Depression gets a foot hold.

As you can see from the date, its not the New Year!  The first of the new year I crashed, mentally and physically.  The last part of 2110 I gained 25 pounds very fast as the depression set in.  This in addition to the 50 lbs I was all ready carrying.  The first couple of weeks of this year were just plain hard.  I never got to the place I wanted to die, but I didn't want to go on.  I could sleep at the drop of a hat.  I would not leave the house for anything but church. There would be days that I still had my pajamas on when Charlie came home from work.  I didn't find it necessary to shower or brush my teeth.  I sit in the recliner and watch TV and napped all day. I didn't care.  I didn't have the desire to do things that I used to fine JOY in.  I had abandoned painting and drawing when I moved, even though I had an artist studio I had never had before.  I had two new puppies that should have made me happy, but my joy seemed buried so deep that I couldn't smile.

One morning I broke. I still don't understand how, it must have been God.  I turned to my husband and started to spill how bad I felt and how low I was.  He was concerned but there was nothing he could do to help.  I was at the bottom of the pit and the sides were caving in on me little by little.  If I didn't find a way out I would be lost. 

I had been taking a well know anti depressant for some time but I knew it was not working.  The Nurse practitioner at my Doctors office knew I felt this way last fall and had given me a prescription for Zantac to take when I felt more down than usual. She had blood work drawn for a complete work up. The Zantac was not working and it seemed to make me worse, so I had stopped taking it.  I knew I needed to see a Doctor but not my normal practitioner.  I got out the yellow pages and looked up Pyschiatrist.  First I looked into my area, then at the names.  I picked one based on how unusual her name sounded last name first.  I called and got an appointment for that same week.  I think I let the receptionist know I was in trouble when I called.  That day was a blur.  I busied myself gathering information until the appointment.  I listed all my drugs and ailments, and major occurances (mother, dogs death, move etc) on a notepad so I wouldn't forget.

Once again God was walking with me all the time.  I was just so low I could not realize it.  When I got to Shannon Little's office I was almost excited.  Things were going to change.  I spent an hour with her, she gathered all my info and ask some deep and probing questions. She requested the results from the blood work done last fall and made a follow up appointment for me to see her.  She wrote a prescription to up my Lexapro from 20 mg to 30 mg. She also told me to STOP taking the Zantac.  It would bring me up and drop me as it wore off, leaving me more depressed and down.  She suggested a Therapist Julie Vero.  She went ahead and made an appointment for me for the following week.

So the work began.  Hard, hard work.  Don't miss understand.  Even with drugs and therapy depression does not change overnight.  Not even in a month.