I need some advice, reassurance and help here please!

[Laurennn]

In May last year my mental health started to decline and eventually in December got to the point of me having to be hospitalised for a full medication change. I was severely depressed and highly anxious.

After being in the hospital for 4 weeks, I couldn’t handle anymore medication changes & left on very high doses of antidepressants.  On my discharge, the psychiatrist said he was hopeful I could manage the anxiety but was doubtful given the amount of antidepressants I was still on.

I have been home for 7 weeks, and the anxiety is killing me. I am constantly shaking, chest pain, nausea & vomitting - hardly functioning at all. I have a little 3 year old boy who I can’t take care of at the moment. I think it is due to too much antidepressant flooding my system.

I know I need to go back to the hospital to reduce the rest of the antidepressants, I can’t do it at home, and I can’t continue to live like this - but I feel like such a failure to my partner & son.

I am also worried it is not the flooding of antidepressants that is causing me great anxiety, it is just how I am & should be able to push through?

Sorry for the rant but I am so torn, worried & needing some reassurance I am doing the right thing & not taking the easy way out by running back to the hospital. 

[therising]

Hi Laurennn

I think major chemically induced shifts can require close 24 hour monitoring in certain cases. If the best place to do that is in hospital, then that sounds like the go to place. While you've been monitoring things at home, sussing out how your chemistry's behaving (with all the side effects), and it's just been too impossible to continue on with then that's another factor that may point to the need for close and strategic monitoring in hospital.

Inner dialogue can be such an absolute mongrel at times, that's for sure. While our harsh and brutal depressing inner critic may sound a little like 'You're pathetic, running off to take the easy way out. Most people would be able to cope better than this', I've found it pays to tap into the inner sage instead. The inner sage may lead us to consider 'Do you want sufferance or do you wish for ease? Do you not deserve full care and support?'. The sage in us can lead to helpful guidance and answers, as opposed to put downs served up by the critic in us.

I like to imagine specialists are looking into every possible reason for your sufferance through anxiety and depression. Inside the square and outside of it, there can be so many causes behind worsening anxiety and depression, dozens and dozens. While there can be pre-existing depressing and/or anxiety inducing issues, when new issues pile on top of those, it's a whole new ball game. For example, while there can be depressing and/or anxiety inducing side effects to mental challenges, b12, iron, thyroid issues or meds can impact chemistry that adds to the mental challenges. While inner dialogue that's reached peak intolerance levels can be making things worse, to add significant sleep disturbances to the mix (such as insomnia or sleep apnea) and this can lead to a complete inability to cope. From a more soulful perspective, while zero inspirational guidance can be managed for days or weeks, when it turns into months or years on end there can be a tipping point, to add to the overall challenge.  Dozens and dozens of questionable possibilities. I think sometimes it takes a team of specialists to diagnose a complex issue. A single specialist can kinda resemble hiring a single detective to solve a highly complex mystery which may actually require many perspectives, not just one.

I know it's hard to not beat yourself up over what kind of mum and partner you are but if there's one thing I've learned over the years, especially while raising myself through periods of depression, I have been a hard worker when it comes to my mental health. Mental health can take a heck of a lot of hard work to manage, as you know. You have got to give yourself credit for that. Who else do you know who has worked as hard as you have? If you are doing all this hard work not just for yourself but for your child and partner too, this makes you a loving worker (even if you can't necessarily feel the love when you're depressed). True love is not found in simple words, it is found in our actions. ❤️

[Laurennn]

Dear therising,

I appreciate you taking the time to respond to me. 

I think the longer you struggle, the harder it becomes to stay strong. I will try to be kinder on myself, the guilt, disappointment and negativity floods my mind without me even knowing.

[therising]

Hi Laurennn

Long term depression is definitely a different experience to episodic depression. I experienced long term depression from my late teens to 35. Some time after coming out of that, it's been episodic from then until now, at 53. I have a legitimate fear of returning to long term depression because of its nature. It's a horrible thing, the way it can wear a person down, on top of the sense of desperation it creates. With long term depression, the longer it goes on for the more convincing it is that 'This is just me. This is who I am. I am a sad person, an angry person, a hopeless person...' etc etc. It leads you to redefine yourself, as opposed to remembering 'This is not me. These are the traits of depression itself'.

If I could compare my time in long term depression to something, I imagine it like being some nasty little creature perched upon my shoulder, whispering unsweet nothings into my ear, day after day for years on end. It's like it had secured a long dark cloak from around my neck, with a whole stack of convincing words pinned to it and these are the words I came to wear, words such as 'hopeless', 'pathetic', 'angry', 'hard to live with' and so on. Dozens and dozens of words all defining me, weighing me down. I remember the very day I came out of long term depression, when that so called creature disappeared and the cloak fell to the ground. The strange this was I had no idea who I was without depression and its cloak. I suppose it was the day I came to realise I was separate from depression. While depression no longer defines me, it does challenge me and torment me when it comes, sometimes to the point of tears. The one thing I can never allow it to do is lead me to forget who I truly am. Easier said than done on occasion. Inner dialogue can be so convincing.