Colors and Spirals

If you haven’t caught any of my previous posts, I struggle often with my mental health. It’s something I know is a part of me, but it isn’t the whole me.

I’ve been denying it lately, but I’m not doing well at all. I thought a few years ago that I didn’t need medication and that I could control this with exercise and just working to stay positive. Also, I didn’t really connect with my therapist so I stopped doing that too.

I know it was foolish, but I never said I was a rational thinker. For some reason I view taking medicine as being weak and not being able to handle my own self. Which doesn’t make sense. If I have a headache…I take something. When I’m physically ill, I take something. Why can’t I do the same when I’m mentally ill?

How can I describe why I don’t want to take medicine? It’s basically this. My mind operates on an all-or-nothing system. Emotions go from 0-100 with no warning. They just come on and I don’t have enough time to process why. Ok…so that’s a good reason to medicate..right? Well, it’s not that simple. The emotions I feel are so saturated. My highs are amazing and my lows are devastating. Imagine you saw the color red (happy). I also see red, but my version is the most beautiful, vivid, amazing color of red that has ever been discovered. On the downside though, the blue (sadness, despair) that I see is the darkest, most dreadful blue you have ever seen. It can be downright scary at times. Medication helps me slow down the development of my emotion so I can recognize what’s happening before it becomes full blown, and medication also helps to not make the feelings so intense.

Again, great reasons to take medication. The hard part is that I lose some of that red along with the blue. The thing I’m trying to remind myself is that it is a compromise that I should be willing to take. The blue is killing me.

I’ve had a few events happen over the last year that have triggered me. I didn’t realize it at the time, but every time an event like this would happen, I would regress further down. Granted I would bounce back, but not quite the same as before. I was being overwhelmed with the blue.

I was bruised and I didn’t even know it. It was one of those deep bruises you don’t see until something pokes it and you’re like….oh, there it is.

I got hit with a big one this past weekend. I wasn’t able to bounce back. I crumbled hard. I couldn’t eat and I couldn’t sleep and I was about to do something drastic. The blue had me in such a grip that I was not going to get out of it, without help.

Because I knew this was happening, I reached out to my support system. I knew that saying the things on my mind, it would not scare them, but rather bring them into action. I called my doctor and got put immediately back on medication. By Wednesday I had an appointment with a new therapist and I’m back on a system again. My wife told me that the last time it was this bad I had made my plans and I was making my messages of goodbye. This time I made my plans (I’m a planner…sorry), but I was reaching out and saying “I don’t want this…I just don’t want to feel this way anymore.” That’s definitely progress. My new therapist said that progress is not like a ladder where you take steps forward and backward. Rather it is a spiral stair case. You may come back to the same trigger again, but you’re higher and stronger than you were before and you can handle the hard better.

So…at this moment, I’m not better. I’m not worse. I’m just here…and that’s ok. Still trying to spiral up.