General Articles

My child, my depression, my life

Wednesday, May 15th, 2013

girlinthecityI used to say my daughter – my only child – is my anchor to life.

In my darkest, suicidal moments she is what kept me from “doing it.” I believed and actually told my therapist and doctor that if anything “happened” to her – as in death – I would be “out of here”" – as in suicide.

That is no longer true. I realized this on Mother’s Day. I truly love my daughter more than I ever dreamed I was capable of loving anyone. I would lay down my life for her without a second-thought. But I could – and would – go on if anything “happened” to her. She is not my only reason for living and I do not want to place that burden upon her.

I consider this progress. My life has evolved beyond the lonely, self-absorbed nights shared with a couple of bottles of chardonnay and the despair of depression to living with the knowledge that I have the power to control my alcoholism and depression. It is work and most of it goes on between my ears – unseen by my daughter or anyone else. But progress is not only my willingness to do the work but actually doing it. Just do it. Take the meds. Go to therapy. Make and take that phone call. Attend meetings. Ask for help. Pray.

Young woman in the city image available from Shutterstock.

Depression aftermath: Hi-ho. Hi-ho. It’s off to work I go.

Tuesday, May 7th, 2013

officecoffeecrpdHeard yesterday, 10 am, near the coffee pot in the newsroom…

Co-worker: “Hey, you’re back. Were you on vacation?”

Me: “No. I was sick.” End of conversation, I walk away, hoping there are no further questions about my illness.

Despite having gone public and written about my depression and alcoholism for 8 years, I still cringe when I take time off because of my depression. I would think nothing of discussing my ailment if it was the flu or strep throat, but admitting that I took time off to deal with my depression somehow makes me feel weak and lazy – like I’m a fraud.

Then I feel bad about feeling bad about feeling weak and lazy because I’m the one always ranting about how depression is real – it is a bona fide illness and the #1 workplace disability in the U.S.

So, why is it that when it’s my turn at bat, I bunt? In most areas of my life I don’t give a rat’s butt about what other people think of me. I confidently do the next right thing without fear of being judged. I have no problem admitting I am a recovered alcoholic. In fact, I’m in awe and proud that I have not had a drink in nearly 15 years.

But when it comes to saying that I had to take time off work because of my depression, I feel like a dog with its tail between its legs. I feel like I’m faking it. Like somehow a fever and snot running from my nose is more legitimate than being paralyzed by hopelessness and an intense fatigue.

My mother was a farmer’s daughter and I was taught to pull myself up by my bootstraps. Suck it up. Do what needs to be done and don’t make a stink about it. A little voice in my head says, “You’ve run marathons. You can dead-lift 195 pounds. You love the tiny roar of your little 14-inch  Barbie chainsaw. Now get off your ‘effing ass and get to work. You know you’re faking this so you can get time off work.”

The logical …

My antidepressants: What’s up with generics?

Monday, May 6th, 2013

pillsandprescriptioncrpdI’m back.

For once I did what I was told to do – called the nurse practitioner – and she helped pull me out of it. I told her I had not hit bottom and had not thought of suicide but I was definitely on my way down. Her first question: Are you on the generic*? I had to check the bottle and indeed, I was.

Before tweeking my cocktail, which has worked well for years, she wrote me a script for the brand name. If that’s the problem, you should start to feel better in a couple of days, she told me. If not, then we’ll look at changing doses. Thankfully, I did feel better after a couple of days. It still took most of the week for that foggy, thick feeling in my head to clear up. But I am feeling much, much better.

Which begs the question: What’s up with generic antidepressants? My nurse practitioner said I am her third patient who has had problems with this particular antidepressant’s generic version and her last patient ended up in the hospital. I also take Wellbutrin and found out that the FDA took a second look at the generic version of Wellbutrin XL 300 after complaints that it wasn’t working. I have an appointment coming up and want to find out if we should report this to the FDA.

The weird thing is that I had been on the generic version for awhile and didn’t have any problems. I have a mail-order prescription program through my company’s insurance program. I get a three-month supply for the ridiculously low price of $60. I had just refilled the prescription and started taking the newly filled generic about two-three weeks before I tanked.

I hadn’t felt well during those few weeks and after a little research discovered that the symptoms I experienced were similar to withdrawal symptoms. Is it possible that I got a bad batch? Or is it that my body up and decided that it didn’t like the generic anymore and wanted the real deal?

I want to to know.

* I deliberately left …

Depression sucks. Period. Exclamation point.

Monday, April 29th, 2013

depressioncrpd“This” has been coming on for a few weeks. It’s been creeping up on me so it was no surprise this morning when I woke up and said “uncle – game over.” I have reached a tipping point and the depression is now ahead.

I sent my boss an email and told him I would not be in today – maybe the rest of the week. I called my psych nurse – which I hardly ever do – and she said she thought it could be the generic antidepressant I’m taking. She prescribed the brand name and $152 later, we shall see if she is right.

I went back to bed. When I got up, I had slept 15 of 17 hours. I could have slept more but I dragged myself out of bed. I know the longer I lay in a dark room the worse this will be. Prone is the enemy.

I am going to try to describe that it feels like when the depression becomes debilitating. First, I am tired. It is a consuming exhaustion. All my muscles, especially those in my face feel slack. The back of my eyeballs ache. Everything – my thinking especially – is thick and heavy. It feels like you are living underwater and every movement requires effort. Life feels relentless. I just want to sit here and stare off into space, or sleep.

Driving back from the pharmacy I told myself, “this is not real. This is a chemical imbalance in your brain. This will not last. This is not what your life is about. You will feel better.”

I don’t feel any better. That’s the problem with antidepressants. You have no idea how long it will take for them to kick in or if they will ever kick in – which sucks.

My dog needs a walk and I do not want to walk him. I want to go back to bed. But I have to walk him and this is a good thing. Thank God for that mutt. I know I need to get up and move. So does he.

After that, I …

Beer, Gatorade and Dopamine: How the alcoholic brain works

Wednesday, April 24th, 2013

beercrpdA friend sent me an article this weekend about a study done by the Indiana Alcohol Research Center at Indiana University: “Taste of beer, without effect of alcohol, triggers dopamine release in the brain.”

“Using positron emission tomography, or PET, the researchers tested 49 men with two scans, one in which they tasted beer and the second in which they tasted Gatorade. They were looking for evidence of increased levels of dopamine, a brain neurotransmitter. The scans showed significantly more dopamine activity following the taste of beer than the sports drink. Moreover, the effect was significantly greater among participants with a family history of alcoholism.”

Research has already linked dopamine to drug and alcohol use but apparently this is the “first experiment in humans to show that the taste of an alcoholic drink alone, without any intoxicating effect from the alcohol, can elicit this dopamine activity in the brain’s reward centers,” said David A. Kareken, Ph.D., professor of neurology at the IU School of Medicine and the deputy director of the Indiana Alcohol Research Center.

How did they do this study: Forty-nine men tasted their preferred beer and Gatorade.  Small amounts of the beer and Gatorade were sprayed into the their mouths. The amounts were so small – 15 milliliters over 15 minutes – that the men could taste the beer without causing a detectable blood-alcohol level.

Here’s the really interesting part for us alcoholics: “The stronger effect in participants with close alcoholic relatives suggests that the release of dopamine in response to such alcohol-related cues may be an inherited risk factor for alcoholism, Dr. Kareken said.” Results of the study were published online Monday by the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, the official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology.

Here’s the really interesting part for for us women alcoholics: The study wasn’t done on women. Maybe the results would be the same. However, 54-years on this planet has taught me that  a woman’s brain work differently than a man’s brain.

Could you do the study again on women and perhaps using Chardonnay and hot chocolate? Or champagne and  lemonade?

I have …

The Boston bombings: how I keep my mental health intact before and after tragedy strikes

Wednesday, April 17th, 2013

I know a woman who barely escaped the World Trade Center on 9/11. She sent me a text message after the Boston Marathon bombing: “Charge your cell phone.” Seemed like an odd request. Then I recalled her telling me how in the frantic minutes and hours after the attack, survivors’ cell phones died as they frantically tried to call their friends an co-workers.

In times like these, we need – really need – to do something. Not just anything,shutterstock_134963717 but something that will help yourself and others. It’s just the way we are programmed, especially if you have been through some horrific event before. Some people have special prayers they say during tragedies. Others talk about it incessantly. And some people charge their cellphones. It’s an emotional security blanket.

For me, it’s batteries. AAA, AA, C, D – any battery that will illuminate a flashlight in those dark, powerless nights after a hurricane. I have been through several hurricanes. They scare the hell out of me. When my home is at the end of projected paths The Weather Channel starts drawing while the storm is still hundreds of miles away, I buy batteries.

Makes me feel better.

Getting to and from the mental health care we need

Monday, April 15th, 2013

I got up this morning, made my coffee, massaged my old dog’s hips and got the newspaper. On the front page was a story about a team of nurses who had been specially trained to provide immediate medical care to rape victims and collect evidence. It’s a great program and desperately needed. Often the victims are taken to a special exam facility near the hospital so the victims don’t have to wait hours in an emergency room.

The special exam facility opened in 2011. It is lovely and now with specially trained nurses, victims can be assured of getting compassionate care in a comfortable, private setting. There is only one problem: the facility is located in a fairly affluent area west of the city. So, how are the victims’ loved ones supposed to get to the exam facility if they don’t have cars? How are the victims – who been given a ride to the facility by police or paramedics supposed to get home?

It’s a helluva long bus ride to get out there.

Part of my job as a newspaper reporter is to analyze crime data and I know that there are very few sexual assaults in the community near the exam facility. Most rapes occur in urban areas miles away. Wouldn’t it have made more sense to build a special exam facility near a hospital that is closer to the communities where rapes occur?

I asked this question at a meeting of a women’s group that a friend had invited me to. The meeting fell silent and the women looked at each other, surprised. They hadn’t thought of that.

What does any of this have to do with mental illness?

Well, in the aftermath of the Newtown shooting it looks like lawmakers have finally decided to free up some money to beef up and build more mental health facilities. Amen. But before we start spending and building, let’s take a really good look at those we need to help and their caregivers and loved ones. We cannot assume that everyone has a car and can drive themselves to a mental health facility.

Transportation is a really big issue for people …

Sen. Mitch McConnell side-steps aides’ swipe at Ashley Judd’s depression

Wednesday, April 10th, 2013

senatorcrpdI lost faith in politicians in the late 1980′s.

I was a cub reporter and my editors decided to send me to Tallahassee to cover the legislative session. I looked a little different then. Actually, I looked a lot different: thin, long blonde hair and great legs. I was shocked at how the lawmakers looked at me and invited me out for cocktails.

It felt like a bunch of middle-aged white guys had been dropped off at summer camp and had morphed into horny, junior high nimwits. They would get what they wanted by bullying, belittling and extorting whoever and whatever was in their way. I remember thinking, “Wow, these are the people running the state of Florida. ”

I was reminded of my spring at the capitol yesterday when a friend sent me a link to the Mother Jones story about Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell and his aides discussing ways to undermine McConnell’s potential opponents, including actor Ashley Judd. According to the article:

The aide who led the meeting began his presentation with a touch of glee: “I refer to [Judd] as sort of the oppo research situation where there’s a haystack of needles, just because truly, there’s such a wealth of material.” He ran through the obvious: Judd was a prominent supporter of President Barack Obama, Obamacare, abortion rights, gay marriage, and climate change action. He pointed out that she is “anti-coal.”

 But the McConnell gang explored going far beyond Judd’s politics and policy preferences. This included her mental health. The meeting leader noted:

 She’s clearly, this sounds extreme, but she is emotionally unbalanced. I mean it’s been documented. Jesse can go in chapter and verse from her autobiography about, you know, she’s suffered some suicidal tendencies. She was hospitalized for 42 days when she had a mental breakdown in the ’90s.

In her 2011 memoirs, All That Is Bitter & Sweet, Judd discusses her depression, her thoughts of suicide as a sixth grader and her stay in a rehab center for depression. There is a lot of laughing by the aides, who go on to poke fun at her thoughts …

Thinking through gun laws aimed at mentally ill

Wednesday, April 3rd, 2013

gunlawcrpdSeems like every state has some kind of bill pending that would limit or prohibit ownership of a firearm by a person who has a mental illness.

I looked at Florida’s bill last night and did a Homer Simpson “D’oh” after reading it. You know legislation is messed up when it contains phrases like, “as provided in sub-sub-subparagraph b.(II).” What?

The Florida Senate Criminal Justice Committee unanimously approved the NRA-backed measure on Monday. I expect it will move up the food chain fairly quickly and by summer, it will be law.

As someone who has depression, hypomania, alcoholism, a couple of suicide attempts and 12 years of sitting in courtrooms covering humanity’s inhumanity as a reporter for the local newspaper, I would like to weigh in on this bill; It is a subterfuge deliberately created with so many bureaucratic obstacles and constitutional pitfalls that it is destined to fail even if it passes.

The bill (HB 1355) would expand the definition of commitment to a mental institution to include those who voluntarily agree to outpatient or inpatient treatment and would prohibit them from buying guns, applying for or keeping a concealed weapons permit.

Sounds like an admirable thing to do. While the current focus of such laws is to protect us from homicidal, mentally ill “lunatics” (a Wayne LaPierre word – not mine), it will more likely save more lives by preventing suicide, which is far more common among people with mental illnesses than homicide.

The bill requires a “preventative assessment” that enables the state to suspend a person’s right to purchase or possess a gun or ammunition and obtain a concealed weapons permit for at least 90 days after a physician determines they are a threat to themselves or others.

Hurdle #1: The bill requires a physician to notify the Florida Department of Law Enforcement within 24 hours of such a finding. Do you have any idea how many suicidal people end up in emergency rooms having their stomachs pumped after botched suicide attempts? Then there are self-inflicted gunshot wound and wrist slashings.

What about alcohol poisoning and unintended overdoses? These people are …

Teachers: The underpaid, overworked missing link in spotting mentally ill kids

Monday, April 1st, 2013

teachercrpdI started drinking and drugging when I was 14-years-old. I eased into it. I didn’t drink or use drugs everyday and it would take decades before I was. But it definitely started when I was 14. I was a freshman and I did it more to impress the 16-year-old junior I had a crush on that because I wanted to get high.

But as the years went by, I realized that despite the horrific hangovers and drama that followed my drinking bouts – many of them that ended in a blackout – I discovered that for a little while – maybe just a few hours – drinking made me feel good. I did not know that alcohol was a depressant and was making my depression and mania worse. All I knew was that a drink or a joint took away the darkness for awhile.

That is how self-medicating begins. And it will always – ALWAYS – end badly. It did for me.

I am telling you this because we need to screen our youth – all of them – for mental illness and we need to do it in school. Why? Because maybe it would have helped a kid like me. Back in the 1970′s we didn’t know a lot about mental illness, especially in kids. We do now. And we are ignoring the greatest asset we have – teachers – in helping our kids.

Hoping for a Happy Ending
Check out Christine's book!
Hope for a Happy Ending: A Journalist's
Story of Depression, Bipolar and Alcoholism
Christine Stapleton

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  • Kaleb: I am 14 years old and I am feeling GOOD! I ran out of carisoprodol and it’s great. I want to break down...
  • wishing I were different: I so relate to this. How can I be honest and call in work explaining I am paralyzed with...
  • wishing I were different: wow! Thank you so much-all of you for your openness and honesty. I am a 49 year old nurse,...
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  • Greg: I’ve also noticed differences in certain generics. My worst instance of this happened when my pharmacy...
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