What happened when I started taking an antidepressant
Disclaimer: What follows is an account of my personal experience and is not intended to serve as advice or judgment.
Last year was rough. My depression settled in deeper than it had in the past and my anxiety spiked often. Add to that more frequent and sustained stressful stretches, family illness and injury, and the combo was just right for me to feel like a mess barely holding it together a lot of the time. I briefly considered antidepressants late in the year, finally ready to give them a chance for the first time.
Then I sank lower — low enough that I just didn’t feel up to trying anything new. Even thinking about talking to my doctor about antidepressants felt Herculean (I know that sounds melodramatic, but mental illness can feel like a drama queen vying for all the awards). I just didn’t have the energy, and anyway, what if meds didn’t work either? Then where would I be?
Around the Holidays, I spent time with a few people who’d been on antidepressants for long periods and short spurts throughout their lives. Brilliant, accomplished, creative, fun, animated, kind, amazing, inspiring individuals that I love, respect, and admire. They refused to have their light hidden and their goals and dreams short-changed by depression or anxiety.
I realized I was holding myself back by not giving the next viable option a chance.
So, I asked about their experiences. How quickly did they notice results? What were the side effects? Did they feel muted or soulless or any of that Garden State stuff? Did they still feel like themselves? Did it affect anything else? Their answers were encouraging.
After several conversations about it with my therapist — in which she eased my fears that it might cause irreversible damage to my mind — I decided to stop looking at medication as a last resort. I deserved to feel better and owed it to myself to try this next thing. Maybe it would make a difference, maybe it wouldn’t. I owed it to myself (and my loved ones) to try.
So, a little over 3 months ago, I started taking an SSRI.
First Impressions and Early Side Effects
I noticed differences in my mood and mental state not long after starting the medication. In the first few days, I did feel muted and disconnected. There wasn’t as much anxiety, I wasn’t really depressed or down; I was just a little out of it.
The best example, the one that kind of freaked me out a bit, was when I listened to the segment “Love is a Battlefield” on an old episode of This American Life. It was about a couple who adopted a child out of a Romanian orphanage, the damage the horrible conditions had done to his psyche and ability to attach, and all they went through to get him to a place where he could feel love and attachment and no longer be dangerous. It was harrowing, heartbreaking, close-to-home hitting stuff, the kind that would usually have me bawling. But I didn’t cry. I didn’t feel the impact as strongly as I “normally” would have. Cognitively, I was by turns horrified, blown away, and uplifted; emotionally I was just…detached, flat.
Luckily, this disconnect did not last long. While I continue to feel more resilient to stress, anxiety, and depressive/dark/angry thoughts, I stopped feeling as disengaged after a week or two.
For the first week or so, I also had some light intermittent nausea, which a couple people had warned me about. It wasn’t a huge issue for me (no worse than the mild nausea I sometimes get from drinking tea on an empty stomach, nowhere near as bad as nausea that comes with vertigo).
I was also a tad more forgetful of routine things and tasks and slightly less able to focus intensely (especially on things that didn’t light a spark in me) early on.
Less and More: Changes I’ve Noticed
LESS anxiety, stress, worry, anger, negativity — The biggest, most obvious change I’ve noticed is in how I’m handling stress and anxiety. For instance, when I went on the medication, I was in the midst of a stressful and mentally/emotionally draining situation, which didn’t resolve until several weeks later. I noticed right away, though, that I just wasn’t experiencing the stress or anxiety as deeply or as strongly. I was able to feel it, notice, take a step back, assess, and sometimes let go of it. Since then, I’ve been able to remain calmer through several other potentially panic-inducing moments and handle them better than I would have in the past.
I’m also not clinging to negative thoughts as much. I still have angry/sad/morose moments, but they aren’t spiraling into tornados and funneling me into despair as often. I’ve been better at catching myself on the verge of that and able to pull back more easily and effectively than before.
My approach to conflict also seems to have gotten a boost. Whether it’s a disagreement with someone close to me or a difficult conversation at work, I’m less overwhelmed and more able to handle things from both a rational and emotional perspective. I don’t get sucked in as often. I’m less afraid to state my positions and thoughts in those situations, and more equipped to express myself tactfully and productively. I spend less time buried under the notion that every issue (even if it’s someone else’s, and something I have little power over) is automatically my fault and therefore my responsibility to fix.
MORE energy, motivation, curiosity, creativity, connection, confidence, and a clearer mind — I guess spending less mental energy fretting and freaking out leaves extra space and juice for the good stuff. Like new creative interests and hobbies (or a return to old ones). And more lively and connected socializing, plus the ability to better appreciate and hold close the amazing people in my life.
I’ve also been feeling more confident and self-assured. Granted, my confidence was scraping concrete a lot of times throughout my latest bout with depression. But that naysaying voice has gotten a little quieter and the encouraging one a little louder.
Which lead me to…goals! Setting them, sticking to them, achieving them. I started trail running a couple months before the medication. Since starting the antidepressant, I worked up the guts to enter a 5k, maintained the discipline to train for it, and mustered the follow-through to run it. I’m a slow runner, but I came in under the time limit I’d set. It felt good and I felt good enough. The week after my first 5k, I signed up for another.
I‘m more aware of beauty, wonder, joy, amazement. It’s not that I didn’t notice or feel these before, but some days they were so few and far between that I clung so hard I’d squeeze the life out of them. Now I can hold them lightly, appreciate them, immerse myself in them, and that actually makes it easier to keep both the memories and the feelings around longer.
My mind feels clearer, less cluttered. I don’t get roped into as much social media drama and noise as before, allotting my time and mental energy more deliberately. And I’m more engaged with the topics/posts/issues to which I do choose to allot my time and energy.
I don’t feel like I’m rid of or over depression/anxiety. Just better equipped to handle it, starting with a better baseline. It’s still work, some days a struggle, but I have more help.
Overall, I feel a bit stronger, more OK in the day-to-day. More grateful, peaceful, open. More intrigued by the possibilities, less mired in the what-ifs.
More hopeful and less helpless.
Just a reminder that the above represents my personal experience. Everyone is different — every body is different, every mind is different, every life is different — and therefore so is every experience.
