a visit from the black dog

I'm still not really in a writing mode, and I'm not sure why. All the writing I've done over the last few months has been so helpful to me. I've been able to work through the thoughts in my head and try and do that sharing thing that is actually ridiculously hard, but very helpful.

I'm worried that the motivation was only there whilst I had the medication and now that I don't then my mind is closing me out again and that maybe I wasn't as ready as I hoped to come off it. The trouble at the minute is that I seem to have gone back to letting things build up in my head etc.

I think this is probably a sign that I do really need to go back to the doctor's. I know it's not an admission of defeat or weakness to say that I need help still, but I'm a little disappointed in myself that at this point in my life I need to have medication just to stay on an even keel.

I've been trying to stick to my routines and I haven't given in and ordered take-away instead of sticking to my meal planning and making us fresh food every day. So I guess in some respects I am better, but I think I still need that background helping hand that the Prozac seems to give me.

To be honest it does it's job fairly well without me even noticing it, it's just my own personal thing that I don't want to be on it. Having a dad who's a Psychiatric Pharmacist doesn't help that I guess!

I have vivid memories of being on holiday in various foreign countries with my dad wearing a Mr Prozac t-shirt... the number of strangers that used to come and talk to him about it... My mum had to ban him from wearing it before she'd had a coffee!

But I guess it really is a miracle drug for some people.

I just wish I didn't need it. I want to be in control, not have some drug do it for me. I want to know that my decisions (no matter how bad they might be) are my own.

I'm aware that I've been hiding from the world a bit again at the moment, I know that I had gotten out of that (though not the no phonecalls thing *shudders* I hate phonecalls!). So I guess it's time I went back and tried again. Give it a bit more time, give myself more of a break. I will get better though, I know it.

I know that I am starting to be me again, so I know I can. Just want to be able to be me. It's weird not knowing yourself or how you've got where you are. People with depression often describe it as a black dog. And I guess I'm not sure that's how I'd picture it. But the blackness is certainly true.

It's as if I'm trying to run from the nothing, you know, from the Neverending Story and I guess it's a longer marathon than I'd thought.