CRA-ZY

 

(And here I must insert a note to Microsoft- Dear Microsoft, Batshit is an actual word. It is not misspelled. Do not underline it in red for it makes me roll my eyes.)

 

So I'm not sure what to call this blog. But it involves apologies and lots of stuff about me being a bit batshit crazy. Actually, I'm not sure if it's possible to be a bit batshit crazy. On my crazy scale, batshit crazy is quite near the top.

 

1- Fun (for normal adults)

2- Fun (for college kids)

3- Wild (college kids on weekends)

4- Me when I'm mild-mannered and at work, or me when I'm half asleep, or me when I have the flu

5- Me when I'm normal but caffeinated (venti nonfat latte, no whip, with 2 shots of espresso and a heaping amount of guilt, thankyouverymuch)

6- Batshit crazy (but on the right meds)

7- Batshit crazy (no meds or other therapies)

8- Rehab crazy (like that singer whose name rhymes with Lamy Whinehouse, or possibly that guy from Christmas Vacation when he's running from the law, but I'm not naming real names here)

9- Psychotic but safe (you're crazy, but you don't hurt anyone)

10- Psychotic in a bad way (like some of the inmates in the prison where I worked, and probably in other prisons, too. Also, I think Hitler would be in this category. And the Unabomber. And a bunch of others that I can't be arsed to list out or I'd be typing all night.)

 

Guess where on the scale I've been hovering (or flitting, if you want to think of me as a crazy pixie person because of my sticky-up hair), between 6 and 7 for the past 6 months or so? Many of you (all of you except my mom, probably), won't remember the blog I wrote back in the dark ages of 2009 when I announced that I was going back on antidepressant meds right before Hubs deployed to Afghanistan. But, I did, at the end of August. And I was thrilled to think that soon I'd be back dwelling in the land of fairies and elves and Care Bears. Ha.

 

Not the same antidepressant I was on in college, but a close cousin. Like really close. Like Deliverance close (note- I have not just watched Deliverance to see if there was any incest, but I'm imagining there might have been a bit of incestuous subtext. If not, don't correct me. I'm happy in my crazy bubble just as I am). Just a slight molecular difference. But this one was available as a generic and college antidepressant was not, so I went cheap. And bloody hell, why not? Drugs are freaking expensive. I'm not crazy enough to pay exorbitant prices. Hellll-ooo-ohhhhh. (Effing red misspelling line. And one for effing, too. Good grief. I'd tell you to "suck it", Microsoft, if I didn't madly love OneNote. Best thing you've ever done.)

 

So here I am, in my crazy bubble, telling you about the pit of crazy that I've been hanging out in recently.    And no, Pit of Crazy is not the name of my housing development, although the HOA Nazis make it seem a bit like that sometimes. A friend of mine remarked that she felt like she was on the set of the Truman Show the first time she came to my house. I told her that's how I feel all the time. I've lived here for a year and I still turn onto the wrong side street thinking that I’m headed towards my house when really I’m just scaring random people who live 3 streets away from me. 

 

But that's another story for another time. Not really. That's all there is to it, so it's not even really a story. More of an anecdote. (And not a very good one. I doubt I'll ever be able to pull it out at parties to entertain people. Unless I embellish it a lot, which is also known as "lying" to some uncreative people.)

 

Anyway, it's been a really long time since my last blog, and that's not a good thing, because when I don't write, the words pile up in my head. Like lint in your dryer. And you know what happens when you don’t clean the lint out of your dryer after each load? It catches on fire and burns your whole house down. I'm not exactly certain now how this analogy applies to the words in my head since my head hasn't caught fire (yet- fingers crossed!), but it's important to remind people. So that's my PSA for today, lads. Stop reading now and go clean out the lint filter. I'll wait. You might also want to take a pee, because I get the feeling this is a rather long blog.

 

Back? Oh, good. I got bored waiting.

 

Ok, so I'm depressed. Which is strange, because I’m not sad or unhappy, which is sort of what I always thought depressed people were like (a la Eeyore- effing red line). Nope, I'm happy and mostly perky and have a good life. But depressed is really a broad term, and for me it means a bunch of things- weird sleeping habits, being out of control with random stuff, not taking super-good care of myself, major attention span issues, and probably some other stuff that I can't think of right now.

 

In short, it's like someone has taken 6-year-old me and put her inside nearly-27-year-old me and told her to run free and wild. Because if I was staying up all night and eating ice cream for dinner and going nuts at the mall with a credit card and playing with playdoh at work…well, that's kind of a 6-year-old's dream. Or at least it was for me when I was 6. I think. I wanted to be a fairy princess ballerina when I was 6, so it's in the same ballpark, you know?

 

I'm not bipolar (which I think is the term I'm supposed to use instead of "manic depressive" to be politically correct, but I'm not sure. If you know, feel free to correct me). It's more like my depression is manic. I don't have crazy swings between one or the other. I'm sort of both at the same time. It's rather tiring, really. And I do say this with a bit of artistic liberty (though I'm not an artist by any means). I haven't had anyone say to me "BTW, you are not bipolar, you're just crazy".

 

I do want to know for sure, so I think I might check out the psychiatrist listings for my insurance this week. And also make a dentist appointment. If I'm going to be crazy, and I am, then I will have sparkling teeth, dammit. Oh, and I think I have an oncology follow-up either this week or next, so I should probably put that on my work schedule. (I have such a busy social schedule, it's embarrassing.)

 

And I should note at this point that if you've never read any of my blogs, yes, I am always this random. Whether or not my brain chemicals are properly balanced or if I've had caffeine, I am stream-of-consciousness-ing all the flipping time. Faulkner at this moment is going "Wait. What? I thought we were talking about you being crazy. And now you're talking about dryer lint and ice cream and the dentist? Let me get a pen so I can take notes to try and keep up. Shit. No pens or paper in this coffin. Might I borrow a writing implement?". I'm not saying that I'm in any way talented like Faulkner, I’m just saying you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who can out-stream-of-consciousness me in a bar bet.

 

Because all bars have those kinds of bets going on all the time. They're the 21st-century version of arm wrestling. (Speaking of arm wrestling, you know that dream where you're in this Mediterranean garden , very secluded, and you're arm wrestling with Craig Ferguson and Eddie Izzard comes over tarted up in full transvestite wear, circa "Sexie", and he joins in? No? Oh. Me neither. I just made that up.)

 

Moving on. 

 

So, I did go mad with the credit card and eating foods that weren't good for me (on a regular basis, ice cream for breakfast is totally au fait every once in a great while), stopped meditating, and let myself go spiritually. Ugh. Slowly crawling back to the pseudo-normalcy that I think I'm supposed to be like, which really just means that I'm not being self-destructive. Which is a good thing.

 

For a while, I thought it was just Hubs being gone and busy work stuff and crazy holiday stuff that was making me feel shitty. I mean, it usually takes me 6-8 weeks to really feel better once I've started on an anti-depressant, so I thought it had just started working when the craziness of November really set in. And it was working. With no meds at all, I have these really awful self-loathing thoughts that creep into my normal interior monologue that really suck and I cry all the time. I haven't had any of that since early last fall, so that is much better.

 

But the exterior self-destructive stuff went really mad when I was finally used to living by myself. Post-holidays, it didn't really get better. So, I gave up and called the doctor last week and told him what was going on and asked if I should try a different dose or a different med or something different altogether. We're trying a higher dose. If it doesn't work, then I'm to "hie thee hence to a psychiatrist". Ok, so that's not actually what he said. It was more like "Hey, I'm just your OB-GYN, so you might want to consider someone whose expertise lies above your waist, like a psychiatrist, for instance."

 

I thought that would freak me out, but it didn't, and it doesn't. I'm not proud of the fact that my brain is so whacked out and unable to balance its own chemicals, but I'm not ashamed of it either. I mean, one of the reasons I'm on birth control pills is because my body doesn't really balance my estrogen and progesterone very well, and when I had cancer, my liver enzymes weren't balanced at ALL. My body loves all or none. Balance is not in its vocabulary, and I accept that now.

 

It's really hard to explain to people why being depressed keeps you from doing stuff that you enjoy doing, but that's what I'm trying (not very successfully, I don't think), to do. I don't write regularly when I'm depressed, although I have been keeping a little paper journal for Hubs while he's been gone, but that's different. That's more like letters that I would send him if they didn't take 6 weeks to get there.

 

I feel like I've accidentally become an adult but I don't actually belong here. Like I really am 6 and just happen to be tall enough to drive. I'm not sure if I'll ever earn my grown-up stripes, though I try, I really do. Or maybe I'm a grown-up but not a very responsible one. I'm quite glad I don't have a dog or kids. The fish and houseplants are rowdy enough for me, and I'm quite high maintenance, and when Hubs is home, the schedule is FULL. I mean, we are self-centered and pretty happy with it.

 

I'm just acting in the grown-up world, hoping no one will notice that I snuck in before I was ready, and faking it 'til I hope I make it. But I'm not a very good actress. Actually, that bit's a lie. I'm quite good at acting, no idea why. It's never really come into play in my life, except when I was Winnie-the-Pooh in kindergarten. Oh, and I was almost a nun in "The Sound of Music" in high school, but that was just singing in Latin. Any idiot can do that- it's phonetic, and it's a dead language so no one can correct your pronunciation, because no one knows what it's supposed to sound like. (So memorize a few Latin phrases and pull them out when you need to appear erudite and learned- that's "learned" with 2 syllables, which is naturally erudite.)

 

So, I've been on the higher dose for a bit over 2 weeks now. Had some insomnia at first, which always happens to me when my serotonin levels get screwed with, but that's calming down and I'm feeling better. I've cleaned the house and have been able to pay more attention at work for longer periods of time. I meditated today and actually remembered to floss my teeth.

 

It might not be perfect, but it's my life, and it's the only one I'm getting. I'm not sure yet if the higher dose of the same med is the best solution, but I'll make that call after a few more weeks. I can't promise that I'll blog all the time, but I'm going to try very hard to do it at least a few times a week.

 

Don't apologize to me, (I think it's inevitable for others to tell you they're sorry when they hear something about you that's not good, but it really doesn’t make sense- no one gave me depression just like no one gave me cancer, so no apologies please). Don't pity me. Don't fuss at me for not writing.

 

And don't feel like you have to comment if you don't know what to say. Or don't finish reading if it makes you uncomfortable. Of course, if you read that last sentence, you may as well finish reading since you've made it this far, even if you have developed a twitch in your left eye from staring at the computer screen too long.

 

Just accept that I wrote this blog, hate it or love it or indifferent about it. There will be more after it, but I don't know how soon after. I still love Skirt! and am happy that so many of my Skirt! buds are friends with me on facebook. (Seriously, Microsoft? A red squiggly line for "facebook"? Where have you been the last 4 years? It is a real word.)

 

I'm off to dance around to Lady Gaga and bake brownies and mop the kitchen. Cheers and happy Sunday, Skirt!land.

 

Sarah the Queen of Crazy Town, signing off.

 

ps- I'm not THAT crazy.  I really did write this on Sunday, but couldn't post it until today.  I do realize that it's Tuesday today, at least for a few more hours.