19 days ago I started taking Lexapro. I tried to come up with some witty way to start this blog. Some way to lighten the paragraphs that follow. I considered talking about the time I stayed up all night concerned that there were no clean sock in the house. Or how I’ve managed to create 10,000 small To Do piles all over the house untouched for months now and how they’ve started to grow and multiply on their own, creating little ecosystems and flourishing societies…

SEE? That’s how I “deal”. I try to fight a disease with humor and denial.

Five years ago before my first, and undoubtedly my worst, bout of depression, I’d have told you that it was a ‘head trip’. I didn’t understand how anybody could actually BE depressed. You have ups and downs. You grieve, you yell, you have a bad day… it’s a process right? But at the end, there’s always… normalcy? Even as I watched my mom drop 60 pounds in six months and lose the ability to function well enough to complete the most simple tasks, I didn’t believe it was caused by something other than her unwillingness to just DEAL with the cards she had been delt.

That month or two before I move up here to San Jose were the darkest months in my life. I look back now and there are entire days I don’t remember. They are just.. black. I can remember laying on the couch one morning and wondering how long I had been there, what was going on around me, how long did the lapse last this time. People told me about conversations I never remembered having. Cassidy would be wearing clothes I didn’t remember buying. Thank God I’d moved into my mom’s for the transition from there to here.

I remember very clearly however sitting on the couch one night at 4am after not having slept for what seemed like days and days and really thinking ‘How much longer can I live like this? How much longer can I hurt like this? How much longer am I going to punish myself for everything that has gone wrong? How do I STOP this?’ But even then, I didn’t see the depression. I thought, like I always had, that in a few days things would be better. It was just a funk. The distant light at the end of the tunnel was just a mirage placed there to suck me farther and farther into a painful darkness.

When I finally got onto Zoloft after months of denying there was even a problem in the first place it was such a wonderful relief. I’d fought myself up from that dark place but I was still too far from the light. I was just close enough to have moments of clarity, but never close enough to feel certain that I was thinking rationally. Zoloft fixed that. But not unlike a lot of people that suffer depression, the first time around I got better and quit taking the meds. I figured I’d gotten out of the funk. I was done being depressed!!

What a pipe dream.

From Depression.com:

A normally functioning brain is a giant messaging system that controls everything from your heartbeat, to walking, to your emotions. The brain is made up of billions of nerve cells called neurons. These neurons send and receive messages from the rest of your body, using brain chemicals called neurotransmitters.

These brain chemicals—in varying amounts—are responsible for our emotional state. Depression happens when these chemical messages aren’t delivered correctly between brain cells, disrupting communication.

Think of a telephone: if your phone has a weak signal, you may not hear the person on the other end. Their communication is muted or unclear.

Serotonin is one of these neurotransmitters. Most antidepressant medications (called Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors or SSRI’s) block receptor sites from absorbing serotonin too quickly which creates a shortage. The shortage caused by these receptor’s means that the brain can’t send and receive messages the way it should. Depression explained.

I can’t control the depression. That’s a big pill to swallow for somebody that likes to control EVERYTHING. I have a chemical imbalance that, at least for right now, can only be controlled by medicine.

The most recent bout probably became “bad” a few months ago. I don’t really need to go into the details here because it’s not the journey that got me to this point that matters. It’s the journey that I’m on now. Plus, I’m sure that the gossipers will be able to come up with much more entertaining stories than the truth anyway. And that’s fine. This is not something I’m ashamed of. It’s not something to explain why things went they way they did with them the last few months (although I’m sure it will be used as such).

I’m getting better. The biggest boost I got was the other day when Ben told me (without me asking) that he could tell the difference. My fuse is much longer, my thought are much clearer and the sky is a magnificent shade of blue.

And my closet is so organized and clean that you are all totally jealous.

Last night my mom was about 30 miles north of Sacramento at about 6:00PM traveling south to come home when traffic stopped. SHE stopped but unfortunately, the guy in the Chevy truck behind her did not. It was an old Chevy truck. The kind that are made with steel forged from a mountain of Gods. The kind that can hit a car that’s rolling at about 5-10 MPH at almost full freeway speed and drive away practically unscathed. So, a tank.

He swerved last minute to miss my mom and took out her drivers side rearend, pushing her into the car in front of her, and finally coming to a stop about 4-5 car lengths in front of her on the left shoulder. Thank God he had the presence of mind to swerve. Had he hit her full force at that speed, she’d probably be seriously injured.

AAA towed her the 130 miles back to San Jose and I met them at the Ford dealership to drive her home. She tried to convince me she’d just call a cab!! AS IF! She seemed okay. A little shook up, still pretty much in shock, but okay. I tried to convince her to let me take her to the hospital to get checked out but she said she just wanted to go home. BUT! She promised me that as soon as she had a rental car today she’d drive over to Kaiser.

As soon as I got her first call after the accident, I completely lost my appetite. Part of the reason I insisted on going to pick her up was because I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat or sleep till I knew she was okay. As soon as I got out of the car I walked up to her and gave her a big, long hug. It scared me. It was one of those reminders to hug your mom more often.

When I called this morning she said her shoulder is a little sore and she has a headache but she’s promised me that Kaiser trip again as soon as she gets her rental car.

I ended up grabbing some McDonalds after I dropped her off and ate it at around midnight. BIG MISTAKE. My belly is pissed. So now I’m off to consume obscene amounts of coffee to try to stay awake for the next 6 hours…

All pics: here.

This weekend was so fantastic. If not for the 4.5 hour drive home I’d do it again and again. And again. I don’t realize just HOW MUCH I miss Carrielee till I get to see her. It kills me to have to look at her big, beautiful brown eyes and tell her that we HAVE to go because we have two kitty’s and a very hawt man waiting for us the across the desert and over the mountain.

But my belly is sore from laughing at the two of those clowns all weekend. And Amber! Man, when we get together I think we literally make up for months of missed conversation in a DAY! We immdeiately fall back into that friendship like it was just yesterday that we saw eachother last.

In time, when I’m well enough to talk about things without the twinge of the sickness I’m fighting I’ll have to post about the BBQ. With the ex. And his girlfriend. And the wake up call that smacked me in the face when I saw how Cassidy was effected by us just BEING there together with no interaction at all. It made me realize we have issues we need to work on with her. Issues that I can’t even begin to solve right now because I’m just not in the correct frame of mind. Doesn’t make sense, it will soon… Hit me like using a 20 pound sledge hammer to crush a peanut.

OH! Kristen! You are a funny drunk. Next time I’ll have to drag Ben down there with me so I can have a few too! OR! You could come up here and we could ALL get hammered and you could crash in the guestroom for the weekend!

Julie! *hugs* ‘Nuff said.

And! Because I’m lazy and tired a visual person and about to fall asleep on the couch while watching Hero’s… a picture post!

Cassidy and Carrielee on the scooter. We gotta get us one of these:

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PEANUT!:

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Silly String is just as much fun as I remember it being:

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PRESENTS!!!

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Heather has grown into a beautiful girl. Like that Audrey Hepburn classic beauty that doesn’t need makeup. Just a smile.

I have a lot to write. A lot to say. But I think I need the weekend to properly form the thoughts into something that doesn’t come across as depressing and vague. Like that sentence. Heh.

The comments are acting wonky. For some reason the time is all off and it’s only allowing one comment then giving a spazztic error saying you can only comment once every 15 seconds. Even though it’s been HOURS since I’ve posted one. I think it’s the sites way of saying, “Stop being a lazy ASS and make me pretty!” So I guess the domain has even less patience than I do. So, it has NONE.

Also, people! Stop coming here and just reading those stupid drama posts. Seriously. Once is enough. They read the same way today as they did a week ago when I posted them. I promise I won’t make any changes to them. Ever. So go start/look for drama on that other forum with your genuine friends. kthxbye.

This theme is back up temporarily till I can get the redesign finished. I actually didn’t work on if for almost a week straight. I’m back at it now though and hopefully I’ll have it up before Friday when I leave for B-Town. This sucks. Because now I can’t give Julie flack for being a slacker.