Last December I came to an intersection in more than one sense of the word: physically, literally, metaphorically, spiritually. Emotionally. I'm speaking also of this actual intersection. So, I come to this intersection and I STOP. I do, of course, because there is a stop sign, but also because you need to look both ways before turning. You need to think about which way you want to go. In this moment, I wanted to go RIGHT in every sense of THAT word. Home was right. My family was right. What was left? Just a long and winding road through a familiar dark wood...a road that I have traversed all of my life.
So there I sat at the intersection of HOME and DARKNESS. I have come to this intersection a myriad of times in my life; I stop every time. I take a pause. On this day I took more of a reflective pit stop. Luckily, you can go hours at times without seeing another car on these roads; I had the time to sit there. So I sat there until I knew exactly which way I was going to go.
I was thinking about an appointment with my doctor that I had the next day...an appointment that my husband had made for me. I was deciding whether to go or to entirely flake out on it in fear. It wasn't a check up...it was a nightmare...or a dream...? I was, at the time, floating head down in a breakdown soup that was possibly 25 years or so in the making. But is that really true? What the fuck is truth anymore? This. THIS is truth.
I'll write about Doctor X and this amazingly awkward adventure more another time because I have been asked too many times about my religious views by him and I want to 'splain that situation. (This nightmare was actually the last appointment I have had with him, I have since switched to his (female) physician's assistant...for many reasons.) So, I already didn't feel comfortable with him, I already knew what the appointment was for and I already knew what he wanted to put me on and what he wanted me to do. I sobbed at that intersection, thinking of Doc X and my husband talking about the past months of my descending mental state and chest pains and all that rot, behind my back, as it were. I, knowing how my husband tends to exaggerate but also knowing how bad I REALLY was at the time, was worried they thought I would hurt my child or something? I did make a slight cry for help, asking my husband to ask Doc X about Deplan, which is a prescription folic acid (B vitamin) he had told me about before. He instead, while at one of his check ups, had got me an appointment for that same week and discussed putting me on Lexapro. Truth is, I can't "fix" myself alone. I've needed help for a long, long time. A window of opportunity was there: therapy and meds. If I went to that appointment, that would be my future. The decision was mine.
And there I was at that intersection, wanting to make it right but having emotional problems with the solution. Therapy wasn't the hard thing to accept, or decision to make. I've always "craved" it in a sense. But, did I really need the use of an antidepressant? I sat at that intersection for a good twenty to thirty minutes crying my fucking eyes out. I had never been to therapy or taken "crazy pills" or any of that, and even though some people are incredibly cavalier about popping their Flintstone meds, ironically, I was raised to not think the answer came in a pill. I thought about my dad and how disappointed he would be, or just the fact that he would disapprove. I didn't want to take them. I knew that pills wouldn't "fix me". I knew that they could only potentially treat the symptoms...but not the causes, suspending any real healing in a faux elation. At least, that's what I thought at the time.
I had been working on myself for years and years and have made continual progress but I had reached a point where I couldn't anymore. My symptoms were worse than my causes. I was seeing the changes in my daughter's behavior before my very own eyes and THE TRUTH was that I was the cause of her negative behavior. I was THE CAUSE coming 'round full circle. I was neck deep in the programmed legacy. I was falling apart. I was in the Dark Night of the Soul. My mind had never been so fucked up. So, I made my choice.
Years from now, I may not be proud of myself for opting for mind pellets, but why should pride keep you from anything that is that important to you? I had been robbed of my full potential long enough and I didn't want to be a victim anymore. I went to the appointment. I accepted a prescription for Lexapro. I agreed to therapy. For my husband and for my innocent daughter, stranded in the storms of this legacy, I decided to go right. For my Self and for myself alone, I chose to go home.
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