Been Awhile!

So, here it goes, my mental diarrhea that comes with insomnia, facing what I have been up to mentally the last month, and oh yeah, Thanksgiving with my doubly divorced and remarried parents/ nonparents for tomorrow.

I'll start with me. I have been in a bad place with depression and its fun twin anxiety. I had never really known this happy-go-lucky playmate, anxiety, before these past few weeks. I can think of exceptions to that being performance anxiety before opening night of a show, if I was any good in the thing. I had anxiety the night before my second kid was to be born. (The first one, I was wrapped up in contractions and willing her to stay inside for another few hours.) I had anxiety when I had to face up to consequences for something bad I had done and I had been made to think about it and ponder my fate. But, overall, this guy was not someone i had ever hung with to say that i knew him like I know depression- buds since kindergarten.

I have been seeing a therapist for the last couple of months. I am being nice and sharing him with my husband in the attempts we make at marital harmony. He has been trying to convince me since day one in his office that meds are a good idea. I have been HIGHLY resistant up until now for the following reasons:

• I have taken them in the past with negative outcomes that are a minor annoyance i.e. lack of sex drive, weight issue, sleep issues
• I have taken them in the past with major fucking side effects i.e. made me go from depressed to psychotic and suicidal
• I don't think that there needs to be a pill that makes you happy. We are so lazy as a society that we have a market that the drug companies happily fill with happy pill. Over half of America takes this stuff. Who says that slightly moody, annoying, and occasionally disgruntled doesn't suit others besides Donald Trump, Andy Rooney, and Oscar the Grouch? Come on! I know people who have made it their lives' works to make sure and earn the curmudgeon of the year award.
• I think that this is the way God made us. To paraphrase C.S. Lewis, God uses pain to mold and shape us into the human beings we are today. Pain is God's megaphone for rousing a deaf world. So, there is my religious ground.
• I do not really do anything with the creative talents God has given me, but for whatever little bit of voice that is inside of me, I know the drugs will shut her up. There will not be anymore writing for anything other than basic journaling noting the weather and a new recipe the lady at the meat counter gave me.

I think there are some more. You would have to ask my shrink; I let him have it for the whole 50 minutes of our session with every reason not to take these drugs and it was final.

Then the disconnect happened.

I had felt it coming on for about 10 days and had tried and tried to warn Will that it was coming and to get to higher ground. Do something, whatever you can, but there is no stopping it. It happened though. He bore the brunt of it as he always does. He gets his shit, the kids' shit, my friends' shit, and my family's shit all rolled into one thrown at him at a high velocity and I keep telling him to move away from the fan instead of in its path. For me, the disconnect was not only a physical and emotional thing, but highly visual. I could see my mind cutting the mooring ropes to my heart and casting off. They had separated and ceased communication. That meant that any of the tender gestures or apologies that would be made, would be processed by my sensory organs, who then translates those signals via the brain. Ain't no connection to the heart anywhere in there.

So, I kept on with life and trying to go to marriage counseling. Then, last week, I had my first panic attack in my life and I am sure that I am having a heart attack. I had been dead asleep next to my eldest child when I suddenly awoke with what felt like a gorilla sitting on my chest, I could not breath, my blood pressure was through the roof, and my heart was pounding like mad. I was covered in sweat. It had been a pretty hectic time at out house but thought I was handling it OK. The attack proved it was not being handled well by my vessel at all. I have now started having daily anxiety attacks that can be as minor as a stomach ache and knots in my shoulders to hallucinations, migraines, and chronic shaking.

I now do not have a choice. I had to had the intervention of medication so that I can be a functioning human being and a decent parent. I try to tell myself that i may not have to do this forever. The truth of the matter is that I probably will. I need to accept it and be ok with it.

Speaking of meds, I have taken the last sleeping pill in my presence and yet I am awake blogging. I still have to get through the cathartic post about my dad before tomorrow.

I am going to get dressed and go in search of lung cancer. I will then start out on the elektra complex post from Hell.

I have chosen to stay sober throughout this ordeal. Mainly because I have this nasty family history. It will also prepare me well for taking meds that do not mix well. Besides the nasty orange label on the side of the bottle telling me not to mix these drugs with alcohol, I cannot find any real info on the web for social drinking and how it impacts the medications. once again, I am putting the cart before the horse.