Rosie and Yinksy
Rosie - You've had so much to handle these past few months--and you are doing it so well. (I know you are saying to yourself "no I
haven't been handling it well...I'm a fraud...I reach for those drugs....etc, etc.") But you really ARE doing well. You are getting there! And if you have thyroid problems, I know from my mother how much that can influence your behavior. Alice and I were just talking about that...when we were kids and during our early teens our Mom just flew off the handle so quickly..she'd go 0 to 70 in two seconds!! Her response to tiny little things was so out of proportion. But then she had her thyroid level checked--and her doctor discovered that she had a BAD problem. Within a month or so of taking the thyroid drug (can't remember its name---Synthroid??)--she just mellowed out so much. Compared to her previous quick anger and her percolating emotions, it was like she'd just been prescribed Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" drug--Soma!(A futuristic drug where society was kept pacified by this Soma concoction!!!) Hmmm...or was it George Orwell's book "1984"?? Duhhhh!! Anyway! It was like night and day. So, you, too, may feel more stabilized when your thyroid levels are corrected. Just wanted to mention that.
I also note that you appear to be doing a similar taper to Alice and I--you've chosen not to "abandon ship until your last shipment sinks!!"
Al and I are doing a similar type taper.....we get our Vics (7.5 mg) from our legitimately-in-pain cousin, who shares her meds with us.
But her doctor is weaning her off the hard-stuff...and it's just a matter of time...so we've tapered down from about 8 a day to 4 or 5 a day "in preparation" for the Big Day!! (Which we anticipate with a combination of relief--and dread.) Pretty spineless, eh? When I read of others' strength and determination (your's included), I can feel pretty disgusted with myself. I've been so strong and determined in so many other aspects of my life...fought my way through the horrific, mind-numbing years of my mother's dementia. (We had her at home with us.) So, when people here offer the names of spiritual books....all I can think is that for 8 years "The 36-Hour Day" was my bible!!! (A fairly well-known book in the healthcare/caregivers circle--it is a practical, hour-by-hour, "tell-it-like-it-is" guide to surviving--mentally and physically--those hopeless, helpless times that lie ahead for both yourself and your parent (spouse, sibling, etc.) At any rate....if I was able to survive those most horrible years of my life...and had the ability to face the reality head-on....then why am I so weak now?? Why can't I face the week or so it would take to withdraw? And then battle through the long, slow climb to normality?
The answer?? Probably, because, in spite of what you all tell me about the joy of finally seeing life clearly, I have very real fears, that as a depressive person who's struggled with my own brain chemistry for much of my life, I may plunge back into a bleak, cheerless world--or, at the very least, never emerge from a lifetime of the "blahs"!
(...Although my antidepressants are heaven sent...and, intellectually, I
know I will "come out the other end"--as you have all done.)
That's about as honest as I can be about why I'm still taking that lower--but addictive--amount of pills. I know that withdrawing from 5 Vics a day is not a horrendous withdrawal...but it's more the fact of what lies ahead...will I
ever feel that joy and "natural high" that you all talk about when you stop taking them?? Troubling, too, is that when my cousin gets her 40 mg oxys--off and on--I find myself "nibbling" off the ends several times a day. (About the equivalent of two pills.) Luckily, she may have had her last prescription of them a few weeks ago--because that is one strong drug..and I would never want to get hooked on them!! No, no, no!
)
I just fear never being "my old self" again...and that "old self" was someone who once got so much pleasure over the tiniest things in life. There's this real lurking anticipatory despair, that, if taking a little pill gave me that ability to enjoy everyday life....what if I can never again reproduce those feelings "naturally".
Reading the posts of all of you who are trying so hard to get back to where you were before the drugs took over, made me think again, that....despite the fact that I've never taken enough pills to be sick from them... nevertheless, I am still frozen at the thought of never feeling their effects again. (In spite of the fact that they really don't do much for me anymore...my system's too used to them.) It's not that I fear the actual withdrawl. I fear that my own brain chemistry will never "work" again--and I will never get back the natural feeling of life being a treasure--and a pleasure--like I once did.
Anyway, Rosie...I think you've been doing great. And those days when you exceed your taper are not "bad" days...they are just "reminder" days... to be regarded as "blips on the landscape"...and to keep going in the right direction.
Yinksy - "Wee tartan skirts, rosary beads...and skull caps..." LOLOL!!! Oh, noooooo. Perhaps if we select
plaid skull caps, the House of Ralph Lauren or Yve's St. Laurent will let us get away with it. What a picture! Baby boomer twins, still asserting their own unique sense of style. (For the Easter parade we can dress up as twin eggs...en route to locate a spare uterus!)
I have been to many a St. Patrick's Day parade....great fun!! You must come see one! Even the crowds dress up. Once a year, on March 17 EVERYBODY is Irish!!!
Don't know, Yinksy, if you saw a note I wrote you on the thread titled--at least I
think it was titled--"Kinda and Yinksy"...or something similar. It was about two days ago. When you sent me that limerick!!! (That long thread where you lined us up against the wall and read us the riot act! LOLOL)
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