It hasn’t been difficult to write in this blog, to this point. It hasn’t been hard to be honest about my ambivalence, where medications are concerned, or about things I get frustrated with myself about when it comes to my own health. It hasn’t been difficult to write about what’s going OK and what’s not going so OK, where getting off medications is concerned. But this post, for some reason, is hard.
For the past three days I have felt very out of tune. On one hand I crave the drugs my body has gotten used to; the total sedation at bed time, particularly, and I am scared to death of life without drugs. On the other hand I crave a body that doesn’t crave drugs, and I am scared to death of wasting my life on unwanted side effects and the mercy of medical strangers.
I took two Unisom before I went to bed last night, and that’s it. No other sleeping aid. And it worked! I slept fine (aside from getting up at 6am to let the dog out and again at 8am to feed the cats…). But I still feel lousy, today. I am constipated, and yet my stomach is upset. I have a funny taste in my mouth. My allergies and asthma aren’t as bad as they were before I changed medications and yet I am, ironically, more worried about them.
I am out of sorts.
PMS? Probably. A side-effect of the Unisom? Possibly. And I am taking more than just Unisom, every day – I’m still using my Albuterol inhaler a few times a day, and I took a Zyrtec yesterday for daytime allergies. And my Protonix, of course.
I am in this weird place in my life where I feel so proud to have stopped taking the Lamictal, Trazedone, Seroquel, Neurontin; so proud not to have dipped in to the actual sleeping pills my ex-p-doc prescribed (I can’t remember which one it is, but the pharmacy sent me another bottle out of the blue, yesterday), and so proud not to have taken another pain pill. I feel proud to have stopped putting these drugs in my body. And then I suddenly realize that I’m still putting drugs in my body every day anyway – they’re just different drugs. Unisom, Zyrtec, Albuterol, Advil. And I don’t feel good. And I’m craving the drugs I’m not taking. I am in this weird place in my life where I feel so proud to have moved forward, except that I’m doing so by walking in ever larger circles.
And I am so out of shape that it’s making working on the kitchen cabinets quite depressing. David scraped all of the old paint off the upper cabinets, yesterday afternoon, which surprised me. I’d scraped and scraped and scraped at the darn stuff and wasn’t making a dent and then here comes David behind me and in 30 minutes he’s ripped it all off. My lack of upper body strength is making things like sanding very challenging, but the only way to get stronger is to keep after it. It isn’t fun, my friends, and I think it should be. Making your kitchen look prettier should be fun.
And man oh man was I dizzy yesterday — but only when I was at Lowe’s. I went by myself yesterday morning to get some sandpaper, and again with David yesterday afternoon. As I walked the aisles during the course of my second trip I had a kind of a flashback to childhood when I realized that I am suddenly able to smell things in the air that I haven’t smelled in years — and I think that’s what was making me dizzy. Isn’t that crazy? It was like – “Holy cow, fresh cut wood and chemicals and solvents and plastic… if I don’t get out of here soon I’m just going to pass out.” I’m at Lowe’s every weekend. It isn’t like I haven’t been breathing this stuff in the whole time. Why would suddenly being able to smell it make me dizzy?
It’s all confusing and depressing. Being dizzy is no fun at all, but I’m still on so many other medications that I don’t think it would be worth it to go to a doctor about it. Not until more time has passed; more time, fewer drugs.
I’m so close to having a system that’s free and clear of things that have side effects. So close I can almost see it. I can almost remember what it used to be like to not take anything for most days of the year, and then notice the side effects of taking anything when I did. I can almost remember the wonder of falling asleep in a natural state and waking up after a good night’s sleep. I can almost remember knowing my own body’s rhythms.
I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, I’ve been able to see it for several weeks now. So come on already, tunnel. End.
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