Thanks, everyone.
I’m doing a little bit better, just taking things one day at a time. The thing that threw me a little is that this summer-long spiral wasn’t entirely the result of my cognitive distortions and poor coping skills. The pharmacy that fills my scripts gave me a different type of fluoxetine from a different manufacturer right around the same time my mom started getting sick. The psychiatrist had them run a bunch of labs on my old pills and on me, and the blend on that batch works so poorly for me that it basically did nothing for me. my doctor’s constant dosage increases over the last two months were just delaying (and kind of dragging out) withdrawal symptoms.
So pay attention when your meds change for any reason, and not just for psych meds. She told me that this happens all the time to all sorts of medications, from painkillers to blood thinners.
Also, she couldn’t believe that nobody had tried giving me anything for my PTSD before, so we’re trying Prazosin. I do feel a little less anxious and haven’t had any nightmares or flashbacks for a few days. And I’m not to write any more explorations of my trauma or how I feel about it ever again. Not on this website, not in my diary, not in my recovery journal, not anywhere. Those are the sorts of experiences and emotions that should only be unpacked in session with a therapist, and only when the patient is stable. Most of my Cottsge posts over the years were essentially unwitting self-harm that may well have triggered attacks in others, and for that I am extremely sorry.
I already have the intake paperwork finished and sent on to another clinic in the same network, so I can go over there any time on Tuesday morning and finish the process to get a new therapist as a walk-in without needing an appointment. And once I’m stable (and it’s been at least five months from now), I’ll also get a psychiatrist who can give me a full set of evaluations. This is a huge jump in efficiency and skill compared to the sort of care I got while in college, and I’m much more optimistic about the outcome. There is no limit to how many people I can see in the network apart from how many people work for them, so they encouraged me to keep switching until I find somebody who really clicks with me. And yes, I keep mentioning Tuesday to everyone I tell about this because I want to be held accountable for it, and make sure I do it. I want to keep this process going. I want to learn how to cope better.
I want to be better prepared to handle my illnesses, and I think that the clinic was full of skillful and caring people who did me a lot of good.
TL;DR: I need much better coping skills than the ones I had, and I still need therapy. But I was also in withdrawal for three months because my pharmacy cheaped out on me. Should be getting set up with a new therapist on Tuesday.
Very math.
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