Posted by llrrrpp on July 31, 2006, at 23:24:32
In reply to Re: Medications the whole answer and what about life??, posted by linkadge on July 31, 2006, at 16:25:26
Hi all,
I came to this board when I was terrified and twitching and panicky about losing my mind on my very first ever psych-med. What I found was that a lot of people experience just what I have, and often far worse. And no matter how many times the pdoc says: it sounds like a side effect/you are probably anxious and it's affecting your sleep/you should try to stick it out a few more weeks... I just wanted to go into hibernation and emerge when I was "better".I had strange expectations regarding psych-meds. I guess not so strange, given the advertising on TV. I would be depressed, take a magic pill and then catch butterflies and play with puppies. On psycho-babble I enjoy hearing people's personal stories. I have learned a lot about mental illness, pharmacology and healthcare here. I have revised many expectations, and suggested things to my pdoc which ended up positively affecting my treatment.
Most of all, I think I have learned a lot from people that I used to shun as 'psycho'. You see, despite a family history of schizophrenia, bipolar, alcoholism and depression, I was arrogant and thought I was 'healthy'. I thought people were weak who needed to see a shrink or take 'those' kind of medications. I thought pdocs were little more than legal drug dealers with nice offices. Mostly I was scared of "them" the people in mental health- patients and practitioners, & probably of myself as well.
I was SOOOOO wrong. 'psycho' people are real people. Just because they have severe depression doesn't make them less human. It doesn't change the fact that we worry about our family, our jobs, our health and our money. Our problems may be more complicated, rarer, and so on, but we can learn so much from the roadblocks and insights of others who are walking the road of recovery with us.
The care and support of the mental health community was first demonstrated to me on psycho-babble. I learned that T and pdoc were not part of a 'system' to put me into a special category of 'crazy-psycho-for-life'. Rather, I learned that they care for my well-being and hope for my recovery. I could not have interpreted the events of my early sessions with T and pdoc were it not for p-babble help.
And finally, I made some good friends here- people from all over the place. I like meeting nice people.
sorry so long. I just wanted to reflect on how far I've come and how much I owe psycho-babble (all the boards)
-ll
poster:llrrrpp
thread:672192
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060724/msgs/672458.html