It’s been nearly a month…

It’s been nearly a month since I’ve last posted on here, my blog. A lot has happened… A LOT.

My psychiatrist and I are trying to lower my dosage of one of my medications, the one that I’ve been on for the longest. After lowering the dose by half, I thought I’d adjust fine because this wasn’t the first time that it was lowered this year. The previous time I did perfectly fine, with no side effects.

Since there are some people, like my mom, who have had some weird experiences with this medication, I’ll share what it is: Sertraline (or Zoloft).

The first side effect I noticed around 2 days after adjusting the medication was my irritability and anger showing up more easily and sometimes at the most ridiculous things. I thought it’d go away soon after, figuring that it would dissipate as my body adjusted. It hasn’t, really.

Another thing I notice is that my thoughts are more negative than before. It isn’t too bad and I can catch myself still, but my thoughts weren’t this negative before the most recent dosage change. I was able to easily intercept the negative thoughts and turn them around.

I fear telling my psychiatrist about my side effects of the medication change. I’d feel like a failure, being told to go back up to my original dosage of Zoloft. Slowly, I’m starting to accept that maybe it’s the best thing that I do. I can’t seem to function properly without it, especially since I’ve been on a high dose for years. My brain is probably freaking out about the change.

I wouldn’t have agreed to such a drastic medication change, though, had I known the amount of stress that was soon going to hit me about a week or two later.

I was soon hit with “business isn’t doing well and you’re going to need to cut your hours down to 10 per week immediately and look for a new job“. As an introvert who is bordering agoraphobic, this is a nightmare.

My family and I were planning to move out of state next year (2020), but with the current status of the business (family business), we might have to move much sooner. Personally, I don’t see the point of trying to get a job in my current city when I wouldn’t even be there for a year before needing to move. Then, after moving, I would need to find another job yet again. So, my plan was to start searching for jobs out of state and move as soon as possible, regardless of when my family was moving.

Not only am I stressed about my medication change, but I now have to stress about financial obligations, moving to a new state, and finding a new job in said state (ideally before moving). Luckily, I have the option to move anywhere, I’m not restricted to one city, county, or state.

Still, this isn’t all of my stressors; there’s less “major” ones. It’s hard to go through my classes with little to no motivation to do much. I’ve gained probably 30-40 pounds within the last 2 years, 50 pounds total in the last 5 years. I’ve always struggled with my image and my perception of my weight. So, this is quite a big stress/frustration. I’ve launched a website, which I’m trying to keep up with daily, but my lack of motivation is really interfering with it. I’ve been wanting to launch this website for years and I finally took the step and did it. I eventually want it to gain some sort of income, like a “side project”, but I mainly just want to write about my passions (mental health, neuroscience, etc.) and spread knowledge.

My self-confidence is waning. I constantly think about my weight, my image, not having a job, not having income, not being able to find a job, not keeping up with my website, not keeping up with the schoolwork, and who knows what else. I guess you could say my anxiety is through the roof.

I guess I just needed an outlet tonight. I don’t talk to anyone really, I never go out with people, and the only people I do confide in are family members, but I don’t usually share everything with them. I don’t want them to worry, but it’s also very hard to understand what I’m going through unless they’ve been through it themselves.

I will be okay. I’ll try to push myself to get some Vitamin D tomorrow (get out in the sun).

xoxo
AllyNikk/Allison