving work, and then scampered off giggling with his scabby little mates. What I was thinking was: Why pick me? What was it about me that made you think you could chuck a big lump of mud at me, and get away with it? Is there something about my face that leads people to believe I'm deserving of a giant chunk of loam being flung in my general direction?
These incidents lead to a bit of soul-searching, and they're the kind of thing that - if you're depressed - can make everything be part of a wider pattern to drag you down. There you are, the sadsack walking target man being attacked by cackling kids, and you can't do a thing about it, because they run faster than you, and they're going to get away with it, and even if you did manage to catch up with them, one of them would probably pull a knife, or you'd end up being convicted of something, and it would all go against you, and, and...
I think that's one of the biggest differences between being depressed and not being depressed. When you're depressed you see yourself as simultaneously the epicentre of all that's dark and painful in the world, yet also a complete nobody, a nothing, a zilch, a zero. You see yourself as, at the same time, everything and nothing: you stand out as the biggest target of all to all who would humiliate you, or upset you, or make you miserable, yet you believe that no-one sees you when it comes to handing out praise, or good thoughts, or kindness.
The truth, of course, is somewhere in between. But it's hard to rationalise the evidence and be empirical about your experiences when you feel so low, all the time; the natural conclusion is to suppose that somehow, you are the cause of all this, that you are the agent that is making this all go wrong. There must be something about me, you think, which is making all of this happen; I must attract the attentions of people who would seek to harm me, while at the same time repelling those who might offer me friendship, or happiness. And that's not true either. But how can you see when you can't see, when there is something preventing you from seeing all this?
I think, looking at it all now from the point of someone who has been depressed, who knows that way of thinking, and who is almost on the verge of escaping the ties of medication, that for me it's always been a question of perception. What causes what is the hard part to work out. Do you think that way because you're depressed, or does being depressed make you think that way? Or do they encourage each other in a self-defeating whirlpool sucking you down?
Perhaps it doesn't matter. Perhaps what's really important is working out how to cope with it. Antidepressants are a way of coping, but I don't think you can just sit still on them and hope that they'll make you bulletproof. A lot of other things need to be worked out and changed, so that if it starts heading downwards again, you're strong enough to ride it out. And then of course there is a time when you might feel you want to live without antidepressants, as I do, and you need to be ready. And some little bastard with a clump of earth isn't going to drag me down.
Tuesday, 20 October 2009
What I've noticed
It was vaguely warm when I began all this, not yet autumnal, and now the leaves are tumbling down, marking the amount of time that's passed - three weeks and counting completely medication-free; seven weeks in total since I started to stop. It's a long time, and a short time. I look back on 'then' as if it's ages ago, at times; but there is no vast difference between 'then' and 'now', just a few subtle changes, and a shift in mood - a shift upwards.
I have a few observations so far, symptomatic and otherwise, and as this appears to be developing into a 'looking back' piece, it might be worth trying to collect them all together, in one place. As I always say here, this is my experience, and it may differ slightly or wildly from anyone or everyone else's. All I can report on is what I've been through myself.
Headaches
These started quite early on, and I was ready for them, as I'd experienced shocking headaches, almost migraines in strength, during my first aborted attempt to become medication-free, when I'd rushed into it, and taken it all too quickly. They came, just as I'd thought they might; but when they did, they were less intense than they were then, and less painful, and lasted for less time. They are still around, but it seems like it's not going to be too troublesome to handle.
Wandering off
I'm a daydreamer at best, but I've noticed that I've found it hard to focus on one task at a time - the mind, ever-busy and seemingly overloaded, flits from one task to another, incapable, it seems, of settling on one thing at a time. I don't know if this is a good thing or not. It leaves a lot of things unfinished; but on the other hand it means some things get started which might not have done otherwise. I'd prefer to be able to concentrate on one thing at a time, but that's not how it is at the moment. The mind is a bit fuzzy, a bit frantic. Hard to explain how it's fuzzy and frantic at the same time, but it is. Organisationally, it's like looking at life through frosted glass; there are shapes, but no detail.
Sleep trouble
I'd expected this to be a lot worse than it has been. Generally, sleeping has been OK. But there have been times when I've woken up and not been able to get back to sleep. That's about it, but dreaming seems a lot less frequent and a lot less vivid than it did before. That's no bad thing, as at times they've been disturbing, deeply unpleasant, uncomfortable - now they're less so. I don't know what to put this down to but it is simply the case that it's happening this way.
Aches and pains
A bit of pins and needles; a bit of acheyness, but nothing more troubling than that. No more twinges or niggles than a relatively ordinary 34-year-old might expect on a daily basis. I mentioned electric shocks before; they're still hanging around, not daring to leave just yet, but getting less and less, bothering me less, worrying me less.
Teariness
Sometimes. But not all the time. It turns up and goes away just as quickly, which doesn't make it too bad, if a little disconcerting when it takes me by surprise, which it occasionally does.
Appetite
I seem to have more of an appetite, but not greatly so. I seem to be grazing throughout the day rather than eating at mealtimes.
Is this boring you?
I get things like this ^^^ all the time, or thoughts like this. I seem to be questioning everything. It's hard to let go of stuff, or say stuff without immediately questioning it, worrying about it, analysing it endlessly and wondering how it might be analysed by anyone else. I worry that I'm boring people, or boring myself, or annoying people, or getting things wrong, or being clumsy, or being arrogant, or being inept... or anything. Do you see what I mean? I am so concerned about my impact on other people, although I really shouldn't be. Happily, though, I seem able to just get on after a few moments' panic, a few moments' frustration and overanalysis, and then just carry on. Which is probably for the best.
Finishing things
It's easier to get things finished. I don't know why, given what I mentioned above about starting lots of things at once, but getting things done seems somehow more simpler, less troublesome. There seems less confusion, despite the fuzziness, if that's not too much of a contradiction.
Knowing it's going to end
One of the most useful things you can learn by doing what is euphemistically termed 'self-medicating' is that these things have an end. It can be hard to see, when you're in the midst of an experience of drugs, be it a short-term something or other, or a longer-term commitment like the one I'm leaving behind; but you gradually learn that these things have half-lives and the return of effects, or feelings, or symptoms, might not necessarily be part of any continual process of being affected, but is just a little peak or a little trough, or whatever, on the way back to what you might call normality. This is just a drug experience stretched out over a longer time frame, but the highs and lows are becoming more predictable.
That's the best thing of all. You reach a point - and I can't really say when it was; it's more of a sense of being made gradually aware of the presence of something that was there all along - where you know it's going to end. Where you can see that you can achieve the thing you wanted to achieve all along. Where you can see that there is a way out, and there will be a time - not so long from now - that all the fears and concerns you had about this will be memories, just like the taking of medication will be a memory. And then there will be new things to face, and new ways to look at the world, but this is what I wanted all along, and I'm going to get there.
It's hard to realise at first, but you get it eventually. You realise: I can actually win this. I can actually do this. You don't want to get overexcited, or overcome with relief, because you know yourself the tricks that the mind can play on you, and how you've been cruelly disappointed in the past by getting it wrong. So you keep the thought to yourself, and you carry it around with you, and it becomes more and more obvious, the more time goes along; and when the leaves scatter along the street in front of you, and it's autumn already, the nights get shorter and the air gets colder, you know that actually it has been a long time, and that this will be worth it. No time to celebrate, not yet. But nearly.
I have a few observations so far, symptomatic and otherwise, and as this appears to be developing into a 'looking back' piece, it might be worth trying to collect them all together, in one place. As I always say here, this is my experience, and it may differ slightly or wildly from anyone or everyone else's. All I can report on is what I've been through myself.
Headaches
These started quite early on, and I was ready for them, as I'd experienced shocking headaches, almost migraines in strength, during my first aborted attempt to become medication-free, when I'd rushed into it, and taken it all too quickly. They came, just as I'd thought they might; but when they did, they were less intense than they were then, and less painful, and lasted for less time. They are still around, but it seems like it's not going to be too troublesome to handle.
Wandering off
I'm a daydreamer at best, but I've noticed that I've found it hard to focus on one task at a time - the mind, ever-busy and seemingly overloaded, flits from one task to another, incapable, it seems, of settling on one thing at a time. I don't know if this is a good thing or not. It leaves a lot of things unfinished; but on the other hand it means some things get started which might not have done otherwise. I'd prefer to be able to concentrate on one thing at a time, but that's not how it is at the moment. The mind is a bit fuzzy, a bit frantic. Hard to explain how it's fuzzy and frantic at the same time, but it is. Organisationally, it's like looking at life through frosted glass; there are shapes, but no detail.
Sleep trouble
I'd expected this to be a lot worse than it has been. Generally, sleeping has been OK. But there have been times when I've woken up and not been able to get back to sleep. That's about it, but dreaming seems a lot less frequent and a lot less vivid than it did before. That's no bad thing, as at times they've been disturbing, deeply unpleasant, uncomfortable - now they're less so. I don't know what to put this down to but it is simply the case that it's happening this way.
Aches and pains
A bit of pins and needles; a bit of acheyness, but nothing more troubling than that. No more twinges or niggles than a relatively ordinary 34-year-old might expect on a daily basis. I mentioned electric shocks before; they're still hanging around, not daring to leave just yet, but getting less and less, bothering me less, worrying me less.
Teariness
Sometimes. But not all the time. It turns up and goes away just as quickly, which doesn't make it too bad, if a little disconcerting when it takes me by surprise, which it occasionally does.
Appetite
I seem to have more of an appetite, but not greatly so. I seem to be grazing throughout the day rather than eating at mealtimes.
Is this boring you?
I get things like this ^^^ all the time, or thoughts like this. I seem to be questioning everything. It's hard to let go of stuff, or say stuff without immediately questioning it, worrying about it, analysing it endlessly and wondering how it might be analysed by anyone else. I worry that I'm boring people, or boring myself, or annoying people, or getting things wrong, or being clumsy, or being arrogant, or being inept... or anything. Do you see what I mean? I am so concerned about my impact on other people, although I really shouldn't be. Happily, though, I seem able to just get on after a few moments' panic, a few moments' frustration and overanalysis, and then just carry on. Which is probably for the best.
Finishing things
It's easier to get things finished. I don't know why, given what I mentioned above about starting lots of things at once, but getting things done seems somehow more simpler, less troublesome. There seems less confusion, despite the fuzziness, if that's not too much of a contradiction.
Knowing it's going to end
One of the most useful things you can learn by doing what is euphemistically termed 'self-medicating' is that these things have an end. It can be hard to see, when you're in the midst of an experience of drugs, be it a short-term something or other, or a longer-term commitment like the one I'm leaving behind; but you gradually learn that these things have half-lives and the return of effects, or feelings, or symptoms, might not necessarily be part of any continual process of being affected, but is just a little peak or a little trough, or whatever, on the way back to what you might call normality. This is just a drug experience stretched out over a longer time frame, but the highs and lows are becoming more predictable.
That's the best thing of all. You reach a point - and I can't really say when it was; it's more of a sense of being made gradually aware of the presence of something that was there all along - where you know it's going to end. Where you can see that you can achieve the thing you wanted to achieve all along. Where you can see that there is a way out, and there will be a time - not so long from now - that all the fears and concerns you had about this will be memories, just like the taking of medication will be a memory. And then there will be new things to face, and new ways to look at the world, but this is what I wanted all along, and I'm going to get there.
It's hard to realise at first, but you get it eventually. You realise: I can actually win this. I can actually do this. You don't want to get overexcited, or overcome with relief, because you know yourself the tricks that the mind can play on you, and how you've been cruelly disappointed in the past by getting it wrong. So you keep the thought to yourself, and you carry it around with you, and it becomes more and more obvious, the more time goes along; and when the leaves scatter along the street in front of you, and it's autumn already, the nights get shorter and the air gets colder, you know that actually it has been a long time, and that this will be worth it. No time to celebrate, not yet. But nearly.
Saturday, 17 October 2009
And there will be good days too
When I was about nine, I scored a goal from the halfway line while I was playing Little League football. It was nearly a full-sized pitch, and it was a fluke. I'll admit that to you now (although at the time I mumbled something about seeing that the keeper was off his line). The ball rolled gently towards me and I smacked it as hard as I could. A freak wind caught it and it soared into the sky before crashing into the back of the net past the poor little kid who was trying to defend the goal. I turned around and laughed. I just laughed. And then the rest of the team mobbed me, and I collapsed into a heap, and it was brilliant.
I can remember it all - the kit I was wearing (rather unflattering green and white), the kit the other team were wearing (a much smarter blue and white), the result of the game (we won 2-1), the look on my dad's face, the pats on the back, everything.
Every now and then, when things are really dreadful and I feel like giving up on things like my attempt to rid myself of antidepressants, I have that stored away like a little film in the back of my head; and I watch it all play out in front of me. And no matter how rubbish I'm feeling, or how tempting it is to imagine that life is a series of raw deals and failures, I can't reduce that down to anything other than a feeling of complete and utter joy. Sometimes you win. Sometimes you really do win. And it might not be often, but you have to enjoy it while it's there, and think to yourself it might not come back quite the same, but at least you had it once.
Yesterday, for example, I had a marvellous piece of good luck. I've been writing my other blog for a couple of years now, and have been very lucky anyway, and have had some very kind feedback. But this post has been read almost 50,000 times. From nowhere, I had a moment where I was brought from total obscurity into just slight obscurity. And it was brilliant. And do you know what? It was as much a fluke as that punt from the halfway line. But you have to try. You have to keep trying, and sometimes it comes off. When it does, you just have to laugh at the absurdity of success - just as you laugh at the absurdity of failure. Not every day is going to be as good as that.
But it happened once. And no-one can take that away.
I can remember it all - the kit I was wearing (rather unflattering green and white), the kit the other team were wearing (a much smarter blue and white), the result of the game (we won 2-1), the look on my dad's face, the pats on the back, everything.
Every now and then, when things are really dreadful and I feel like giving up on things like my attempt to rid myself of antidepressants, I have that stored away like a little film in the back of my head; and I watch it all play out in front of me. And no matter how rubbish I'm feeling, or how tempting it is to imagine that life is a series of raw deals and failures, I can't reduce that down to anything other than a feeling of complete and utter joy. Sometimes you win. Sometimes you really do win. And it might not be often, but you have to enjoy it while it's there, and think to yourself it might not come back quite the same, but at least you had it once.
Yesterday, for example, I had a marvellous piece of good luck. I've been writing my other blog for a couple of years now, and have been very lucky anyway, and have had some very kind feedback. But this post has been read almost 50,000 times. From nowhere, I had a moment where I was brought from total obscurity into just slight obscurity. And it was brilliant. And do you know what? It was as much a fluke as that punt from the halfway line. But you have to try. You have to keep trying, and sometimes it comes off. When it does, you just have to laugh at the absurdity of success - just as you laugh at the absurdity of failure. Not every day is going to be as good as that.
But it happened once. And no-one can take that away.
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