baby steps

remember in what about bob? when richard dreyfuss tells bill murray to take baby steps and bill (bob) takes him literally and minces through the office, down the hall, into the elevator, etc? i can sort of relate. i broke yesterday into small chunks of time that i could manage; an hour here, a few hours there, a pill here, a nap there, maybe a shower. i made small and stupid goals, one a time and tried not to think any further than i had to, and it seemed to work. my body still feels weird and shakey, but today i'm finding i can sit still through a whole movie, i can think some things all the way through instead of thinking about five million things all at once, and i can focus for more than ten minutes at a time. the truth is, the medication won't kick in all the way for about a week or so, but the difference between today and friday is huge. for one thing, i haven't cried all day. the last two weeks found me crying at least once a day (usually about nothing specific), and the last month or so i've been bursting into tears at random times. this freaked me out because i am a not a big crier, but i couldn't stop it once it started. my mom kept saying to me, "stop with the crying! you can cry when i start acting like a jerk, don't cry because i want to send you money. this is good stuff i'm telling you."

the counselor they sent me to on friday was horrible. she was wearing sandals without socks and had these awful raggedy toenails, and i was sitting there trying to explain how my skin hurt and i wanted to crawl out of it and she was recommending some herbal tea. tea is great, i love tea, but all i could do was look at her awful toenails, scratch at my arms, and finally ask, "so you can't prescribe anything, right?" i felt like such a drug-seeking loser right then, but i needed something to help me sleep, something to get me evened out, so that things like herbal tea, relaxation tapes and yoga don't seem to laughable. half an hour into our little meeting i just flat out said, "look, i need to see a doctor. can i write you a check?" i went to the clinic i had been referred to, but they won't see me until the 25th of july. at that moment i had a mini-internal breakdown, looked blankly at this nice guy all tattooed sitting behind a very tall desk and said, "25th? really?" i took the appointment, because i didn't know what to do and thought maybe later this month it will come in handy. i got into my car, cried for a while, then called the agency i worked with in the beginning. i explained that i had been sent to a counselor who was not a doctor, that i didn't know she couldn't help me, that i tried to get an appointment at the place they referred me to but that they won't see me until much later this month, and i'm sorry i'm crying but i feel really crazy and i think i need to see a doctor. this lady, she was a genius. she told me to go to an urgent care clinic, explain that i needed someone to get me on something, and take it from there.

if someone had told me this about a week ago, i would have been thrilled.

the doctor i finally saw was sort of a condescending prick who said to me, "maybe we shouldn't have gone off the meds, should we?" but i could have cared less because he was writing things down on a blue notepad. when he asked me how i was and i told him i was okay he said, "no you aren't okay, or else you wouldn't be here." he was a smart-ass, but i wanted to hug him anyway. the script he wrote was weird though, lots of tranquilizers all at once, ssri's in small groups of five. the ssri's aren't the fun pills, so i'm confused why he was so stingy with them.

i don't know what i'll do the next month. go back to the urgent care clinic when my prescription is up, or go to the other clinic. i still can't think past a few hours here and there, but i feel more like myself every moment. there's a twilight zone marathon on the scifi channel, and i'm knitting a baby blanket and feeling like tomorrow might not be horrible. i'm not looking forward to going back to work, but i think i'll be better at it than i have been for a long time. baby steps.