“Strange Days” or “My Week Without My Meds”

Let’s start with the idea that, being honest, there is a stigma for anyone who is taking “meds.” I’ve witnessed the strange looks that my friends with diabetes have gotten as they have done their glucose tests. I have friends who have clinical depression and are on medications for their depression, and anytime that it comes up, they are looked upon with derision, and people shrink away. These folks are fine people — Ted Bundy they ain’t.

As for me, I suffered from a traumatic brain incident in early 2014. It has been almost 5 full years since it has happened, and I have spent most of the time since then on medication to regulate my neurochemicals. It took me a little while to accept that I needed the meds — I have a degree in Psychology, and I am a huge proponent of seeing people take care of themselves, so I hate the stigma. Contrariwise, I have never been OK with the idea of taking meds. I’ve had major surgery and not taken anything stronger than Tylenol. I do not like meds when it comes to myself, and I have to be seriously ill in order to take them. Even cold medicine. So it took me some amount of time to accept my limitations and then to embrace the necessity for medication. What I take amounts to the equivalent of insulin or synthroid for my brain. I know it sounds like a denial, but I’ll be frank — I’ve had episodes of depression years ago, I’ve been to therapy long before the traumatic brain incident (TBI), and I’ve been to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to help me adapt to the “new” way of living after the TBI.

CBT helped me arrive at the conclusion that I was not going to regain that which I had lost. While in comparison, what I had lost was not that much, it was enough. I had an argument once with someone who denied the damage that I had incurred due to the TBI. She had a friend who had wrapped his car around a telephone pole, and he had suffered massive brain damage, so in her eyes and by her comparison, there was nothing wrong with me. I used the analogy of an amputee to try to explain to her the extent of my injury and loss.

• Her friend had lost his entire left arm due to his car accident.
• A stroke victim might have lost her entire left hand.
• I only lost a couple of fingers on my left hand (I am right-handed), although I am a concert pianist and I am expected to continue to play with 3 fingers but with the same skill and prowess as when I had 5 fingers.
  
  And there is a lot that I've lost, skills and abilities that I may never regain. Sometimes, it is still a difficult thing to accept.

Bring us to recent times, as I am taking the medication, I learned a few important details regarding how it functions in my brain. Caffeine, for instance, has a cumulative effect, and physically builds up in my brain, so I get the whole “ninjas-on-the-lawn” thing going for me after about a week or so of heavy coffee consumption.
(WARNING: Strong language ahead)

Although, admittedly, I am not nearly as funny as that fine gentleman.

Other stimulants produce a similar result. As I stated in my post from a a few days ago (https://steemit.com/writing/@phoenix32/2019-the-year-of-the-mucus), I’ve been having sinus congestion like you wouldn’t believe. When I had the infections at the turn of the year, I was given prednisone, and that really played merry hob with my sleeping when taken in conjunction with my normal meds. I had consulted my doctor regarding my normal medication and skipping it in light of the other stimulants and she instructed me that, in my particular instance, skipping my normal meds so as to not be over-stimulated was advisable. Bearing that in mind, as I was taking Mucinex DM, I decided that being overly-stimulated was a bad idea, so I followed her advice regarding skipping. So I spent a week without taking my normal meds and instead crutching along on the stimulants that would help clear my sinuses.

And boy, let me tell you, there is NO substitute for the real deal, ladies and gentlemen.

My decision-making process was fairly straight-forward. I found myself at odds with the different needs of my body:

• Taking my meds alone would have helped my mental state, but the constant flow of snot would have continued unabated
• Taking my meds and the Mucinex DM would have helped my mental state and stemmed the flow of snot, but would have made me way too hyper and irritable, thus offsetting the benefits of my neuro-meds.
• Taking only the Mucinex DM would have helped my sinus issues and would give me enough stimulant to compensate, at least temporarily.

Option “C” proved to be fruitful, to a degree.

The first day was Sunday a week prior. I managed to get through Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service, and my slowness and impairment was due more to being sick than to skipping my meds. I knew that I would have a couple of good days left in me before I would begin to notice a difference.

Tuesday presented itself in the usual manner, and I was still fighting the mucus and able to function in class, my independent study with the Rabbi, and my evening class as well. Granted, I was exhausted by the end of it, but the cause of that might have been more than the absence of my meds and the stress of functioning without them.

Wednesday was proving to be a bit more difficult, but a full night’s sleep was helpful.

But towards the end of the week, I was not feeling great. Thursday was tougher, for sure. My brain was not firing on all cylinders — I was slower, my retention was lowered, and I was rather grateful that my Friday schedule tends to be mostly empty in terms of academics. Not that I accomplished much of anything for my reading and homework for the other classes. My attention span was almost non-existent, and my ability to focus and concentrate was downgraded to that of a Neanderthal.

Come Sunday morning, I was feeling it. I didn’t like the way that I was feeling, but just as importantly I didn’t like the way that I was thinking. It wasn’t the thoughts that were in my head — those, thankfully, were healthy — but it was the way that the thoughts were flying about.

It’s hard to latch onto the one that you need when they are flitting about randomly and wildly.

Today is Day 2 being back on my meds, and I can feel a particular clarity that I was missing come the end of last week. The last week was a real and condensed version of what I went through initially with the TBI.

• I had a period of physical recovery during which I was exhausted easily and not well.
• I chalked up my exhaustion and inability to focus to the physical issues and tried to address them with better diet and a proper sleep schedule.
• I realized that, as the physical issues abated, I was still having difficulty with concentrating.

This “accidental experiment,” if you will, allowed me to confirm that which I already knew about my initial journey after surviving the TBI, and it was gratifying to know that I was correct. It was also good to know that I could go for a couple of days without my meds in the event of an emergency, and that there is a quasi-substitution in the form of coffee or other the side effects of medicines for other physical issues. Not that I would ever suggest to anyone to EVER change up their medication without consulting with a doctor. Check my statement a few paragraphs up regarding consulting your doctor. And I would not have even considered proceeding as I did if not for the advice and recommendations of my doctor.