Stuck in the Mud

So that's what I am. The euphoria passed and things are not a whole lot better than they were before I started, at least at this moment. I can tell you about symptoms and serotonin uptake etc, etc, but I still don't understand my condition. I feel dangerously close to the edge of self-pity talking about this, I don't want to descend to the level of "poor me". But one of my greatest dilemmas is figuring out where my flaw ends and my fault begins. It is so easy for anxiety and depression to put a person in a place where even trying to improve seems an insurmountable obstacle. When is that legitimate and when is it 'sitting in the shit and complaining about the smell'? I don't know, I really don't. It's been ten years or so since my diagnosis, and aside from being able to keep a job I'm not sure I really want I don't know that I am any healthier.

My psychiatrist just increased my dosage. I am now at 60 mg once daily. I started this process at 10 mg. The curve is alarming. 5mg/year or thereabouts. Hmmm... there goes my sex life. Those riding the Prozac bus know of what I speak. Combine that with incipient middle age and I am lucky when I get my rocks off at all. Where is it headed? Am I looking at climbing up the dosage ladder step by plodding step until I reach the maximum dosage, then, when I still have problems, switch to Wellbutrin or Paxil or the flavor of the month and start at the bottom again? Will I ever really reach a place where I consistently feel better? Am I expecting too much? If I am supposed to haul myself out of the hole on my own, then (not to mix metaphors or anything) I feel like I brought a knife to a gunfight. Again, I return to the question of whether or not these thoughts are condition or behavior. If the latter then anyone reading this is entitled to point and laugh and throw rocks. I can't stand self-pity. Which makes me suspect that often I can't stand myself.

Crises at home lie behind the increased dosage. I found myself alone in a room at work unable to function for the better part of an hour, thinking I was having a nervous breakdown. I kept wondering if I should go to a hospital and then wondering how much doing that would cost me (not financially but overall). I ultimately rode it out but the effects linger and upon telling my brain-doc he suggested upping my dosage. My therapist's advice is Winston Churchill's; "When you're going through Hell just keep going."

So that's what I'll do.