It is saturday afternoon and I am thinking about how I was when I last worked regular and how I am now, I am now 5 days into full dose on escitalopram and have had it in my system for 10 days and it is difficult to gauge it's effect though taking yesterday as an example I was able to be a little active and I put up some shelves at my dads house and did a few other things, also I was able to get by on just 2mg of diazepam and a half dose of nite nurse and I did not have a panic attack and I had some general anxiety but all in all if I compare myself to when I was working and living a full busy life I was much calmer and more together than I was back then. One of the main reasons for this is continued sobriety as it is now 11 days since my last panic stricken day which is also the last time I had a drink which was 8 pints of lager, so there is a huge cause of my panic attacks - alcohol - the stuff which was also the main stay of everything that I enjoyed in my life.
My life used to follow a pattern of finish work on friday and a few pints down the pub after work then binge drink at my pc in chat till sleep, wake on saturday in extreme anxiety and drink saturday away in the pub and at my pc until sunday when in more anxiety I would struggle thru the day and maybe have 2 cans to calm myself down followed by a terrible sunday nites sleep and anxiety on monday morning and the physical and mental activity of working as a joiner would work the bad adrenalin out of my system and I would lock into a system where I would work the week with underlying anxiety which was mainly caused by smoking and caffeine, but I was always busy and the adrenalin was worked out and I didnt have time to sit around thinking and in the evening I was hungry so I ate and I was glad of something good on tv to watch and glad of my pc for some chat and happy to put my head on my pillow to sleep cos I was tired.
But I always had a feeling inside me of de pers' and de real' lurking below the surface which caused me anxiety and also a feeling that my life was not how I wanted it to be and that I wanted more which caused a different set of anxiety which then every friday would explode in a binge on alcohol as I seeked to escape.
Now my life is empty and I do nothing or very little but drink tea smoke cigs and sit at my pc and watch tv in the evening under the drowsy effect of a half nite nurse before turning to chat in the late hrs until I sleep at maybe at 3 or 4am.
I do have things that I need to do, proper real things that would take up my full day, things that would improve the quality of my life today and improve my life in the future, but I just dont do them, I just think about doing them and self watch for signs of improvement in myself.
I seem to have some sort of crazy notion that the clouds will suddenly part and all will be sunny and I will spring into life then when I wake in the morning and it hasnt happened I feel despondent and downhearted then anxious then the de pers' and de real' sets in and I repeat the same pattern of the previous days and months.
My fact is that I am now in pretty good shape mentally, I suffer from de pers' and de real' and anxiety which are multiplied by my inactivity and when I have returned to work before after time off I have been quaking in my boots with worry over whether I could cope but its always helped, hasnt made it perfect, but it has distracted me from myself and made me busy.
The fact is I may have depression and anxiety but the fact is also that I am quite lazy and very undisciplined and only the outside motivation of a job will force me to do the things that help me feel better.
I am wanting to set myself a target of returning to work after easter week which will be the 21st of april which will have given me 4 weeks on full meds dose and if 4 wks from now I am waking up on a saturday morning sober and refreshed from a good nites sleep then that will have been a good week when I will have been forced to be active and for which I will be rewarded with money and only then will I be able
Reply With Quote
