I recently started a new anti-depressant, switching from one I had been on for about two or so years. I have changed medications before and knew going in that it was possible the new medication wouldn’t work for me. After several weeks of waiting and seeing, my psychiatrist and i decided the new medication wasn’t working for me. So we’re going to try again with another new medication.
This new new medication will be the fifth one i’ve tried, not counting one that we tried as an adjunct to one of my previous medications. Objectively i understand that just because in haven’t found the right one doesn’t mean i will never find one that gives me some relief to my symptoms. But it is of course hard to stay hopeful when you’ve ticked another potential medication off the list. And it’s harder still when you have been dealing with depression for years and years. I have only really ever gotten to a “functioning but not feeling good” place. Which, yes is better than the “not functioning at all and in the depths of agonzing depair” place. But I haven’t had a lot of joy or contentment or much confidence or a healthy sense of self that i hear people who are not depressed can have a fair bit of the time.
And tapering from any anti-depressant has its own effect on your mood. It’s been a challenging and difficult few weeks, first with feeling no improvement in my mood (which has been really low for months) with the new medication, and then with tapering down from the dose i was at. Somehow, I have managed to keep working my full time job and although i have found some tasks more difficult right now (things i know i am capable of doing but that just seem harder) i know there’s been no dip in my work performance. So I guess that is something. I am grateful i am able to support myself - there was a time when i was not able to.
All that said, it’s just hard and i’m tired and not looking forward to dealing with new side effects of yet another new medication. And did i mention i am just really tired. It’s hard to really believe it’s possible that a new medication will help, even though objectively this is true. It could help. It may not but it could. Maybe it will lead to a diagonosis of treament resistent depression which may open the way to alternative therapies like TMS or ECT (where I live it becomes easier to access these treatments if you have tried several medications with little to no improvement). The only way to know for sure is to try, unfortunately. Keeping going is sometimes the hardest thing.
#Depression #MajorDepressiveDisorder #TreatmentresistantDepression #Anxiety #Selfcare #Medication
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