Making myself ill

Hi I have been making myself ill by not taking my medication for my ongoing illness.

The main reason I have not been taking it is really because I feel no better when I am on it and it is making my blood tests go odd. Also I am unemployed and before I had my illness my family were always asking me what jobs I had applied for and what interviews I had coming up and so on. So I feel that since I have this illness for as long as it takes I am not receiving this pressure from my family. Does that sound weird? I know I ought to do the right thing in taking the medication and I've already stopped it once before (as some fellow sufferers at my local meeting group kept on about me having another possible illness that my medication may worsen, turned out I did not have this other illness at all) which my doctor knows about.
I have no problems going back on the medication, I just don't want this pressure on me to find work as it is hard enough for me already - I have been without a job for over a year simply because for one thing I just can't find anything and secondly I haven't felt well enough to.

I have also been told I am mineral deficient and my levels are dangerously low but that doesn't seem to bother me. I feel as though I just don't care anymore.

I would think a mineral deficiency could make you feel like not doing anything. But, of course, it is a symptom of depression. Talk to your doctor and see if he could try you on something different that might make you feel better and take the meds.

Hi thanks for your reply.

Doctors have said I am iron deficient but the supplement I take is not really doing very much. I have had my Vitamin D tested, that is 59.6 (25-50 is deficiency and 50-75 sub-optimal, doctors say normal), Vitamin B12 is 395 (180-900) and my folate is 6.2 (4.1-18.7) All these levels have been much lower. My therapist has said it is hard to differentiate between physical depression and mental depression and because my illness causes depression he thinks it is more a physical cause. I know that when the time comes for me to get back into work when my symptoms and bloods are better I will have no reasonable explanation not to look for work - sounds a bit daft I know.

You might need infusions to help your iron level go up. Supplements wouldn't work for my wife. She had to go to a clinic twice a week or something to get hooked up to a feratin (spelled wrong I'm sure) drip IV. After that she at least wasn't as tired anymore. She was very anemic.

Thanks for replying, I have been supplementing but the ones I take I don't feel are working very well. I don't mind if I get put on infusions. Sorry for sounding as though I don't care about myself but in a way I don't care what happens to me or how ill I get, as long as it keeps me away from the pressure my family are giving me. I just want somewhere to hide and never show my face again. I feel like the black sheep in my family with no job and never fitting in to their ideals. :,(