Part 3: When I Started Taking ... Candy

Ever since I started blogging about my experience with depression I knew the day would come that I would finally write about ... my candy.  To be honest, I'm excited to share this part of my tale, because this is the part of the story where things started to get better.  However, on the other hand there's some kind of inner propriety filter that keeps going off saying that writing a blog post about prescription medication is somewhat ... politically incorrect?  Is that the right word?  Whatever the word is, please understand I approach this topic respectfully, yet lightheartedly for those people who are like the prudish Kristen I used to be.

Anyways, I last left off saying I took a crumpled piece of paper out of the bottom of my purse after I hit absolute rock bottom.  Now why in the world did I put off filling that prescription for so long?  Why did I choose to ignore the help of a doctor and remain so miserable?  Truth be told, I thought I was better than taking pills.  I figured I was stronger and better than all of those people who take pills to feel happy.  Cause that's all they were right?  Happy pills.  And I, Kristen Gibb, was above relying on a pill to make me feel happy.

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There were other reasons too.  Whether you agree or not, mental illness has an incredible amount of stigma surrounding it.  Nobody wants to admit that their head isn't working right and that they need help fixing it.  Then on top of that, anti-depressants don't exactly have a good reputation either.  While growing up it seemed like the news was always full of stories of kids committing suicide because the anti-depressants they were on made them crazy.  Or stories of people trying desperately to ween themselves from these horribly addictive pills their doctors made them take for depression.  So on top of being arrogant, I was scared.  I didn't want to be ingesting something that could potentially drive me to suicide, result in a lifelong addiction, or be the reason that people were judging me behind my back.

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However, the time finally came that I swallowed my pride and decided to start swallowing some pills.  To be completely honest, when that time came I still felt like I could cure my depression all on my own, I just didn't have the patience for my own tactics to start working.  So I made the walk to the nearest pharmacy.  It probably looked something like this:

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Despite what everyone may think, anti-depressants aren't this magical pill that makes everything go back to normal immediately.  In fact, it takes close to 2 to 3 weeks for them to really start working and in a lot of cases, the first pill prescribed isn't the one that will do the trick, which means right back to square one.  I was lucky.  The first prescription was the right one for me and around three weeks later I started catching glimpses of the old person I used to be.  And even then, it wasn't instantaneous.  In retrospect, there wasn't really a definitive turning point where suddenly everything was back to normal.  Just as gradually as symptoms of depression began creeping in to my life, those same symptoms gradually disappeared.

Nowadays, I can recognize both the pros and cons in regards to taking anti-depressants.  However, the pros outweigh the cons a million to one.  In case you're curious, here are the biggest pros and cons:

Pros:

• Treatment of Depression.  Duh.  The anti-depressants made my mind a much clearer, more rational, and over all happier place to be.
• Elimination of negative body image.  Before taking anti-depressants, my mind was a continuous battlefield of negative thoughts in regards to my weight and image.  Nowadays, my mind is  surprisingly peaceful and happy with the body I have, which in return has made it easier to live a healthy lifestyle.  How so?  I no longer simply give up and binge on junk food, starve myself, or over exert myself through exercise.  Because the negative thoughts are gone, I have more energy to think positive things and enjoy a moderate amount of exercise and healthy portions of food.
• The sudden ability to really relax.  Before taking anti-depressants, I was literally unable to do nothing.  If I didn't have work or other responsibilities or homework, I would be cleaning or exercising or just anything.  I could NOT sit still.  I had to be productive, I had to make the most of my time.  If I wasn't doing something it meant I was worthless or, even worse, a failure.  It was the strangest feeling to realize one day that I had been sitting in one spot for quite sometime without the need to plan my next move or get up and do something.

Cons:

• I'm content with doing nothing.  Although the ability to relax is a pro, there are times that this new found aptitude has gotten frustrating.  You see, the constantly racing mind and need to be doing something made taking care of priorities really easy.  It kept me going and motivated to do the next thing at hand.  However, there have been days where my ability to be content with doing nothing has left me doing exactly that for long periods of time: nothing.
• Money.  Obviously pills cost money.  I can think of a lot of other things that I'd rather be buying than a bottle of pills.  Fortunately I have a student health care plan.  It helps.  I don't have much else to say for this, it pretty well speaks for itself.

Will I ever go off of my anti-depressants?  Yup.  That has always been the plan.  When they were first prescribed to me the doctor said I should be on them for at least one year.  That year will be up next month.  However, by no means do I intend to get off them as quickly as possible and I have absolutely no problem with the possibility of having to go back on them.  To be completely honest, my candy has changed my life for the better.  Although two things as simple as having a positive body image and the ability to relax seem pretty small, they've made a huge impact on the overall happiness of my life.  Who knew that I had to get depression and start taking anti-depressants to defeat the longest battle of my life?  I'm a happier person than I have ever been.  And I seriously mean that when I say it.  Who knew that something I would oppose so violently would actually bring the most peace and happiness to my life?

And again, before I close, the disclaimer.  Candy is probably a really bad name for something as serious as anti-depressants.  In all honesty, I call it this mostly because I was ashamed to call it medicine or pills when I first started them.  It's like a code word between Jon and I.  Now I call it candy as a joke, or in an attempt to be funny.  Please don't consider this post an endorsement for anti-depressants.  By no means would I ever encourage someone to start taking anti-depressants.  That is between you and your doctor.  And lastly, although my anti-depressants have been beneficial in areas other than simply treating depression, I wouldn't encourage someone to go on anti-depressants as a cure for a negative self image.  Again, that's between you and your doctor.