Other Links:
Confession
thejanechord
Diaryland
notifylist.com
2002-10-21
6:30 p.m.
In the middle of the transitional period from one drug to another and another, I am definitely going to have to say that I am not feeling very well. Granted, it’s only been about a week and a half, maybe almost two weeks, since I started the major change, and I know I can’t expect these sorts of things to happen overnight. However, that doesn’t change the fact that at this very moment, I feel like absolute shit.
The problem with changing medications is that you have to go through so many procedures to get off one and on another that by the time you’re at a point where you can stop to think about how you’re feeling, you don’t even really know what’s just happened to you and why.
Yes, I feel like shit. But why?
It could be one of any number of things. It could be withdrawal from the Paxil. It could be side-effects of the Wellbutrin. It could be side-effects from the Prozac. More than likely, it’s a combination of two or more of those things. Determining which of the problems is causing the apparent shittiness is quite the losing battle.
After serious contemplation and deliberation, I think I’m going to have to break it down even further.
First of all, I haven’t been able to eat much of anything for the past two weeks without feeling like I’m going to puke. This is not to mention the other problem that invariably follows eating. If it weren’t for the fact that this horrific stomach problem started before I went on the Wellbutrin, I would’ve surely decided that was the cause based on the statement my doctor made before giving it to me. He said something to me about how he wouldn’t prescribe it to anyone he even suspected of being bulimic, and I quickly assured him that he shouldn’t worry about that with me.
God knows I’ve tried to be bulimic; I just can’t make myself puke.
One of the last resorts that I decided to try along the path to my alleged “recovery” was maintaining a continuous workout regime because they say it’s good for depression.
I think they’re full of shit.
In any case, I have been religiously working out on a regular schedule for the past year and a half. Perhaps working out has helped to alleviate some of the constant fears of inadequacy in the midst of swarms of women who are obviously more attractive than I, but what it has achieved more than anything else is at least the knowledge that I’m doing what I can -- no more and no less -- to keep myself from feeling like an eyesore. So, I’m working out such that I don’t expect to be able to quit working out anytime soon, regardless of how much I have to endure feeling like even more tired and sweaty shit than I do ordinarily.
That said, perhaps I should consider the possibility that it’s the withdrawal from the Paxil that’s causing me to feel like I’m going to puke. Of course, the withdrawal must be what’s causing the perpetual dizziness, and it can’t be causing both, right? The addition of the Prozac and the Wellbutrin must be affecting me SOMEHOW.
Picking apart the possibilities seems like an impossible task.
And so I’m left to think to myself about the withdrawal of some drugs, the addition of new drugs, the fact that I can’t eat, and oh yeah, I just remembered that I haven’t been able to sleep lately, either.
Sleep has been HORRIBLE. It’s not exactly that I’m not sleeping at all; it’s that I’m so tightly wound up in anxiety-crusted knots that I can’t relax until I take something to knock me out. The something to knock me out has tended to be either Benadryl or Tylenol PM, depending on how my allergies are feeling and how dehydrated I felt throughout the preceding day. Once the something to knock me out kicks in, I do eventually fall asleep, but the dreams I’m having are enough to make even Salvador Dali feel queasy.
A few nights ago, I had a dream that I was stuffing dead bodies into mattresses, and I was so overwhelmingly filled with a sense of horror at the prospect of a lump in my bed that I continued pounding on the dead bodies with my fists until I felt like I could finally sleep on top of them without feeling a lump in my mattress. I had another dream in which my pet bunny, Lloyd (see picture here), was sent to dig out a ghost from beneath an RV that was completely submerged in murky water, and when he succeeded in digging out the ghost, it actually turned out to be a bear.
Numerous other dreams have left me feeling really, REALLY uneasy, as well, but I can’t remember them at the moment.
I guess the point is that I feel like shit, and it could be the result of practically anything. Never one to accept things that vague in their explanation, I’m going absolutely out of my mind trying to figure out what’s doing it, even though I know that I’ll probably never figure it out. All I can hope is that these damn drugs level out at some point in the not too distant future and that I can once again proceed with my life in a state of hyper-aware, less than contented, near-furious apathy.
