Well, I decided to give anti-depressants a try. The feelings of sadness, anger, irritability, were no longer something I wanted to deal with anymore. I think people don't realize how much of depression can be made up of anger. It's not just that people want to die or are always sad. I didn't want to die, that was not the reason I chose to try the medication. Medication for me, was a last resort. It was a huge decision for me and I fought it for weeks before I finally took one. I cried and cried when I took it, it felt like I was admitting defeat. After 14 years of not needing medication, and priding myself on that, I was medicating again.
The first day or so, no real change. By day three I noticed I was starting to lost the ability to feel any emotion. While that was kinda nice in some aspects, I was starting to not even be able to smile or laugh. Like I have said before, just because I am depressed, doesn't mean I cant laugh, smile, joke, or feel happy. So this was scary and new, although a common side effect of anti depressants. I was very cautious about what medicine to choose. I went with the last anti-depressants I was on at 16, because I had taken that with success before, although the withdrawal process was hard. This category of anti-depressants is supposed to have less side effects. But the one I chose, is one of the worst ones for withdrawals. And all anti depressants have a black box warning. The black box warning states that during the initial treatment phase (1 to 2 months), some users will have increased suicidal thoughts and behaviors. So you're telling me it can do the exact opposite of what I want it to do? It was the scariest thing to me about starting the medication! What if I lost all sense of reality and ended up doing something I could never take back? At least when I am not medicated, my rationality and healthy thinking are still there, just sometimes quieted!
Day 4 of the medication, I was feeling even more numb, felt like I was in a cloud and just going through the motions. Day 5 I felt the same as the day prior. Then I just got extremely depressed and started rationalizing things. Things like everyone would be OK without me in their life, and that my kids would be better with someone else as their mom. I was still aware enough to see that all of this is happening, that I am getting worse and the thing I was most scared about happening, was happening. I was too scared to continue after that day, what if one more pill, caused me to lose what rational thinking was still there? It just wasn't worth it. I knew the risk of severe withdrawals from stopping an anti-depressants cold turkey. But usually that's if you have been on it long enough for it to do what its designed. Since I had only been on it for 5 days, I thought it would be fine. Boy was I wrong! First two days I felt ok, then it hit me like a brick wall. Hot flashes, dizziness so severe it caused repeated vomiting, fatigue, hot flashes, brain zaps, mood swings. I wanted to die! My doctor told me to go in to urgent care for an IV. Of course urgent care was closed, so we had to go to the ER.
They got me to a room quickly and got me on the monitors. They gave me an IV and took my blood. Also gave me something to help the nausea subside and another for the dizziness, which is what was triggering the nausea and vomiting. They had me do some strength tests to eliminate the possibility of a brain problem. Then we just waited for the tests to come back and to get enough fluids in me to pee, so they could eliminate the last few things with that.
Everything came back normal! Doctor said it was withdrawals from the medication and that with that particular medication, symptoms can last for quite a long time. He gave me a prescription for the nausea and dizziness meds. Also said if I get to the point again that I get dehydrated, I will need to come back in for IV again.
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