Life with meds

My neurotransmitters called, and they asked for some additional support

Last Friday, I went to my doctor and asked if he would write me a new prescription for Wellbutrin.

I had been taking Wellbutrin, an antidepressant, for about four years when, this past June, I decided to wean off of it. I suffered few side effects and wrote about trying to adjust to a sort of new normal back in August in my post Life without meds.

About a month ago, I was sitting in my little closet in my favorite chair, the walls a deep, dark blue, a small fan providing enough white noise to block out the sounds of my family, and I finally had the courage to say to myself, “I am not doing OK.”

My question to myself was, “How long have I not been doing OK?”

I had lots of reasons for why I hadn’t been doing OK—in mid-August, I had surgery on my foot that required weeks and weeks of physical therapy, and which was not totally back to normal yet. I had been (and still am) struggling with chronic arm pain. Between the physical therapy, surgery follow-up, and arm-related appointments, as well as random appointments my kids have, I was sometimes at an appointment most weekdays. Both of the physical issues, my arms and my foot, have made exercise complicated. The arm pain has also meant I have had to limit some of my joy-bringing hobbies, such as playing the piano and cross-stitching. I bought a used bike to limit impact on my foot, but my arms can’t handle long rides. Sources of dopamine hits were few and far between.

In addition to these physical issues, we have four kids, in case you’re new here. None of them are in diapers but none of them can drive, either. One day recently I drove almost 100 miles over the course of a day, going to four different appointments (podiatrist, meeting with a woman from church, spontaneous pediatrician visit for suspected ear infection, speech therapy). Our older two boys are in marching band, and the fall is basically like the schedule travel sports families have. Then there’s church, my part-time job, and trying to make sure everyone is fed and clothed.

It’s a lot. I know it’s a lot. And I have not been able to handle it.

During this time, I did try to use the tools in my depression toolkit, which was not enough to fix anything but probably made the pit slightly less dark.

Adrenaline fueled me through most of marching band season, but the day after a big competition that our boys’ school hosts and that I helped organize, spending 16 hours at the high school that day, I crashed. All the frustration of the pain in my arms and my foot, all the late nights for church and band, all the early mornings of getting to school, all the driving from here to there day after day—it all caught up to me.

It was that day that I knew I needed to call the doctor. Yes, life had been crazy, and yes, the physical issues have been additional stressors. But I have not been handling it.

“Coastal View (A Foreboding of Sadness),” Vittore Grubicy, 1893/1894

I have been in the pit of depression before, and somehow that makes being back in the pit even worse. I look around and see only darkness and I don’t want to be there. I know there is another way to experience my life, and I want to be there, but I can’t climb out of the pit, no matter how hard I try.

There is, I think, a greater awareness now of suicide and of the red flags loved ones should watch for. What is hard to explain to people who have never struggled with depressive and intrusive thoughts is that there is another land in between true suicidal thoughts and “normal” thoughts (or, at least, the lack of intrusive thoughts).

In this land, you aren’t thinking about hurting yourself or coming up with a plan to do so. You aren’t wishing that you could die.

In this land, you’re just kind of wanting to melt into the ground. You’re not wanting to be dead, but you also aren’t wanting to be a participant in your life anymore. For me, the first step toward that land usually begins with feelings of overwhelm and a frequent thought in my brain that says, “I hate my life.”

Of course, I don’t really hate my life. My life is not the problem. The problem is that my brain thinks I can’t handle my life, and my brain wants to protect itself, so it can’t blame itself for the problem. My life is the only thing left to blame.

When I begin to think every day, every hour, that I hate my life, it becomes too much to bear, and so my brain stops saying it and just lets me feel the weight of my life at every turn. I open my eyes in the morning, and I have a two-ton weight on my chest. I move more slowly. I struggle to answer questions. This time around, food has been a particularly difficult issue. Thinking about food has made me want to crawl into a hole. This is problematic because I am primarily responsible for making sure the people in my house have food as well as actually preparing the food. My kids have eaten a lot of Jimmy Dean frozen croissant sandwiches for breakfast this fall.

When you’ve been telling yourself that you hate your life for long enough, but you know that your life actually isn’t bad, you begin to worry that the people in your life can tell that you think you hate your life, and they might even think you don’t care about them, because you are unable to express any affection or positive emotions toward the life that your brain is telling you that you hate.

Photo by Art Institute of Chicago on Unsplash / Don’t know what exactly this is meant to be, but it felt relatable

It is at this point that you really begin to think that everyone is better off without you. This is one of the most painful lies your brain can tell you. If you’ve ever wondered what could compel people to actually hurt themselves, I would guess it’s some version of this, but maybe not only because this is such a painful thing to think, but because they’re so tired of trying to tell themselves it’s not true.

And even if it is true, I want to be here.

I want to see Noah in his Minecraft pajamas before school, even if I’m exhausted and I don’t want to think about what to pack in his lunch.

I want to hear Zoe come home from school and tell me that a kid in her class drew a picture of their teacher as a bottle of ketchup and I want to laugh with her, even as I hope she doesn’t want me to help her with an art project, because I’m just too tired.

I want to go pick up the boys from band and see Cohen across the band room, throwing his head back and laughing at something one of his friends said, even as I lament the fact that I am in the car for the fifth time that day.

I want to crawl into bed to read, even as I know I will not be able to make it through more than a few pages, and to hear a knock at my door and for Stephen to come in to say goodnight and give me a hug, because at some point I guess my 15-year-old started tucking me in at night?

I want to sit with Christian at our favorite coffee shop and have to keep putting my cup down so I don’t spill it because he keeps making me laugh, and to know that he really and truly love mes, even as I grieve the burden I know my broken brain has been on him.

And so to hear my brain saying—everyone is better off without you—while I hear my heart aching—but I don’t want to be without them!—makes me feel like my body might rip itself in half.

Photo by British Library on Unsplash / Another old illustration that’s very relatable

The response to my post about deciding to stop taking medication wasn’t measured in comments here, but in the texts and e-mails I got from people who found something in it that they could relate to. The pain of depression and anxiety may be silent, but it is a real kind of pain, and I am not the only one.

I also know that it is hard to explain to people who haven’t been there. I don’t have much of a purpose for this post other than to let you know, if you are suffering in this way, that you are not alone. And if your brain needs help to stop telling you that you hate your life and everyone would be better off without you, it’s OK to ask for help and to receive the help, whether in the form of medication or friendship or both.

I have a friend who, when I texted her a few weeks ago and said that I didn’t feel like I could take it anymore, first asked me if I was considering hurting myself or someone else, and when I said no, she sat with me and gave me a bag full of the new Oreo Reese’s cups as well as some Dubai chocolate from Costco and listened to me say the same things I’ve been saying for months. She reminded me I’d be going to the doctor soon and that the medicine would help. That she knew I was just so tired. That it made sense that I felt the way I did. In the days since then, she has told me more than once that she is glad that I exist, and that she loves me.

There are people in your life who are glad that you exist. You are loved, not only, I suspect, by human people in your life, but also by a God who formed your fragile brain. I don’t know why some of us have received this thorn in the flesh. I do know that it is making me softer. I still wish it would go away. And I still want to be part of this life that my brain tells me I should hate.

Somehow, this is all grace, and today I can see it. I praise God for my candy-gifting friend and my husband and my children and the other friends who occasionally receive what probably feel like unhinged texts. And I look forward to the joy I know I will feel, one day, when the dark clouds lift. I pray I will get to taste some of that joy on this side of heaven. If I don’t, then I will keep praying the Lord will sustain me—and you—until then.

If you need someone to hear the painful things your brain is telling you and you don’t have anyone else to talk to, I’m all ears: chelseykcrouch@gmail.com.