So I met with the doctor to plead my case. And she listened. So as of now, I am back on the medication that I was on when released from the hospital which seemed to be helping me to stabilize. After just 3 days I am feeling much better. For that I am truly grateful. But the utter and complete irony is that I am now on the same medication and dosage that I was on for the past 10 or so years. Go figure!
I think one of my problems right now is that I am trying to make sense of all this. The only way to actually make sense of this is to see this whole experience through the eyes of God and that is impossible at this point and in this life. So that leaves the only other means of healthily viewing these events and that is through the eyes of faith.
When I am confronted with a situation in which rhyme and reason have taken a vacation and my feeble mind cannot conceive a bit of logic, I turn to the life of Christ for perspective. Jesus, as we know, embraced his suffering willingly but not without first reading the fine print for an escape clause. “Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.” But the contract was iron clad and Jesus upheld his obligation by honoring the will of the Father. He knew, though he preferred to avoid it, that his suffering and death had meaning. That beyond his agony, torture, humiliation, suffering and death lay salvation for his children and the triumph of life over death. There was a purpose. Rhyme and reason had simply slipped into the shadows for a time but were ever present.
I can’t make complete sense of suffering and evil…mine or anyone else’s. But I have always felt that the life of Christ was intended as a template for our lives. Did his suffering and death make sense at the time? To his followers and friends…absolutely not. To Jesus? Yes. But he had the benefit of a God-view of things. That did not make his passion less terrible but he knew that there was infinite good to be realized from his acceptance and surrender. And that is what we have to go on. That there is good to be realized from our suffering. We cannot see it because we are saddled with a creature-view of things and not a Creator-view. But the Lord has told us that we should take up our cross and follow him. And where did he go? To Calvary, to the grave and then to eternal glory.
If we were able to Google Map our lives and type in “Heaven” as the destination I think that we would be unnerved to see that the route outlined would, at some point lead through the “Valley of Death.” But the operative word here is “through.” The road does not end there but after numerous annoying traffic jams, collisions, breakdowns and repairs we will reach the promised land. It can be an ugly commute but St. Paul tells us that it cannot be compared with the glory that awaits us. Hopefully, that is reason enough to hang on until the ride is over.
And the saga continues…
First I called the pharmacist to ask what recourse I had to access the brand name Effexor. He told me that if I presented a written prescription from my doctor indicating the brand name must be used. They would then override the previous prescription and give me the the “good stuff.” He said they would handle with my insurance company. That was a positive first step.
I then called my psychiatrist. It is the second time I’ve called with an issue and I’ve only seen her twice. She must be thrilled to have taken me on as a patient! But I must give credit where credit is due. Both times that I’ve called I have had to leave a recorded message. Both times I received a call back from the doctor’s assistant within the hour. I told her about the problems with the generic Effexor. I also told her that I was very concerned about the effect that the Lamictal was having on me. Frankly, within days of beginning this medication I began to feel worse instead of better. Now I am feeling much worse. I told the doctor’s assistant this and she consulted with the doctor and she agreed to provide the prescription for the brand name Effexor. She also moved my appointment up a week and told me not to increase my dose of Lamictal.
So I will meet with the doctor on Monday afternoon to again plead my case. For whatever reason, I seem to be super sensitive to these medications. I just want to keep doing what I was doing. I have only been out of the hospital for a bit over 6 weeks and I just want to get stabilized before we start moving things around. I don’t think that is too much to ask.
I can’t believe that I am dealing with all of this at this point in my life. These are the kinds of crises that you have when you are young and confused. I am supposed to be taking care of my family’s problems not becoming one for them. I figure that if my brain chemistry was going to get all out of whack that it would already be out of whack.
I am still struggling with prayer. It is as if the “God monitor” in my soul has been switched off. I have zero spiritual energy right now. That is not what I want at all but that is the way it is. Guess that I just have to be patient and await the re-energization.
I know that this is starting to sound like a pharmaceutical forum but for better or worse, my life has turned into a pharmaceutical fog.
I still am having some “challenges” with the Lamictal. It makes me feel very strange. I feel spaced out and kind of loopy. I have headaches and I usually do not get headaches. I have powerful hunger pangs after eating but I have absolutely no appetite! How bizarre is that?
To make matters worse, on Monday I picked up a new prescription for Effexor. This was the medication that I begged my shrink to leave me on and she agreed. When I opened the prescription yesterday morning I saw that the pharmacy had given me the generic version of Effexor which just came on the market. I take generic versions of other medications without incident so I didn’t think much about it. About 6 hours later I was sitting in my office and the room started spinning. That was just one of the many side effects that began manifesting through the day. This morning I felt so bad that I did not go to work. This was mostly due to the way I felt physically but there was also a component of depression there also; a sense of not being able to face the day. Right now, these medications are knocking the crap out of me.
There is a great deal that I have not said about the nature and circumstances of my hospitalizations. Just acknowledging that I was hospitalized twice within one month is difficult. But the circumstances around each stay were very different. The first was ultimately precipitated by desperate and dangerous attempts at self medication. But “desperate” is the operative word here. I was on a downward spiral for a long time and then I accelerated my own decent and crashed.
The second stay was very different. It was precipitated by the medication that I was put on during the first stay. It is astonishing to me that a medication developed to provide healing to the human mind has the ability to affect the very thoughts that we think. I have found it has shaken (but not broken) my faith to the core to know that there is a fine line between healthy thinking and destructive thinking and that we can be shoved across that line without any control over it at all. A chemical can affect your very thoughts. The same thoughts that we learn with, love with and pray with. A doctor said to me during the second stay, “we can’t control what we think but we can control what we do.” That is a sobering and challenging thing to wrap your head around.
I know that the response to this will be to speak up and say what’s on my mind. Just tell the doctor what I want. But I’m not sure what I want. I’m not sure what I need. I’m not a doctor. Perhaps I should just be patient and ride this thing out. Maybe I bail too early. And I am painfully non-confrontational, even when my overall well being and health are at stake.And maybe it will soon be time to say “enough.” Just let me be on the brand name Effexor and the Neurontin and let it be.
I have to get up and go to work tomorrow morning. It is critical that I do that for many reasons. But I am utterly perplexed about what I should do about the medications.
Today I stopped in the chapel while the nuns said the rosary. I have been having difficulty focusing and saying the rosary so it was good to have the nuns leading the way. I prayed for patience, healing and surrender. At the same time the Serenity Prayer came to mind as the most appropriate plea in my case.
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The Courage to change the things I can,
And the Wisdom to know the difference.
Well, my appointment with the doctor was a “good news” and “not so bad news” sort of thing. She did agree to leave me on the Effexor for now which was a great relief. Frankly, I wasn’t going to get off it no matter what she said but is nice she cooperated. She still wants me on the Lamictal which has been a bumpy ride so far. I am taking it slower than she wanted but I agreed to hang in for a bit even though it is making me feel uncomfortable. I do know that sometimes with these medications it is a matter of getting over the hump before good things happen But I will have this medication on a short leash.
Still just praying for the right combo!
I think that it is time to start blogging again. Not because I want to but because I need to. Just the thought of thinking through things and then having to type them out is tiring. But I can’t continue to have feelings and thoughts bouncing around in my head without a proper vehicle through which to express them.
I left the hospital on July 1 so I have been back in the real world for about 6 weeks. To say the least, it has been challenging. But by the grace of God I have been making it through each day.
I like to present the bad with the good and the good with the bad. The good is that during the last couple of weeks I, and others, began to notice a significant improvement in my mood and activities. I was getting into work a little earlier each day and getting more accomplished. Last weekend was the best, and most productive, weekend that I had in months. On both Saturday and Sunday I actually jogged a couple miles! It felt wonderful. I worked in the yard, watched a couple of movies and did other things that were not complex but that I have found difficult nonetheless.
On August 3, I had an appointment and assessment with a new psychiatrist. I was impressed with her and her thoroughness and her insights. To my surprise, she wanted to take an entirely new approach to my medication. She wanted to discontinue the meds I was on and start me on something called Lamictal. I had heard about Lamictal and the things that I heard were good so I didn’t think too much about it. Actually was a bit excited at the prospect of being on a medication without the side effects and other baggage of Effexor, the medication that I was on for 10 years and which they had put me back on in the hospital.
Reality struck this week as I began to experience a whole passel of things that I knew were being caused by the Lamictal. Headaches, sadness, anxiety, physical tension, irritability, difficulty concentrating, depression, nausea, etc. Each day of the week was worse and I called the doctor on Thursday. She said that it was “anxiety” and it should be expected. I know anxiety when I feel it and this wasn’t anxiety. It was ugly side effects from the Lamictal.
It isn’t getting on the new medication that scares me. It is getting off the Effexor at the same time. Frankly, that seems downright reckless to me. For the first time in almost 9 months I have felt like things were going in the right direction and as soon as I meet with this new doctor she wants to wipe the slate clean and start all over again. Why? What is the problem with staying where we are until things stabilize for a reasonable amount of time? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! I am not a fan of Effexor but things were getting better and after what I have been through in the last couple of months I don’t care about annoying side effects if the medication is keeping me together and helping me get back on my feet.
Tonight at Mass I prayed for the grace to communicate this properly to the doctor at my next appointment on Monday. I also asked that the Spirit would direct the doctor to be open about my concerns and understanding about my fears. Honestly, I am not just afraid, I am terrified. I even set up an appointment with my family doctor for this week as a fallback just in case the psychiatrist does not want to cooperate. I need someone in the medical profession to listen to me and believe that I know my own body and what it is saying to me.
I have always had a special feeling about the feast of the Assumption. I think that it may stand out because it is the only holy day of obligation that falls in the summer. It was the one holy day that fell outside of the school year and we would have to go to Mass even if we were on vacation. Being in August, it was the “hottest” of the holy days. But now, I see it as the celebration that the Church intends it to be. Mary, the most blessed of women, assumed body and soul into Heaven, never to experience the physical corruption of death. It is appropriate that the ark of the New Covenant be given her proper place at the right hand of her Son where she advocates for us who are still mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.
It is hard for me to believe that I am sitting here typing this post. I have just returned from two consecutive hospital stays. One was for 6 days in a facility in Delaware and one was at a local hospital here in PA. I won’t even attempt to get into much detail about the “whys” because the circumstances that have led to this are so terribly complicated and confusing. Suffice it to say that I ended up worn down to the weakest and most vulnerable state you can imagine. Add to that some very destructive (unintentionally) attempts to find relief and you end up with a shell of a man in a truly ugly and horrifying place.
I don’t know how we are going to recover from this but I have been left with the knowledge that there are many people that truly love me and care about me. They can’t fix or change anything but that knowledge is one of the things that I can hold onto. I am trying to believe that their love reflects the love that Jesus and his Blessed Mother have for me. That is all I have to hold onto.
I am truly struggling with the fact that this descent into darkness began as I approached the completion of my consecration to Mary in the beginning of February. It has been truly downhill since then and the rate and extent of my deterioration was astonishing. I have had the thought many times that as I approached and completed the consecration to Mary I grabbed the attention of the devil himself. I know that sounds grandiose and dramatic but if you could only know the darkness that has recently enveloped me you would be hard-pressed to attribute it to anyone or anything less than Satan himself. I feel like I outraged him by the consecration and he came after me. This may be a complete exaggeration but that’s how it feels.
It will be a long road back. My family has been truly beat up by this. My relationship with my business partners is quite shaky based on my prolonged absence and my inability to keep pace the past few months because I was so ill and drained.
Your thoughts and prayers are appreciated. My daily rosary has evaporated into an exhausting effort to complete an Our Father and a Hail Mary. But I do manage to get in a prayer of consecration to the Immaculate Heart each day. It may be just words but they are all I have. I hope that over time the words will reconnect themselves more directly to my heart.
I have had many inspiring and beautiful moments interspersed with the nasty, ugly moments that seem to dominate my life right now. I will try and hold onto them and hope that the light of Christ that is veiled somehow within those beautiful moments will find their way out of darkness and become the light of new life and a new day.
My dearest friends,
I have had a breakdown and just returned from week in hospital. Living on a minute by minute basis. Many extraordinary problems. Sincerely, no exaggeration.
As we all must, I am sharing the passion of Christ. The order of my passion, though, is slightly different. I have been on my God-assigned cross crying to my Father, “my God, my God! Why have you abandoned me.” I will now be entering my God-assigned garden to plead, “Father, if it be thy will, please remove this cup from me.” My prayer is for the God-delivered grace for the faith to resign to, and accept, the will of the Father. My hope is for the God-promised resurrection to new life, in whatever form He wills.
Sorry for the dramatics. Very close to despair and in much, much pain.
With love and gratitude.
There is much to be said but now is not the time to say it for many different reasons. However, I feel truly obligated to at least say I am here. I want/need to say many things when I am able.
What I had been led to believe would be some sort of intensive evaluation of my situation and some insightful and proactive recommendations turned out to be a total bust. It was nothing more than a glorified doctor’s appointment. I filled out a lot of forms, was interviewed by a young intern for 15 minutes, then ushered in to see the Doctor who proceeded to read me a list of anti-depressants like they were menu options. I won’t even go into the rest of the dialogue because it was such a farce. I may as well have been at WalMart and taken to the anti-depressant section and told to “take your pick.”
I am so frustrated and disappointed I can’t even write anymore .
Dear Lord Jesus and Blessed Mother Mary, please lead me to a person, place or thing that can provide a solution to this mess. I am at the end of my rope.
Tomorrow morning I begin whatever sort of program I’m beginning. I’m really not sure what I’ve got myself into but it is not without a little trepidation and some fear that I start this.
I need to get better. These last few days have demonstrated what I difficult state I am in. I have become a poster-boy of bad behaviors for those like me that are trying to hold things together with whatever “resources” are available. All I can say is that tomorrow I will come clean to whatever degree I have to in order to give the people I will be working with whatever they need to help me.
I truly don’t know what to expect and I am placing all in the hands of the Blessed Mother to bring things where they need to be. I am trusting that good, bad or ugly all is exposed that needs to be exposed in order to get myself back on track.
I missed Mass yesterday simply because I did not have the mental or emotional energy to attend. That is a first for me. I have prayed for forgiveness because I feel like I just “bailed out” rather than have a really good excuse.
This has been very difficult on my family. My anxiety and depression is causing others to become anxious also. It basically paralyzed my household over the weekend. We did manage to get a few seasonal things done and I guess anything is an accomplishment.
I am afraid. I feel so far from being “better” that I am having a difficult time seeing the road back. But I pray as a consecrated son of Mary, that she will provide the grace I need to do the things that I, by myself, am incapable of doing. I absolutely cannot do this myself. I will need the intercession of the grace from prayers of others in heaven and on earth on order to be healed.
I don’t want to sound overly-dramatic, but if you had lived in my head over the past two weeks you would have similar concerns. I don’t just want to get better, I need to get better.
So Mary, Queen of Heaven and Earth, hear the prayers of your consecrated son. Help me to do and say all that is necessary for the staff of this facility to do their job and help restore me to health. Please pray to the Sacred Heart of Jesus for the necessary healing of mind, body and spirit to return the mess that I am now to some degree of normalcy.
I also pray, and ask prayers for, my friend John and his devoted lady friend of 40 years, Josie. Josie died on Saturday from complications of diabetes. John and she have led separate, celibate lives but about as close as a married couple could be without being married. The loss of Josie is devastating to John and, as an 80 year old man who has lost his companion and soul mate, I know it will be extraordinarily difficult. I always refer to John as “my friend in the rosary” and I ask any other ‘friends in the rosary” to include both John and Josie in your prayers.
Josie has earned her “mansion.” John is left, for now, in his apartment to try and live a live that does not include Josie. He truly is a man with a broken heart.
God bless you all and thank you.
