The new me...
Posted: November 5th, 2007, 4:48 am
Guys, I want to ask some questions. It would serve me right to get a lot of jokes and razzing in response, because that has been my approach to so many of you in the past. But if you have a real take on this, say so, okay?
I has become obvious to a few people here that a big change has come over me recently. I have become less confrontive and am attempting to avoid dispute and verbal fighting, and remain positive. No one is more surprized about it than me.
The physical reason for the change is a new medication I started taking for adult ADD called Vyvance. My sister, the psychologist, and my mother, the mother, had been comparing notes about me and came to the conclusion that I was ADD as a kid. I didn't act out in class or get violent with other kids, I was a daydreamer, my mind flitting off in a hundred different directions, with limited ability to concentrate for extended periods of time, and becoming bored with things in very short times. I did lousy in school up through the 11th grade. After that, it was all review anyway, so I graduated high school as a C student.
My IQ scores said I should have been doing much better, and it angered and frustrated my father so much that he couldn't think of anything to do but berate and beat me over and over to make me obey him about school and live up to my potential. That just drove me deeper into me, and reinforced the bad things I already thought about myself.
Cut to now; the doctor I have been seeing has been trying different meds in an effort to find one that helps me focus and not run off on a hundred bunny trails in my head. We've tried several, with poor results. But this new one has really made a difference in a lot of things, not the least in my outlook on life.
The drug itself is a form of dextroamphetamine, speed for those who aren't in the know about street drugs. I asked if I was gonna become addicted to the stuff, and the doctor told me no, and that I wouldn't develop a tolerance to it and have to keep increasing the dosage either.
When I looked it up on the iinternet this morning, it said one of the side efffects could be a feeling of well-being. Suffice it to say, I have that side effect. Despite losing my job, I feel like things might just work out for me, instead of feeling like a failure doomed to die alone in poverty. I have hope, and I didn't really have much before. I can't tell you what a relief it is.
I have to say that when I lost the job with Sprint, the thing that bothered me most was the fact that my insurance was going away. I am told Vyvance is REALLY expensive. There is no patient assistance program for anyone over the age of 12 till next year, and without a med card, it could easily be more than I could swing.
My questions are thus; Is the use of this drug giving me a false image of the world around me, or letting me see what really is going on without the filter of depression?
Is this a "happy pill" that keeps me from feeling what I should, or is it helping me be who I should be?
Should Christians use antidepressants?
Am I getting something from the drug that I should be getting from God?
I has become obvious to a few people here that a big change has come over me recently. I have become less confrontive and am attempting to avoid dispute and verbal fighting, and remain positive. No one is more surprized about it than me.
The physical reason for the change is a new medication I started taking for adult ADD called Vyvance. My sister, the psychologist, and my mother, the mother, had been comparing notes about me and came to the conclusion that I was ADD as a kid. I didn't act out in class or get violent with other kids, I was a daydreamer, my mind flitting off in a hundred different directions, with limited ability to concentrate for extended periods of time, and becoming bored with things in very short times. I did lousy in school up through the 11th grade. After that, it was all review anyway, so I graduated high school as a C student.
My IQ scores said I should have been doing much better, and it angered and frustrated my father so much that he couldn't think of anything to do but berate and beat me over and over to make me obey him about school and live up to my potential. That just drove me deeper into me, and reinforced the bad things I already thought about myself.
Cut to now; the doctor I have been seeing has been trying different meds in an effort to find one that helps me focus and not run off on a hundred bunny trails in my head. We've tried several, with poor results. But this new one has really made a difference in a lot of things, not the least in my outlook on life.
The drug itself is a form of dextroamphetamine, speed for those who aren't in the know about street drugs. I asked if I was gonna become addicted to the stuff, and the doctor told me no, and that I wouldn't develop a tolerance to it and have to keep increasing the dosage either.
When I looked it up on the iinternet this morning, it said one of the side efffects could be a feeling of well-being. Suffice it to say, I have that side effect. Despite losing my job, I feel like things might just work out for me, instead of feeling like a failure doomed to die alone in poverty. I have hope, and I didn't really have much before. I can't tell you what a relief it is.
I have to say that when I lost the job with Sprint, the thing that bothered me most was the fact that my insurance was going away. I am told Vyvance is REALLY expensive. There is no patient assistance program for anyone over the age of 12 till next year, and without a med card, it could easily be more than I could swing.
My questions are thus; Is the use of this drug giving me a false image of the world around me, or letting me see what really is going on without the filter of depression?
Is this a "happy pill" that keeps me from feeling what I should, or is it helping me be who I should be?
Should Christians use antidepressants?
Am I getting something from the drug that I should be getting from God?
