Still alive and still taking her meds

It's been pointed out that I haven't spent much time talking about eating disorders here lately... I know that I have, and that in doing so I've really kinda been skirting my original purpose for this blog. Really... No good reasons or excuses.

I guess that with how things have been going lately I've been rather distracted from any of my life purposes beyond those basic survival instinct dealies. Additionally, internet access has gotten sketchy again (sigh...screw you, Amber) so I'm not as up-to-date on information like I used to be, or at least used to try to be. I don't want Novare to fall by the wayside but at the same time, right now it looks like trying to keep on keeping on has to be my main focus.

...You know, I really don't have much of a life to write about at present.

When I'm not working I hang around the house all day like a lonesome, whiny puppy dog impatiently awaiting the people's return. I watch CNN and LOGO and sometimes a movie or two. Read Borges and crochet, write in my journal and draw. Stare at walls a lot. Dismally ponder the lonely depths of despair. Things like that. ^.^ I need to be rich and have good insurance so that I can be on the appropriate medications at the appropriate dosages at the appropriate times. Instead of, you know, being all depressed now, needing them, and weaning myself off them because I can't afford them.

By the way? I'd just like to say one thing about medication and depression, or medication and mental illness in general. I don't care how many times you've heard this from how many sob cases or doctors you think are quacks, but mental illness is legitimate illness. True, maybe it isn't caused by an identifiable pathogen. Neither is diabetes, Lupus, cancer, arthritis, Lou Gehrig's disease, asthma, multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, and on and on and on. That doesn't make those diseases any less legitimate in your mind, does it?

The body falls apart in a myriad of different ways. Sometimes bodies are born with deformities and genetic defects which cause significant impairments to a person's quality of life. Men and women suffer from infertility, yet we see it appropriate to treat that. We see treatment as being appropriate for headaches, for allergies, unwanted zits, astigmatism, fatigue, insomnia. Almost all things physical which can be naturally impaired are deemed in need of treatment. (I won't go into details, but, Viagra?) So why is it that people continue to hold on to outdated beliefs about the treatment of mental illness??

...Taking a moment to breathe, here...

I'm not saying stop your asthma treatment or throw out your eyeglasses, because I see those treatments as being appropriate and necessary! In fact, I find treating your depression, panic disorder, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, etc, etc, as being just as vital as treating any other physical ailment. If anything, treating them may be more vital than many physical ailments. It's a lot easier to live through those zits or live through that obnoxious hay fever than to survive suicidal depression or manic psychosis.

Yes, the first course of action in treating many mental illnesses should be talk therapy (or religious therapy, whatever you want). Just like the first response for a mild headache should be sucking it up. However, if things get out of hand and the person can barely make it out of bed anymore because the world feels too heavy and their thoughts too dismal, maybe medication should be legitimately prescribed.

And maybe, the person taking that medication needs it. Maybe they're not just taking some drug each day like popping happy pills.

Hell, if it was that simple, I'd say screw Welbutrin and give me some weed. Chances are it'd be cheaper and have less long-term damage on my liver.

(Says Crystal in awesomely witty postscript: "So Bush, you have a choice: legalize pot or provide universal health care.")