I’m Beautiful Like Me.

So I guess I best check in!

It’s been one helluva summer. Between the dental work, the battle of the sicky-ickies and the depression, it’s really some wonder that I renewed my domain for another year. I promise to ramble a lot. It may get deep and sad and troublesome. I promise it’ll get better. It always does.

If you read my last post, you know that overcoming the fear associated with all-things-dentist has been nothing short of monumental for me. I have a long-ass way to go, too. But I’m dealing. Dr. P (the shrink) is giving me Xanax, which alleviates my pre-appointment anxieties somewhat. I suck it up and just do it.

Back in May, Dr. P prescribed me Zoloft. After nearly three months on it, I realized that it was making things a LOT worse. I had lost all desire to do the things I normally do. I was beginning to have really weird affects from watching the reality cop shows (like Forensic Files) I watch, too. After getting sick in early July and again in mid-July with a bout of vomiting and diarrhea, I was starting to obsess about germs: Was my food contaminated? Was I contracting the ick from the borked weather we’ve experienced this summer? We were turning the air off and opening windows and alternating back again a lot. Was it allergies? Am I allergic to outside atmosphere? Was my husband poisoning me? Was I not thorough enough when washing dishes and/or laundry? Was I ingesting toxins in my sleep (I have a history of sleep-walking)?

The shit was seriously disturbing.

If you know nothing else about OCD, it’s important that you at least know that there is no rationalizing with it. I knew most - if not all - of those scenarios is totally bogus. But I couldn’t stop obsessing about them. I wasn’t sleeping. The daytime hours were okay, because I could distract myself with television or internet or taking the kids to the park or whatever. But turn out the lights, lie in bed and my head would start reeling in a million different directions, especially during those endless days of feeling like knives were in my guts with the certainly that I’d never be able to eat a steak or Mexican food again.

Dr. P took me off the Zoloft and switched me to Celexa. He gave me some Ambien to help me sleep. I cried like a baby when I told him that I had suicidal thoughts. Not the same kind of suicidal thoughts I’d had when I was a kid wherein I actually think about ways to off myself. These kind were (let’s face it - are) more along the lines of feeling like there isn’t much to live for, that the world is hard and no matter how great a thing I do, in the grand scheme of time and space, none of it will really matter.

Unfortunately, the Ambien is evil. However, things are improving slightly. Despite not taking the Ambien, I’m sleeping better and obsessing less.

The hardest part of this depression verses the depressions I’ve experienced before are twofold: I’ve felt extremely anti-social (save for online socializing) and I can’t really discern why I’m depressed. Typically for me, when I’ve felt down in the past, it’s my style to call a friend and ramble on about my various complaints. Perhaps it’s because I can’t really pinpoint anything (except for perhaps financial reasons) that is making me feel sad and obsessive that is causing me to feel anti-social. I dunno.

The truth is, life ain’t so bad. Sure, I may never cause the profound changes in the world like, say, Martin Luther King, Jr. But I’m married to a wonderful, smart, funny man (who would never poison me), I have two healthy and happy kids (who aren’t really trying to make me crazier) and we have clean water, food, shelter, a number of creature comforts, friends and damn near all the makings of the American Dream.

I’ve won a substantial amount of scholarships and grants to go back to school. I have an appointment with an advisor in a week and based on how that goes, I’ll finally decide whether I’ll go back to school. I’m absolutely terrified that I’ll feel overwhelmed. After all, it’s been a task this summer just to drag my ass to the library to check out books I’ve never read. It’s been three and a half years since I’ve been in school full-time and if the circumstances aren’t just right for me to ease back into it, I’m afraid I’ll have to decline. Husband is still in school and trying (and somewhat succeeding) to beef up his own business. We have a toddler that requires a lot of my energy. A lot of my energy. Yeah, I’m intimidated by the prospect of being a full-time student again!

I’m knitting again. I’ve even been out to Knit Night. I’ve gotten a ton of compliments on the fingerless gloves I recently whipped out and am strongly considering starting a business on Etsy to sell items, but I’ve got to work out some details with copyright permissions and designs. I’d be absolutely tickled pink to earn some cash doing something that I love and is so therapeutic! It certainly wouldn’t sustain us by any means, but it would allow me to help contribute something to the household finances.

On July 30, Husband and I celebrated our third wedding anniversary. Since finances are tight and we don’t really have access to a babysitter, we didn’t get an opportunity to do anything special. A friend offered to watch Buddha and Joy tonight, so we’re going out to have dinner. I’m pretty excited! Afterwards, another friend is coming by and we’ll have a few drinks. Last weekend, we had a friend over for dinner. See, I’m starting to be a little more sociable!

I’ll even be making an extra effort to blog more, if only to post my knitting adventures or pictures of our food from dinner tonight or to carry on and on about how amazingly fast Buddha is learning. I could certainly fill a few pages with that alone!

Hope you have a great weekend