Trying

Over the last couple weeks, I have been actively working toward being a healthier version of myself.  As I mentioned in my "Adulting" post a couple weeks ago, I started therapy.  I realized my brain had gotten to a point where it was no longer working in a logical, rational realm and had moved on to worst case scenarios all the time.  It was something that was no longer in my control, and it was taking me over in a damaging way.

The first session I had was through the free program offered by my work.  In the first session we went over why I was there, which as I mentioned was really emotionally exhausting.  The second session, which ended up being via Zoom because of weather and my busy schedule that day, was focused on how the prior week had gone before we shifted to some practical stress reduction techniques.  That stuff is always a little awkward because meditation and deep breathing are not my strong suit.  That was my last session with that therapist, though, as we had already determined during my first session that I was going to be a longer-term project and would move on to the next step of the program, which meant a different therapist.  I was fine with that, as the first one was just sort of meh.  She was sort of the stereotypical, emotionless, prim-and-proper therapist type...nice, but a little too cold for me.

My first meeting with my new therapist (for something like 18 sessions the program offers, anyway) was even more emotional than the first session with the other therapist.  I had to retell my story, which wasn't really any easier than the first time.  This therapist is a spitfire of a woman, a warm but no-nonsense black woman mama bear type who seems like she's seen a lot.  This one has a certain warmth and ease about her, a definite let-it-all-out feel...and that I did.  I answered some tough questions, shed a few tears and tried to hold back a few more, and then had to go into the office and work...ha.  Note to self: stop scheduling sessions when I can't just go back and work from home after.  We talked through a lot, and she basically validated that this has been a huge burden to carry.  She said that the "generalized anxiety" diagnosis was a pretty easy one in my case.  So, there we go--one more thing to check off on the old medical history.  I've always sort of thought I had some tendencies that would qualify me, but at least now I can check it off without feeling weird about it.  I think just having someone acknowledge that this has been a lot is a very emotional thing.  You can know it, and you can even talk about it with other people who acknowledge all that you're going through is hard, but hearing it from a professional who has probably heard everything hits different.  I mean, maybe it's their job to validate your feelings and quietly they're like, why is she freaking out about this?  But I don't think that's the case.  I think they at least understand brain chemistry and get that even if the things I worry about aren't actually real, they seem way too real to me in the moment.  We haven't delved into this yet, but I feel like some of it is the planner in me--I don't want to be caught unaware, so it feels like my duty to plan and prepare for every worst-case scenario, just in case.  And news flash: that is exhausting and probably not the healthiest coping mechanism.  

The following Monday was my medication evaluation.  I wasn't really planning on going in there and giving an enthusiastic "yes".  I wasn't closed-minded to it either, as I know plenty of people that have benefited from medication, but part of me hoped for a more natural plan.  That's why I started magnesium late the prior week, just to see if it eased things up a bit.  Someone had recommended it and it seemed like a starting point to see if maybe that could do the job for now.  Well, I do think it helped a little--I did get one full night's sleep and I didn't freak out doing Carter's birthday cake, nor did I go into a panic when Jacob kept mentioning more random symptoms here and there over that weekend.  But then I had two bad nights of sleep and decided maybe it just wasn't enough, at least not yet.  

The nurse practitioner I met with was really friendly and down-to-earth.  I had to do my whole story for a third time, and once again, it was hard and tear-filled.  The story just has so many steps, and every time I tell it, it boggles my mind even more how much we've been through.  There's so many "how many more things is this kid going to deal with?" moments--where the therapists probably think I'm getting to the end of the story but I'm actually just somewhere in the middle--that it really drives the point home of what a slog this has been.  It's been an endless set of issues, and to still have no real resolution is hard.  And that's just the story of the last eight months of countless instances of freakouts for random medical concerns.  It's probably at least 15 minutes of that before I even get to December's surgery, and the bone cyst that led to the plate that led to December's surgery ends up being an "oh, yeah..." kind of afterthought.  The ADHD and Celiac diagnosis enter into the mix somewhere when I explain his past, and that's not even mentioning early issues like a couple bouts of bronchiolitis and acid reflux as a baby, plus that random mole removal as a toddler.  I haven't even gotten into those with the therapists, but thinking back on it myself, they certainly set the stage for a "never a dull moment" life with him.  It's not his fault, obviously--he never asked for any of this and pretty much doesn't know any different than to deal with challenge after challenge.  It sucks for him...100 percent.  I love him more than life itself, obviously, but recounting all of this has been a stark reminder that I really, really wish I could have enjoyed this parenting journey a little bit more.  Survival mode sucks.  Thankfully I've had more of the good, "normal" moments with Carter, which has saved me at times.  Even though Jacob's anxiety flares continue to be a struggle, I can't help but marvel at the person he has become.  He's had so many struggles but is so resilient in other ways.  He's mature beyond his years and is super goal oriented.  Sometimes he says things that amaze me with their maturity, and other times he's so stuck on a plan he's convinced is flawless but won't listen to reason about why it could use some work.  Having a confident, stubborn, smart kid has its pros and cons for sure.  But I'll probably always carry with me a lot of guilt and wishes for all that I could have or should have done better, because I know I have failed him in so many ways, despite my best efforts.  If he wasn't already so sick of therapy, he'd probably have an adulthood worth of material for a therapist discussing how badly I messed him up. 

Anyway, back to my medicine eval.  The nurse practitioner asked how I've been sleeping, and the answer was, "Not good."  I can fall asleep just fine most of the time, unless Jacob has a late-night freak out which then gets me all riled up.  But most of the time I'm overly tired (dating back over a year ago post-COVID when I started getting crazy tired mid-evening and usually take an involuntary chair nap, unless I can somehow keep myself moving/occupied), so falling asleep isn't the problem.  What is the problem is waking up sometime between 3:30 and 5:30 and not being able to go back to sleep.  It all started right before my car accident (ironically) and got worse after.  My brain would just get going, and I was done for the night after a mere few hours of sleep.  It eased a little bit after a couple months, when I got a bit better at dozing back off, but it's pretty hit or miss overall.  Oddly, despite the sleep deprivation, I have managed to function reasonably well during the day.  Rarely do I have one of those afternoons where I'm nodding off at my desk.  It's like five hours became my new magic number, but of course the magic wears off mid-evening.  The nurse explained that with all of the stress hormones flowing through, it's no surprise I can't sleep.  But...I also know my dad has long had similar sleep patterns so I may be working against genetics on top of my own brain.

The nurse practitioner delved into a really solid explanation of why medication is important in a case like mine.  Bear with me, it was a lot and maybe I won't recall it 100% correctly, but this is the gist.  I've been anxious to some degree my whole life, and that has slowly drawn down my serotonin levels over time.  I've managed to function pretty highly despite the anxiety, but things are starting to dwindle a bit (I'm guessing that's not just the effect over time but also of age).  With all the added stress lately, my body is basically bleeding it, and when you spend most of your time in some sort of fight-or-flight mode, your blood vessels contract (she said it was the difference between sucking through a McDonald's straw vs. a coffee stir straw) so your blood pressure rises.  The blood flow is diverted to your heart and brain that need it for fight-or-flight, keeping it from other parts of the body that need it too.  You have stress hormones pumping through your body, and before you know it, your body is breaking down.  She basically insinuated that it was possible that most of my physical symptoms lately--my sore back, lymph nodes, weight loss, GI symptoms--could all relate back to the inflammation that those stress hormones wreak on the body.  Well, shucks.  That was eye-opening.

And, of course, as I'm hearing all of this, part of me kept thinking about Jacob and the countless things he's been dealing with, which in some cases we've assumed were anxiety-based.  Think about it--while we can't explain the high blood pressure that first day at the doctor, the resulting stress from that--plus the worry about what it meant and maybe underlying concerns about us leaving on our trip--could have spiked Jacob's stress hormone levels and poof, his acid reflux was born.  We don't know that, of course, but it's a thought.  And all of the other things that have been bothering him?  I mean, we know the kid has stress and anxiety and spirals very quickly, so it's not a reach that some of those physical symptoms he's having could relate back to that.  He's always maintained he does not want medicine, which I can sympathize with.  He is already on ADHD meds and doesn't love it.  I do think they help him more than he realizes since we can often tell the difference when he doesn't take it or they wear off.  He gives his brother a harder time, stirs the pot more with us, gets distracted from school work, and usually has a wide-awake obsessing period right before bed (which prevents him from getting enough sleep) that usually involves endless conversations with us when we're trying to go to bed.  But I honestly think he might benefit from some meds to get himself to a baseline to see what his body does when it's not fighting against itself.  He's wasting a lot of energy (and potentially blood flow) on that anxiety, so it really makes me wonder what it could be affecting.  But he's so into natural stuff that it will be a struggle just to get him to consider it.  The nurse did say she has a pediatrics portion of her job and would love to get him in just to explain it all to him.  Given his continued struggles to heal his leg (it's better, just not where he wants it), I think it could be motivating.  He does now seem open to it, so I guess we'll see how soon we can make that happen.

But for now, the best I can do is model what this experience is like.  After hearing her rationale, I really felt like medication had to be attempted and there was no sense putting it off.  If it could ease some of the things I was dealing with, that would be a game changer.  She suggested Zoloft, and because it takes a while to reach max efficiency (let alone finding the right therapeutic dose), she recommended Klonopin a couple times a day as well.  That gave me pause because I was almost immediately sure that was the drug that Stevie Nicks (of Fleetwood Mac fame) had been addicted to, which she said was worse to quit than cocaine.  Hmmmm.  But, obviously, this is a bit different.  That was eight years, this is just a few weeks on a super low dose.  It will ease the anxiety symptoms while my serotonin levels rebound a bit as the Zoloft gets itself up and running.  It's still a little nervewracking, but I trust her.  I picked up the prescriptions that night, and started them last Tuesday.  

A week and a half in, and so far, so good, I guess.  I did have a moment of blurred vision right after taking the first doses--my reading glasses weren't enough to see my phone clearly--but that seemed to pass.  I've maybe been a little more physically tired, but nothing terrible most of the time.  My anxiety had been in a relative lull when I started them, but I felt pretty good the rest of the week.  But near the end I was starting to get a couple jolts of baseless angst again.  I think it was just a perfect storm of Craig leaving on a road trip, Jacob having two games and a training session, Carter's actual birthday (with possibly late presents), and an incoming massive snow storm that threatened to screw up our beloved and much anticipated Strong Museum night Sunday (it did but it got rescheduled, and the snow wasn't terrible in the end, although it did make Craig's travel pretty rough).  Still, I was much better off than I would have been.  Sleeping still has its challenges as I think the Klonopin is wearing off when I wake up and my brain has struggled to keep quiet, but I have had more decent nights recently, so I'm hopeful.    

By the middle of this week I was feeling pretty darn great, actually.  Overall I think my brain and body have both been calmer and I just felt like a huge weight had lifted.  My next therapy session was Wednesday, and she was like, "You're smiling!"  I did feel almost like a different person than the last time I was there.  It seems like most of my physical symptoms have eased, but it's hard to know if it's the anxiety or they finally just ran their course.  GI things have evened out, my back pain is significantly better, and my lymph nodes aren't as sore.  I still have a couple lingering things, but at least I can pinpoint those better if/when I finally call my doctor.  If it is all due to the medicine, well, that is one heck of a realization of just how integrated our mental health can be with our physical health.  

Today marked day one of the full Zoloft dose so I'm just waiting to see how that impacts things.  I can also start easing off the Klonopin, so I have to see what that starts feeling like as well.  Today I'm back to feeling a bit more tired and brain foggy, but I know there's adjusting that needs to happen so I'm trying to be patient.  I know this is rarely an easy process, but so far it's been smoother and done more than I expected very quickly.  It does give me a lot of hope that it could help Jacob as well.  

But then later today the wheels fell off a bit.  Jacob was calling me incessantly at work telling me he wasn't sure if he was sick and he really wanted to test for the flu.  His teammates have had a variety of illnesses and kept coming to practice, and even the athletic director ended up with COVID this week.  He hadn't been feeling 100% all week but he couldn't really pinpoint it--maybe a little tired, maybe a little more stuffed up, some headaches.  But today he got all panicky and wanted to test before practice to know if he was going to give anything to his teammates.  I was a little resistant because he didn't have a fever and really didn't seem to even be sure he was sick...so how bad could he be?  Would it even show up on a test?  And considering this was the kid that insisted he had pneumonia on and off for weeks, can you blame me for assuming he might be making it bigger than it was?

Well...he did a combo flu/COVID test and sure enough, Flu A had the absolute faintest positive possible.  So of course he was super mad at me for insisting he didn't have the flu--though had he tested a couple hours earlier, it probably wouldn't have shown a positive.  It was SO faint.  Most people with Flu A have high fevers, body aches, serious fatigue, and a cough...and he barely had any hint of that.  So...was I wrong?  Yes.  But can you blame me?  Probably not at that stage.  By later tonight I would have been more easily convinced as he was feeling a lot worse.  He went to the doctor this evening and got Tamiflu since it was so early.  We'll see how that works out.

He was absolutely intolerable most of the night after that.  He's upset because he probably won't be able to play in his big comeback game in sectionals on Tuesday.  He had SO been looking forward to that and now that dream is probably dead.  I don't blame him for being devastated about that.  I also know he's not feeling well, so I know that doesn't help.  But he was being an absolute jerk about literally everything, yelling and ranting about how he can't trust me and I don't help him and blaming us for not getting him a drink he never asked for....it was one of those moments where I was wondering if we might need to take him in somewhere because he was barely even making sense by that point.  He also lost it on me when I was about to message his therapist about doing the medication consult, because how dare I do that when he's sick (even though it was very clear it was needed before this).  He did chill out and apologize by the end of the night, but these anxiety spikes are crazy and we really do need to try medicine sooner rather than later because these incidents are so damaging to our relationship.   

I still probably did better with the whole situation than I would have non-medicated, but yeah, the anxiety is still there.  Ultimately I know that no matter how good the meds are, if something is really wrong with anyone in my family, they won't ever be enough medicine to offset it.  That is really the key to everything.  I will probably never be my old self until I know my family is healthy and happy, or at least reasonably close to where we were before these last eight months.  When the therapist cautioned me to not be one of those people who decides out of the blue that I don't need the medicine now that I'm feeling better, I told her the only way I'd probably ever consider going off it is if we get past this entire medical mess and I have full confidence that Jacob (and everyone else for that matter) is fine.  I may never have that much of a comfort just because of how life goes, but for now I'm thankful to have found a way to get some relief from the constant mental torture I was dealing with before.  I was in a place where I was endlessly imagining all the things that could be wrong, and that was wasting a lot of energy and sanity.  The baseless worry on top of real worry had created a spiderweb of problems that went beyond my brain and into the rest of my body.  Now that much of that has eased, I can hopefully focus my energy on what's real and try to manage that.  I'm hopeful the medicine will help repair some of the trauma of the last eight months and help strengthen me for whatever lies ahead.  

Tonight was hard regardless, but I'm so thankful that I'm hopefully on a path to healing my brain and my body for the long haul.