11:26 p.m. - October 06, 2001
meds
I don't quite know what happens next. I think the withdrawal effects have almost completely faded away.. so now all I'm left with are the remnants of why I began taking this medication in the first place. Which is almost funny, in a way... that the withdrawal was a bigger concern. Now it isn't. My God, it's only Erik, it wasn't like I was out with sexy foreigners, but I got such terrible tremors. My stomach threatened to erupt every five minutes or so, flaring the way a fire does; sporadically and unpredictable. I ate an entire dinner during eight or so minutes of peace from within, and then tremors came, along with the nausea, and I was instantly sorry I'd eaten.

I'm starting to remember so many things I'd forgotten; why I wouldn't eat in public (said stomach tremor), why I was scared to drive (unexplained panics in the middle of some highway) and why I basically couldn't be too far from my house (something unexplainable, the disease itself). I think, though, that I handle it better now. I ate my salad, I ate my soup, I drank up my banana smoothie and I drove halfway through Chicago and back. Claustrophobic traffic. My skin crawled, but I did it... I could feel my skin going numb the whole way.. but I sang to the music and kept myself distracted by talking to Erik. The big difference between then and now is that I don't hide from it.

But it doesn't make it any less painful. It doesn't make me feel any better when my body and mind are rebelling inside when I'm out with my friends, and nobody else has to expend all their energy just to have an okay night out. It shouldn't be that hard to do... fun is such a natural thing. Medicated, it was as easy as I'd always thought it should be.

I'm still seriously considering staying on meds. I got off them in the first place because I hate being dependent on chemicals, which I know is silly because your brain IS chemicals, but I'm the type of person who won't even take ibuprofen for headaches or fevers. The whole mind-over-matter concept is something I want to be able to control much better than I do. I hated having to dutifully unscrew the bottle of Paxil every night, break the pill in half, and swallow one, even though I was still only taking half the lowest dosage possible. Even though I felt wonderful, better than I remembered ever feeling, on this med. I hated taking it. I hated it.

So I stopped.

Also; it lowered my sex drive, and that's never good. The one bright spot in this whole 'well, I'm not really mentally healthy, the pill just made me think I was' scenario is that I can feel the sex drive coming back....yesss...

Damn, I'm sorry for being so whiny.

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