drugs or no drugs?

bed is good to hide ... i stayed in bed all last weekend and most of the weekend before and barely went out, my roommates were out most of the time luckily so wouldnt have noticed. i had some wine and lorazepam so kinda knocked myself out for much of it.

i dont know, it makes sense but it sounds like you couldn't go to work, i still manage so - maybe if it gets worse.

good to hear you are gettin better

maybe you're right DD.

I am going off my meds, a little at a time, under the supervision of my med-shrink. I took more than two years to decide this, and I have done a lot of reading up on these drugs. I don't tell people not to take meds; I think each person should research it themselves and decide for themselves. But I choose to try living without them because I've never been completely off meds for a long time since I got on them about 29 years ago. I know it will be hard, but I don't like a lot of things about meds, and I believe I can overcome my problems with alternate solutions. I also don't feel the illness is worse than the treatment. And we don't know what these meds will do to the body over a long term. I've had some very negative things happen, including weight gain.

If you're not comfortable with meds, perhaps you should look into alternative treatments, such as dietary changes that might make a difference, herbal remedies (but research them well, because "natural" remedies can have side effects and react poorly with medications you take, so know what you're doing!), and other alternatives. Some people have had success with these things.

Two things you said really struck me, and I'm wondering if you realized how your self-talk comes across.

> yea but if you're still coping then isn't it kinda a cop out.

Medication is a cop out? I thought medication was used when you didn't feel well. Illness may not be optional, but suffering is.

> i don't feel i should not have those problems 'because' i'm a professional, but i dont really see why i SHOULD. what's my excuse for having anything wrong? absolutely freaking nothing.

You need an excuse? You miss days at work. You lie to cover for it. You are notably stressed, maintaining this illusion.

How sick do you need to be, before you'll acknowledge how you feel?

Pure rhetoric, I threw down. You do not know how hard it is for your peers to function as they appear to you. You seem overly harsh in your self-assessment and expectations. If there is a stigma to taking meds in your local work environment, don't tell anybody. Or use euphemisms in conversation. You have a chronic illness.....being treated by a specialist.....hoping for remission.

Trying to be a mirror, but not sure how well I did.

Lar

Yes Larry, but there's no justification or reason to have the issue in the first place.

And yes I know that sometimes it's chemical not caused by other things but that concept implies not being able to control what happens and i dont think that sits very well with me? i don't know. i just want to get back to normal.

DSF, I understand what you mean to some extent about the justification. I have no 'disorder' or 'diagnosis', but sometimes life just takes its toll. The times that I took meds, it was a hard decision to make because there is nothing clinically wrong with me. But you know, why struggle? Where does it get us? I'm glad that I overcame my pride and accepted the helping hand that was offered. Medication got me through a hard time in my life, and I'm grateful that it was available. Would I have survived without it? Well yeah, sure. I've been through worse with NO medication and survived those times, too. But why create our own obstacles to our happiness? What sense does THAT make?

Another thing that has recently occurred to me (yeah, I'm a little slow sometimes): mortality. I am under lot of pressure both at work with an extremely challenging, high-exposure job and at home with a husband who has some serious psychological problems. I've been playing Superwoman for the past 15 years and have accomplished a lot, but what kind of toll does stress take on your body? I never worried about ulcers or anything like that in my 20s or early 30s, and in fact kind of enjoyed burning the candle at both ends. But... yikes, ulcers do occur and people my age are starting to get ulcers, heart attacks, breast cancer, parkinson's, MS... all kinds of things that make me realize that life is just too short to be so 'proud'. Healthcare is way more important than I ever realized. I don't want an ulcer or worse, a heart attack.

I've been concerned with those things, too, LMo, even more as I've gotten older. It's so hard to explain to kids/teens how what they do now will catch up with them, and it's easy to say, "Well, that's thirty years from now!" but most people will see age 40 or 50, and will usually regret their choices. Kids need to understand "today" someday will be "today" now. If only we could go back in time and try to convince our young selves...but some of us were pretty stubborn, even back then.

I do believe there's a point in struggling...to a point. In general, what doesn't kill us, makes us stronger, they say. That isn't always true, actually, but my point is, some struggles are good, if you can learn to overcome them. But some struggles you can't overcome alone, and it's ok to ask for help. IMO, in life, we're supposed to be independent sometimes and sometimes we're supposed to be social, helping each other...and being helped. I'm not against medication, but I believe informing yourself first. Taking medication, or using anything that helps you when you need it, doesn't make you weaker...it makes you stronger.

just wanted to say thanks for the responses in this thread, gave me a lot to think about and i realised i didnt say thank u

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LMo said:
Another thing that has recently occurred to me (yeah, I'm a little slow sometimes): mortality. I am under lot of pressure both at work with an extremely challenging, high-exposure job and at home with a husband who has some serious psychological problems. I've been playing Superwoman for the past 15 years and have accomplished a lot, but what kind of toll does stress take on your body? I never worried about ulcers or anything like that in my 20s or early 30s, and in fact kind of enjoyed burning the candle at both ends. But... yikes, ulcers do occur and people my age are starting to get ulcers, heart attacks, breast cancer, parkinson's, MS... all kinds of things that make me realize that life is just too short to be so 'proud'.

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That's how I feel too LMo. I might have gotten better eventually without taking medication. I resisted for a long, long time and wasn't getting better, but I might have. I just don't know. I started worrying about the toll the constant anxiety was taking on my body and how it was affecting my physical health. Anxiety was wearing me out -- mentally and physically. When you're that worn out, your immune system is weakened and your body doesn't function as well. I read a study a while ago about the effects of melatonin. It's a hormone your brain only produces in the dark when you're sleeping. The study I read about concluded that nurses working night-shift on a regular basis had higher rates of breast cancer and it was attributed to the lack of melatonin their brains were producing -- because they were up all night and sleeping in the daytime. So, just that one thing -- the fact that I was too anxious and panicked to lie down and go to sleep at night (or had to sleep with the light on) made me worry about what that might be doing to my physical health. I'm much healthier -- mentally AND physically now. I know for certain I would not have gotten to this point AS QUICKLY without medication. Therapy was helpful too, but I was too agoraphobic to leave my flat to GO to therapy before I started taking medication.