Pills, Chills, And Bellyaches

Hello Readers.

I knew that grad school was going to be hard work. I knew I was going to come up against passive-aggressive personalities, and I knew that it was going to place hereto unforseen demands on my schedule. But I did not bank on it being this socially isolating or triggering the fuck out of me.

It's no secret that I've struggled with my own mental health issues. Anxiety progressed from depression to eating disorder and back to depression in my past. I've been in therapy for most of the past eight or nine years (with a couple short sabaticals) and figured that I had most of my shit figured out. I didn't understand that some of what I called "worked out" might really just be a purely intellectual understanding. And if learned anything in my former career, it's that knowing something in your head and knowing something in your body are two very different things. I've likely being using intellectualization as a defense mechanism for some time. Maybe a couple decades.

I have a very heavy theory-based semester where I am learning out 1. cognitive and behavioural assessments of children and adolescents, 2. psychopathology from a developmental-contextual perspective, and 3. theories of psychoanalytic psychotherapy and psychotherapeutic change with children, adolescents, and families. I've always been very big on working through my own personal issues so that I don't bring them into my role as a therapist (as much as possible). But I realize that just studying this stuff so heavily this semester has left me feeling very vulnerable and broken. I am aware of old psychological scars that I thought had healed. Or, perhaps the dressings have been pulled off before they were healed enough to withstand this process. Or, more likely and moderately, perhaps this is just a natural and necessary part of the learning process that is brought on more by my developmental age. I am between six and eight years older than the rest of my cohort, and even older than the people in my lab who are at the end of their PhDs. So it is very possible that I am at a more reflective stage, with my defenses more relaxed, 8.5 years of therapy and self-awareness under my belt. Perhaps it is only logical that I would be feeling triggered by memories. Feeling ripped off that the level of awareness the profession and society in general have now, the help available, the increased success of helping interventions... that all of this was not available to me as a small child -- not available to me as a teen -- and that I had difficulty trying to access help initially as an adult. If I were a client seeking my own help, I would likely point out the differences that exist for children today compared to when I was growing up.

To increase th intensity of this difficulty, I have a loved one, a very young person in my family for whom I am "God Mother," who is stuggling with their own mental health issues in a difficult family situation. On one hand, I feel this intense frustration on their behalf, wanting to support them and force their families to see clearly what I can see now in terms of the benefit of early intervention that targets the entire family system. On the other hand, I feel intense jealously that my own parents are doing a MUCH better job being supports to this child than they were to me. Don't get me wrong, I am glad that they have improved on their own journey. But I do grieve the loss of what was never available to me. And I fear for this child. They are geographically distant from me, and I feel quite powerless to influence or help the family in any concrete way.

All of these things, combined with my lack of a social life these days, are certainly affecting me. I realized about a week and a half ago that I needed to say aloud to my therapist that I am worried that this might be capital D Depression. My therapist is awesome, and the one real stoke of luck that I have had on my own journey to mental health (for reasons too numerous to mention, one important one being that I can afford him). He brought up the idea of medication, and reluctantly I've decided to go that route. It's not a med that I have taken before, but one he claims will have a minimum of disruptive side-effects and be more energizing than relaxing (seeing as I am complaining of always being tired no matter how much I sleep). I didn't want to go on it, mostly because I didn't want to admit that I'm depressed. For someone who works and studies in mental health, I sure do have a double standard! I feel like a failure. I feel weak. I feel like I need a crutch to help me through something that others are doing without the same help. I also worry that I will have withdrawl symptoms when coming off of it, and a few other things in terms of the meds keeping me from doing some things that I want to do in the near future. But I've decided to put my immediate psychological health first and make sure I can complete my semester.

I'm not gonna lie to you, the side effects are bothersome right now. I feel quite nauseated and tired. I also get really keyed up around 5pm and have a bit of trouble sleeping. But I need to remind myself that I would be much gentler and offer more compassion and understanding to ANY client I've ever worked with than I have been offering myself. This double standard has to go.

I'll try to keep you posted on how things are going. I promised I would stop working at the computer 15 minutes ago, and I need to do that. I hope self-care is the way to go, and that I don't need so much of it that I never stop and can't get back to work when I need to.

That's it. If you love me, thanks for loving me. If you care, I appreciate that too. If you were hoping just for humour, give me a few weeks til the meds kick in! :)