When hope change us

Larissa Caramel
Sep 9, 2018 · 3 min read
“woman lying on stairway at nighttime” by Daniel Garcia on Unsplash

It’s a complicate effort to measure how much we change when antidepressants and such start to work on our brains. It’s terrifying to read that nobody knows exactly how those drugs affect us and that colateral effects can be all sorts of things. It’s so terrifying to think that methods such as electroconvulsive therapy are still seen as viable solutions for our abnormal behaviors.

Yet, not taking those pills is not an option neither. At least, not for some of us.

I took too long to seek help, so many years, and even longer to understand that I should have patience with the different types of meds I would need to try till find the best one for my body and my brain.

And, oh boy, how those attempts changed me.

For starters, my metabolism was seriously affected by the time I’ve tried lithium. Then I’ve passed through all types of SNRIs and SSRIs and none of them helped me, au contraire, they made me fat, they made me sick, they made me feel dead inside, they made me want to die even harder than before.

Therapy didn’t work as well. The magical rapport thing never happened, and I’m more honest when drunk than when I’m with a psychologist trying to explain me to myself. I know that all the fuckery I lived damaged me, that’s pretty obvious, you don’t need to be a genius to get to this conclusion.

Then recently I’ve figured out, with my psychiatry help, that it wasn’t normal to have someone else living in my head. In fact, I had never talked about it before because that was part of my routine since forever and never occurred to me that the friend in my head could be my foe and that it was in fact considered creepy to have someone else living here inside.

I’m now complementing my friend vortioxetine with my 1st quetiapine attempt and I’m still trying to understand what it means to me. It worsened the feeling that I don’t know who I am without my mental illnesses. I have no drive to work, to live, to do nothing but think obsessively about it. I feel alone. But at least I feel something. That’s a good thing, right?

It’s debilitating to think that I lost so many years to my illness.

At the same time, people look at the life I’ve managed to build and simply don’t understand why I’m not enjoying success. They have no idea that I have no idea how to enjoy something.

I don’t remember the last time I was happy. I don’t remember the last time I had a dream to accomplish. I keep living. At the same time, I don’t want the rest of my life to be a waste.

Now, is that me or the drugs, perhaps the brain-controlling toxoplasma gondii parasite, or maybe simply the Matrix?

What’s the point of knowing?

All I can do is to keep hoping that at some point I’ll start to function and feel that I’m not wasting my time.

Is that too much to ask?

Larissa Caramel

Written by

Bilingual occasional writer & Escritora nas horas vagas. The Quetiapine Stories, Série Insólito e mais. insta@laracaramel

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