I use anti-depressants, gratefully. [View all]

[get the red out]

I am starting to get a subtle societal message that try to convince people I'm not on the verge of a killing spree, or simply try to hide my medicated status. I realize I'm being rather unsavory with this post, but the anti-medication push is becoming a bit much for me. I think one's medication needs are between them and their doctor but I am starting to feel that the idea that one needs medication is beginning to make them appear "of the inferior type".

I did walk the zero personal tolerance road on anti-depressants for 18 years of trying to deal with emotions that were completely off the scale. Trust me, that was NOT normal ups and downs, it was down and then HELL. Fear striking my body in waves for no reason and with no trigger. I stood it, I wanted to be PURE, I wanted to be GOOD. I didn't want to be one of THEM. I was one of the people a few years ago posting against anti-depressants on DU and getting (rightfully) slammed; while turning off the computer and wondering if I just wouldn't be better off dead. Heart disease is the killer that you can talk about in my family, depression is the destroyer, equally prevalent, that you can't. I got frustrated with a lack of help as a teen and went through self-medication hell that almost killed me before I was 30 because no psychiatrist had been able to do much, saying when I was 18 that I should be able to come out of it, I had a college scholarship waiting on me after-all. Then when I self-medicated they decided I was a really sick failure and pumped me full of anti-psychotics until I was dull, couldn't see straight, and was physically bloated. After my self-medicating nightmare, and my bad psychiatrist misery, I gave everything up, no more meds, I would show everyone how pure I could be. My doctor even had trouble getting me to take meds for my cholesterol and I wouldn't even take flu shots. It was all just big pharma trying to snare us anyway wasn't it? By God, I was good. And the doctors wouldn't own my ass again, EVER. I grinned and bore my depression because I figured the alternative was so much worse.

A few years ago, after some more life-trials I won't go into, I finally relented and sought help for my depression and anxiety (which I have suffered as long as I remember). I talked with my doctor a long time and made sure he knew what I had been through and that I was NOT going there again, death would be better than going there again (and I was thinking about death a lot at that point). He was available and treated me like a fellow human being, much different from the treatment I had received first as a teenager and then as a failure of a young adult who just needed to be shut away in the opinions of doctors and family. I had gotten my freedom from those people in the intervening years of working and building my own existence; but still so much of myself was simply missing in the daily struggle to want to live, and be able to stand to be around others. I am glad I reached a point where I was willing to admit that and be a participating partner in my own medical solution finding.

Apparently, more medications had come into existence since I was a kid, and knowing that I could say no to anything that worked poorly, and try something else; I was helped by medication and am now experiencing normal ups and downs in my life. I wouldn't give this up. I'm alive, I can be around people, I can participate fully in life; which I could not do before. I DO feel, but I feel normal ranges for the first time ever. I had gone from being over and poorly medicated as a very young person and into my late 20's; to trying to grit my teeth and "be good" and take nothing through my 30's and into my 40's. Now, I don't want to kill anyone (never wanted to kill anyone else), or myself, for a change.

What someone does for themselves is great, no problem, that's one of the beliefs that makes me a confirmed liberal IMO. But overall, I just keep seeing more and more of some kind of drive for "purity" where mental health medications are concerned, or at least an idea that having to utilize available treatments in this area signifies weakness or a desire for someone to not feel anything at all. This trend is not healthy for many of us. I fell for this for a very long time and it was not beneficial for me personally, and I could be judgmental of others when I was on the anti-med bandwagon, because I guess if I had to feel that damn bad I needed to be better than someone, or maybe I was just an ass (maybe I still am , meds don't eliminate one's personality) . Once again, I don't have a problem with people's personal decisions, but the overall tone regarding mental illness medications that I frequently and subtly encounter lately is concerning. Perhaps people like me are becoming the liberal version of Romney's 47%? Though that is admittedly a harsh statement, I am seeing a growing stigma. Medication isn't the be all end all for mental illness, I get therapy also and have for years. I also have a spiritual path, (rather off the beaten path that it is) but that wasn't my whole solution either. Medications aren't perfect; but what on Earth is? More is discovered every day about everything! I've walked several paths on this and I think we are in a better place than we were 30 years ago. We need to go farther by far, but that won't happen if old stigmas become new again.