Winter Blues

Thank you all for your comments and support on my last few posts. The past week has been really difficult for a multitude of reasons, and words are hard to find so you'll have to bear with me.

On Thursday I saw my GP. When I sat down, she kind of looked at me funnily, then said,
    "Have you always had your lip pierced?"
It actually made me laugh. I've been seeing her for three years, and I didn't think it was that subtle.

I didn't talk to her about seeing the one who hurt me. I couldn't even bring myself to tell her I'd gone out to dinner. I haven't even really talked to mum about it, and I only briefly spoke to the dietician. I'm having enough trouble even writing about it in my journal.


We talked for a while about my concerns with SNRIs and my history with SSRIs and all of that fun stuff. I've been on the Duloxetine/Cymbalta for a little over a week now. Still a low dose, but no side effects (or any effects) to speak of. But there wasn't really much that Google and you guys hadn't covered. I told her about my lovely friend in Bahrain who's studying medicine and really helped clear things up. I think my initial fear was that they'd be a bigger, badder version of an SSRI, but that doesn't seem to true at all.

Like I wrote last week, I'm feeling kind of okay with this one from all the information I've read, which is a rarity for me. I even put off reading about it for weeks because looking up new antidepreants usually results in breakdowns and millions of worries and apprehension. She said if I haven't read anything concerning (and was surprised I hadn't), she doubts there's much more she needs to tell me. When I see her next month, I'll start on the full dose.


She mentioned that my old Mental Health Nurse, the one who I lost at the start of the year, had found a new job. At first I said nothing but then I realised that after so long, it's probably now or never.
    "Do you think I could maybe still see her again to say goodbye, with you or even just the dietician there? I just can't do it alone."

She's going away for a couple of weeks, but when she gets back she's going to call her and sort it out. Hopefully, it'll be a positive. Even though she said a few shitty things, for the most part she was good. The only reason I'm so bitter was because our last appointment ended terribly, and she was going to call to arrange a time to say goodbye properly after her holidays, but never did.

    "And I still don't know what to do about the new MHN..."
    "Well, I was going to give you a break from that until next time, but I thought I made it pretty clear you need to get back to see her."
    "I know. I just don't know how to. I really don't want to talk about what she said, because it's already ingrained in my head ("MUM'S TIRED OF YOU!"),  I can't hear it any more. I just don't know how to face her. I'm scared to go by myself, and mum's always been there, but now she just says I'm on my own."

She was going to talk to the dietician and try to come up with a plan of action. So I'm going to talk to her about it on Tuesday, and we'll reassess in a month.


She asked if I'd spoken to the dietician about weighing, and I explained she was cutting me some slack until the chest infection cleared up. Which given I'm now on steroids, which always have a chance of fucking with your weight, may not be such a bad thing. My GP, loving deadlines as she does, tapped into my notes that I have one month to get on the scales.

I'm on a third course of antibiotics for my chest, and have started on two weeks of prednisolone. Oh, and because of all the antibiotics, I have oral thrush and tonsil stone, which explains the sore mouth after throwing up last weekend. I ended up being sick for a couple of days after. I'm not sure if it was my stomach not coping with the strange food or the anxiety or both, but it seems to've passed now.


To top things off, last week a downpour of rain swept on to the back porch overnight. When I woke up, the bottom 6" of my electric blanket was soaked. I panicked, dried it off with paper towels, and it worked okay for a while, then slowly but surely died over the next few days.

Since then, I've been using a hot water bottle while waiting on a new electric blanket. It's been clasped to me pretty much 24/7, layered between camisole and cardigan, the belt and wrap on my dressing gown helping to hold it up.

As weird as it might sound, it's actually been fucking with my body image (which I normally consider to be relatively sound). Carrying it around all the time, having to reach over it, makes me feel bulky, two extra kilograms sloshing around, like the extra mass around my middle is actually a part of me.


xxBella