The Bad Pill Kept Me From The Good Pill

In a previous post I mentioned that I take medication for OCD: Prozac. It’s been extremely helpful, but it took a long time for me to even consider trying it. Here’s why:

Mood music:

As a kid sick much of the time with Chron’s Disease, I was often put on the maximum dose of a drug called Prednisone. The side effects were so horrific that I forever after resisted the idea of taking medication until I reached a point in my OCD treatment where I felt so desolate I was willing to try anything.

Prednisone does an excellent job of cooling down a Chron’s flare up. If not for the drug, chances are pretty good I wouldn’t be here right now. More than once the disease got so bad the doctor’s were talking about removing my colon and tossing it in the trash. Each time, the medication brought me back from the brink.

But there was a heavy price — literally and figuratively.

The drug quadrupled my appetite, which was already in overdrive because of the food restrictions imposed upon me during times of illness. It contributed mightily toward the binge eating disorder I wrote about a few posts back.

The drug also fueled vicious mood swings and introduced me to a lifetime of migraines, many of which were so bad I’d end up hunched over the toilet throwing my guts up.

So when I started to confront my mental disorder and specialists started talking about different medications available, I balked. In fact, I told one therapist to go screw.

I focused instead on building up an arsenal of coping mechanisms. That helped tremendously, but it wasn’t enough. I found myself against one final brick wall; one I couldn’t seem to punch through.

And still I resisted.

I had plenty of excuses. I knew many people who had gone on antidepressants and were still depressed most of the time. Some had gained weight — a problem I already had. I just didn’t see the point.

I also couldn’t shake the memory of a dear friend — a man who essentially became an older brother after my real older brother died in 1984 — who had been on medication for depression but ultimately committed suicide anyway. I walked away from that nightmare with the theory that antidepressants made people worse rather than better.

Finally, I resisted because the depression that often sprung from my OCD wasn’t the suicidal variety. Truth be told, I’ve never once considered taking my own life. It just never occurred to me. Mine is a depression in which I simply withdraw, saying little to people and spending as much time as possible on the couch zoning out in front of the TV. To me, medication was for people in far more serious condition.

And so I resisted until I was so desperate I was willing to consider anything, no matter how extreme or stupid.

After researching the various medications and consulting the doctors, I started taking Prozac in January 2007. The results were almost immediate.

I stopped re-spinning old anxieties in my head. I automatically stopped obsessing over things I couldn’t control, like the possibility that the plane I was on might crash en route to a business conference. Suddenly, I had an overwhelming urge to experience all the things I used to fear.

I fell in love with travel. Work challenges became fun instead of something to dread. I finally became comfortable in my own skin.

The compulsive tendencies still surface on occasion. I still get batty over getting chores done. I still get bent out of shape if my sons use my desk and move a few trinkets out of place.

But the fear and anxiety went away in 2007, and haven’t returned. For that, I am grateful beyond words. Nothing robs a person blind quite like fear. You spend all your time hiding from all the beautiful aspects of life.

The medication also gave me the last little push I needed to stop living my work life in a way that was all about pleasing others and maintaining some imagined golden-boy image. By the time I moved over to CSO Magazine to be a senior editor, I was well past that sort of thing. While there, I’ve never had a problem speaking my mind, expressing ideas forcefully and simply enjoying the heck out of the work itself. I’m certainly lucky in that I work with a wonderful group of people. I truly like everyone I work with.

I did do some research on anti-depressant medication and found that there is an actual science to it all. I learned that while personal history is certainly a factor in the things that trigger mental disorder (a history of child abuse, for example), the root cause if often an imbalance in the fluids that direct traffic in the brain. The WebMD website explains it pretty well:

“One common theory is that depression is caused by an imbalance of naturally occurring substances in the brain and spinal cord … Major depression affects about 6.7% of the U.S. population over age 18, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. Everybody at one point or another will feel sadness as a reaction to loss, grief, or injured self-esteem, but clinical depression, called ‘major depressive disorder’ or ‘major depression’ by doctors, is a serious medical illness that needs professional diagnosis and treatment.”

It goes on to say that most anti-depressant medicines improve mood “by increasing the number of chemicals in the brain that pass messages between brain cells.” That’s a key point. Mental disorders that are often viewed as stereotypical insanity and craziness are rooted in a chemical imbalance. When the brain chemistry is out of whack, the thinking process is disrupted. In my case, side effects of that imbalance included compulsive behavior and the inability to move on from certain preoccupations.

A good example: In 2005, when I was still at the beginning stages of dealing with my OCD, the hype about bird flu started to circulate. There was endless talk about that strain evolving into a pandemic as deadly as the 1918 Spanish Flu; far worse than the H1N1 pandemic we are currently experiencing.

I spent the following months in blind, silent panic. I feared for my children. I scanned through three pages of Google News results per day to keep track of the bird flu deaths in Asia and elsewhere.

When I started taking Prozac, that sort of thing stopped.

Make no mistake: Medication does not turn us into uncaring, numb and slap-happy beings. I still worry when my kids get sick. I still worry when the economy tanks and layoffs occur all around me.

But instead of stewing over these things around the clock, to the point where I can focus on little else, I’m able to function and still enjoy the precious present despite the mental burdens of the day.

Medication isn’t for everyone. I have no doubt that a lot of people on antidepressants don’t need to be. But in my case, the diagnosis was dead on and the prescription has done wonders for me. Three years ago, the concept would have been absolutely absurd.

The ultimate lesson: If you are in the grips of mental illness and you face the prospect of going on medication, don’t be afraid.