Finding HopeSide Effect City
Posted on November 1, 2017
Just over a month ago, I started taking Venlafaxine for my depression. I’ve tried lots of different anti depressants in the past, many of which I had a bad reaction to, so I was nervous. Weaning myself off the Phenelzine was hard and I was very, very depressed but somehow, I reached a point where I felt ready to feel different. It was a bit like breaking the surface after being underwater. I was, and still am, desperate to feel better.
Week 1
I started on a very low dose, half the lowest therapeutic dose, so that my body could get used to it. But despite that, I felt the effects straight away and incredibly strongly. I was very nauseous. It was so bad that I couldn’t really concentrate on anything else; all my concentration was focussed on not throwing up. It made me dizzy and I was tired all the time. I did check with my psychiatrist to make sure it was okay to keep going with it and he said it would pass so I focussed on tolerating it.
The other immediate change was my sleep. I went from struggling to wake up before eleven (and I mean really struggling: it felt like I was drowning) to being wide awake at eight o’clock in the morning. It was bizarre.
Week 2
The nausea faded around the beginning of the second week, which I was very grateful for. My mood, while still pretty low, was stable, and I was still waking up much earlier than I had been able to previously. However I started having headaches and I was exhausted all the time, which made it very hard to do anything.
Week 3
In the third week, I went up to the lowest therapeutic dose. This caused a pretty dramatic reaction. For the first few days I was so tired that I fell asleep in the middle of the day, something I haven’t done in years. But despite that, I was waking up even earlier, between six and six thirty am.
By the middle of the week, I couldn’t concentrate at all. I couldn’t hold a conversation, I couldn’t follow the storyline of a forty-minute TV episode, I couldn’t even play a game on my phone… That was scary, but I couldn’t even really feel that because I couldn’t seem to process the emotion. I started to feel faint and very shaky and that went on for several days. If I stood up for longer than a couple of minutes, my legs started to shake and my hands shook so badly that I couldn’t hold a pen. That was very unpleasant.
Week 4
Most of the fourth week was lost because of severe, unexplained leg pain that had me in tears. My psychiatrist didn’t think it had anything to do with the medication and DVT was ruled out but other than that, we don’t know what caused it. I’ve been taking painkillers since and it’s been better. So that tired me out and overwhelmed everything else. But since then, the shaking has mostly stopped and I’m back to waking up between eight and nine in the morning.
This week is the first where I’ve felt different mentally and emotionally while taking Venlafaxine. I wouldn’t say I feel better but I’ve been feeling a bit lighter. That feels very strange and a bit scary. With this new lightness, I’ve been feeling a bit lost which I’ve written about here. I’ve been so depressed for so long that I can’t remember what it’s like to not be depressed. But despite all of those confusing emotions, I am pleased that this medication is starting to work. It will probably take another month or so to really know how it’s affecting me but it’s looking positive and I’m really grateful for that.
The Big White Room
Posted on October 21, 2017
Since taking the Venlafaxine, I’ve felt different. I’ve felt a little bit lighter, mentally and emotionally. In some ways this is better but in some ways it’s not. Depression is such a heavy feeling but now I feel a bit like I’m floating away. I feel kind of lost, or like I’ve lost something really important. In a weird way, I miss feeling depressed. No, that’s not right. I don’t miss it, but I feel kind of lost without it. And feeling like that makes me very anxious.
Objectively I understand why I feel this way: I’ve spent a lot of time feeling depressed. It’s familiar. It’s certain. It’s a world where everything is in focus with clear and sharp edges. Now the edges are fuzzy. I feel like I don’t know who I am or what I’m doing. And emotionally, I’m finding that really hard to get my head around.
I know who I am when I’m depressed. Those emotions overwhelm me, they define me. Depression takes over my personality, or becomes the biggest part of it. It affects everything. It’s like depression takes up all that space. But now, there’s suddenly all this space that wasn’t there before. It feels a bit like when you stand in the middle of a really massive empty room. It’s quiet. It’s cold. It makes you feel so small and lonely. And if I look at myself in that big white room, I don’t know who I am. I don’t know if I’m optimistic or pessimistic. I don’t know if I’m a good person or a bad person. I don’t know if I’m loud or quiet. I know some little things but not the big things.
I do recognise the opportunity here, the opportunity for things to be different: to fill the room with new things. That thought is both thrilling and terrifying. But I’m not sure I’m there yet: I’m still pretty overwhelmed by how big this room is, how empty it is. I don’t know where to start.
I’ve thought a lot about identity, both mine and in general. It’s something I’ve struggled with for a long time and something I want to write more about. But I think your identity is made up of the things about you that don’t change, the fundamental aspects of your personality. I don’t know much about myself but I do know that I’m very sensitive. I’ve always been sensitive and I can’t see it ever changing. So I guess that’s a part of my identity.
I’m not sure my depression is gone but I’m not drowning in it anymore. And that’s scary. I’m so used to it that I’m not sure who I am without it. When I’m depressed, that big white room is so dark that I don’t know that all that space is there, so I don’t even know the room is that big. But now I know it’s there and it’s very compelling. I keep turning it over in my mind. As I said, I know who I am when I’m depressed. I want to know who I am when I’m not. So I guess that starts now. It’s a brave new world.
Coming Off Phenelzine
Posted on September 27, 2017
Just over a month ago, I decided to change medications. It was a long time coming but I eventually managed to speak to my psychiatrist and we came up with a plan. The first step was weaning myself off the Phenelzine and the second was going drug free for at least a couple of weeks to make sure it was out of my system before trying the new medication. I kept notes to track any patterns in mood and since I couldn’t find many accounts of coming off Phenelzine when I searched online, I thought I’d write about my experience. As always, this is only my experience, which will be specific to the dosage I took and the duration for which I took it.
Week 1
I was already on half of the prescribed dose so, to start the weaning off process, I went down to a quarter of the prescribed dose. Very quickly I felt very irritable, snapping at people over things that normally wouldn’t bother me. I was also overly emotional and ended up in tears a lot, sometimes multiple times a day.
Week 2
In the second week, I stopped taking the Phenelzine altogether. My anxiety skyrocketed and remained really high, higher than it’s been in a long time. My mood was also very fragile, so even small things made me very upset and depressed.
Week 3
In week three (the second week without any medication), I felt completely exhausted; some days, I was so tired that I could barely get out of bed. I was very depressed and felt blank, empty, completely disconnected. It was like everything just bounced off me. I’ve gone through periods of feeling like this before so, even though it isn’t pleasant, it wasn’t unfamiliar.
Week 4
Although I’d already been off the Phenelzine for two weeks, I decided to wait a little bit longer before trying the new drug. It was two weeks minimum and I’ve always been very sensitive to medication so I wanted to make sure it was completely out of my system before starting the next one. I didn’t want any chance of an overlap distorting that experience; I didn’t want to risk writing off something that could help over something as small as a few more days. For that last week, I was just really tired. My mood seemed to stabilise a bit and everything just felt less turbulent. It was that settling of my mood that made it easier to think more clearly and I felt ready to try the new medication.
It’s worth pointing out that my mood has been consistently low throughout all of this. I’ve had a couple of days where I felt a little bit lighter but on the whole, I’ve been feeling very depressed, hence the change in medications.
And now I’m onto the next stage: trying the new medication. I’m nervous but I’m really ready not to feel like this anymore.
Finding Hope 