Friday, January 13, 2012

Depression, the great deceiver




So, I woke up from a nap where I had a weird dream about walking down a busy street with my students to go to a restaurant and lo and behold, depression had paid me a visit.

Thanks, buddy.

I have known about my depression since I was diagnosed in 2002. That year, it became patently obvious that something was wrong with me. I thought it was my soul-eating job as a loan officer at a small credit union, but I was just being ignorant and blind. The maternal side of my family is shot through with clinical depression. Why it did not occur to me before my 38th year is a mystery to me, but there you go. Sometimes you really can't see the forest for the trees, I suppose. I was less than thrilled to discover that I was also harboring an anxiety disorder as well. I was prescribed Zoloft and went on my merry way, suddenly a poster child for Pfizer Pharmaceuticals.

It was still there. Usually situational. Something would happen that brought me down and I would roll around in it a while until I found my footing and got back on track.

Lately, my meds (Cymbalta among the myriad I have to take for my diabetes) seem to be revolting against me. I wake up in the mornings sick and exhausted and in a fog. I began having intrusive thoughts again, like I did ten years ago.

But I also began writing again after over ten years. WTF?

I don't know if the trade off is worth it.

I don't know if what I write is good enough for others to read. What I do know is being a writer is really all I ever wanted, and in this life of mine where I have been so many things, this is the only thing I have not truly 'been'. And thinking about this makes me more depressed.

I am three days without my Cymbalta and the withdrawal symptoms are getting worse. I can't decide between the two sides of myself. Drugged and numb, or letting the crazy loose, feeling everything, and maybe truly being alive.

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