Pondering.....

Matty eating popcorn at Anne's soccer game. This is why he comes to the games.

I haven't written in awhile.  It isn't that I haven't thought about it.  I guess I am just feelings super frustrated and I have been busy too.  We have been going pretty much every day of the week lately between pre-school and soccer and church stuff.  I am not sure that soccer is the "thing" for my daughter.  She says she wants to go and complains when it is time to go and says she doesn't want to play because she never gets a turn to kick the ball.  I am thinking we will try something different next fall.  I think she would love dance but we will have to see if we can swing that on top of pre-school tuition for Matthew and kindergarten tuition for Anne. 

I have also survived my yearly week with Daddy away on his business trip.  My husband travels for a week once a year for his job and that is  probably the longest week each year for me.  The first year he went was when my PPD was at it's peak and I wasn't sure I was going to make it through.   I had some anxiety about him leaving before he left but we all survived the actual week just fine.  Now we are jumping head first into his busy season and I am trying to be relaxed about it.  I should be well used to him working all the time each summer, but that doesn't necessarily make it any easier to deal with.    I get tired and unmotivated just thinking about it.  I hate going out when it is hot and humid and being cooped up with two small children and a dog is not my idea of fun either.  I would rather just take a nap most days.

When I last wrote, I had just started to take my new medication....after weaning off the stuff that clearly was  not working.  Rather than allowing me to go back on the old medication that worked just fine until I couldn't take it any more because of cost, the insurance company insisted that I "try" generic Effexor first and if that didn't work.....maybe I could go back on Cymbalta.  I was doing okay with the new stuff, but I was just not feeling myself, still really depressed so my doc increased my dose.  I figured that would happen because I started on such a low dose.  Now I have been on the higher dose for awhile and I am still having many depressed days and low motivation....with a little bit of that old time anger on the side.  And the side effects....guess what I discovered one of the "less severe" side effects of Effexor is....abnormal dreams.  I am right back to having significant nightmares and intense dreams again.  I am pretty much fed up with those, and sick and tired of being tired all the time.  I am also dealing with a couple of other annoying side effects. 

Now I am at an impasse.  I am tired of feeling depressed and I am tired of dealing with side effects.  Frankly, I feel that all the med changes have done more harm than good at this point.  I am considering going off medication all together.  Even when medication makes me feel better, there has to be some frustrating side effects to deal with along with the constant feeling of being tired.  I wonder if it is worth it, but I am also concerned about/afraid of going back to the state of virtual incapacitation that I used to be in.  I also wonder if I am able to go back on Cymbalta, which I did well with before with virtually no side effects, after being on all these different medications if it would still be as effective as it was before.  Then there is the hassle of changing medications.  It would have to go through the insurance company for approval, if it gets approved at all.  Then there is the nonsense of withdrawal from the current medication, and waiting for the new medication to take effect.

If I decide to go off medications all together, I will have to wait and go through withdrawal and see how I feel for a while after it is all out of my system.  I wonder if I am strong enough to try to go back to the old unmedicated me.  I wonder how much of what I have been feeling since last fall is related to all of the medication changes.  Maybe I really am okay underneath all of it, with the exception of my normal hormonal mood changes.

If I decide to stay on medications, I either have to deal with the current frustration and crap with the medication that I am on and continue to feel as sub par as I am feeling right now, or I have to deal with changing meds yet again and waiting to see what will happen, and it could take months until a med change can actually have me feeling better, if it does at all.  I know that there are lots of antidepressants out there, but I am running out of options in terms of what can work for me.  Many of the major "families" have not worked out at all.

So where does that leave me?  Either option does not make the next few months much to look forward to.  I have really been pondering the options.  I have been praying about it, and I am just not sure what I should do.  There is no clear answer.  I have not discussed this with my doctor yet.  I have an appointment in just under two weeks.  I may call before then, I might wait until the appointment.  I have not decided yet.

There is much to do and look forward to over the next few months.  My Anne turns five in less than two weeks and I have been working on planning her birthday bash.  She will also be finishing pre-school and going to kindergarten orientation.   Then she starts kindergarten in September, which will be here before we know it.  My Matty turns three in August, and starts pre-school in September.  We have lots of opportunities for playdates and day trips and time with extended family this summer.  We might also even get to take a short vacation.  I don't want to just try to get through all of these things....I don't want to spend the summer trying to force myself to do stuff.  I don't want to feel like I am missing out on my own life.  I am afraid that no matter what decision I make, I will leave myself in that state, when I feel like I am in the back seat of my own life.

I really make an effort to not write a blog entry when I am feeling really down, because I always want to leave my readers with hope that their situations will improve.  But I also try to be honest.  Sometimes it is just hard.  Sometimes you will feel awful.  Life can be frustrating.  It feels like I am constantly at war with myself, trying to find my old self somewhere in there.

I am trying to pull my focus on tasks and looking forward to things.  Right now I am working on my daughter's birthday party.  We are doing a Veggie Tales Pirates Who Don't Do Anything theme.  How is that for a mouthful?  I made invitations and am working on decorations and games.  I find it easier to cope when I have a task to focus on.  I am also looking forward to working on Anne's Birthday Scrapbook.  Every year I make my kids a scrapbook for their birthday that covers the whole previous year of their lives, with all important moments and memories captured for them to look back on.  Anne has grown and changed so much in this past year. Here are some of the decorations I have made for her party:

Pirate Larry the Cucumber

Pirate Pa Grape

Pirate Lunt

I think they turned out pretty well.  Here is hoping that the summer does too.