Andey Layne

still here

please don't delete me!

posted by: ButterflyLane at 17:56 | link | comments |

Day 109

Yup, it's been forever since I posted, but that's because things are pretty much normal.  Well, normal for me, anyway.  I haven't had many really bad days- although I"ve discovered that if I miss a dose, it seems to hit the next day.  (Mental note to self: Don't forget the damned pills!)

So, the Effexor seems to be working out pretty well.  I'm dealing with life much better, the kids aren't getting to me as much as they used to, and all in all, everything's pretty much okay.

posted by: ButterflyLane at 00:04 | link | comments |
emotional update

Day 21

Well, after several days of not being able to sleep at night- I was literally waking up every fifteen to twenty minutes all night long- I've decided to try switching back to taking the meds in the morning.  Took it at 2 am Wednesday because I'd forgotten to take it at supper, and I actually slept last night.  So, we'll try the morning thing again. 

On an emotional front, I'm actually feeling an improvement.  I haven't been sad or angry in something like four days now.  Sunday I spent part of the day at Mom's, which wasn't too bad- I like spending time with her, but sometimes she can really depress me... this time it wasn't too bad, though.  The rest of the week has been pretty good- I think this stuff is finally working.  Yay!  Still sweating more than normal, but I've lost five pounds, so I don't think I'm going to complain too awful much.  I don't seem to have much of an appetite, either- I'm hardly ever hungry, which makes staying on my diet much easier. 

I go back next week to see the nurse-practitioner again- I think I'm going to suggest staying on this dose for another month since it seems to be working. 

posted by: ButterflyLane at 22:12 | link | comments |
emotional update

Oh, man...

I just had the weirdest experience.  I was standing there, talking to a couple of the ladies I work with, and out of nowhere this wave of incredible sadness just poured over me.  I thiought I was going to start crying standing there- and I have absolutely no idea what caused it.  I still feel down- and knowing that it makes no sense is just making it worse.  The only thing I can think of is that I'd just eaten a piece of chocolate.  A Nestle Crunch Egg- little piece of candy half the size of my thumb.  I cannot possibly be reacting to chocolate.  That's insane.  I'd rather be mad all the time than this sad- it's like my brain isn't quite connected to my body, I'm floating in a sea of sorrow, and I feel sort of buzzed, like I'd been drinking, but without the pleasant feeling.  It's that whole not-quite-with-it, slow to react feeling.  It takes effort to think.  Now the top of my scalp hurts- but that might be because my hair is pulled back. 

I didn't sleep well last night- I took a nap from 7:30 - 9:30 so I could stay awake and watch UFC 3 with Oshu, but then I couldn't go to sleep until 3:30 this morning- even though I was so tired it almost hurt.  So I woke up when the alarm went off, turned the clock off and fell back asleep.  Didn't get back up until 9, even though I woke up every twenty minutes and looked at my watch and thought, "I really need to get up and take the kids to school."  So, I was late to work, Ethel was late to school... and I feel like crap.  Maybe the sleep deprivation is causing the mood swings.  Who knows.

posted by: ButterflyLane at 10:08 | link | comments |
emotional update

Day Fourteen

Wow.  I've been on this stuff for two weeks now.  Not sure how much of an effect it's having yet.  I know it can take four to eight weeks to work, but shouldn't I be seeing something by now?  Okay, so I've not been quite as depressed part of the time, but I"m still angry a lot.  Sort of a low-level simmer.  Picked George up at daycare and his teacher had left the coloring sheet they were supposed to do today with a note saying 'color both sides and return' and I got absolutely pissed.  Who the hell does she think she is, giving my son homework when she's too fucking dumb to even teach the D'Nealian manuscript?  The school districts here all use D'Nealian, but she's still teaching block letter printing.  This classroom is a joke- they have little notes all over the room labeling things like the door, the book corner, the blocks... and the pencil sharpener one is misspelled.  Okay, I freely acknowledge that I am far from perfect, but come on!  Don't you think it's a good idea to make sure things are spelled right if you're gonna post them?  The notes they send home are misspelled sometimes too.  I confess, I have never really liked these teachers- so maybe I'm over-reacting, but still... it drives me nuts that these idiots are teaching my son- and teaching him wrong, at that.  I can't wait until they move him to the next classroom.

Lately I haven't been depressed as much, but I've been angry more.  Or maybe I'm just noticing the anger more because I'm actually paying attention to my emotions.  I got pretty mad at Oshu early this morning- he got drunk last night, which wouldn't be such a big deal, except that he spilled sugar all over the kitchen making kool-aid, then spilled the kool-aid all over the living room carpet.  The kicker, though, was that he's been talking about how we don't spend time together on Thursdays like we used to, so I told him last night that I wanted to go for a hike in the park today.  Then he buys a fifth of booze, drinks most (if not all) of it, and stays up all night playing video games on the Xbox 360 with one of his friends.  In my mind, staying up all night makes it seem pretty unlikely that he's going to want to get up and go hiking with me.  Not to mention the whole booze thing.  As if that wasn't enough, he woke George up at 5 this morning to get him to watch MacGyver with him, and then told me to my face that George was already awake.  Well, I was awake, and I heard him go wake our son up.  When he drinks, he becomes a compulsive liar- which makes me think that he probably lies a lot when he's sober, he just hides it better.  I know he lies to me, I've caught him plenty of times- it just doesn't seem worth fighting about. 

When I asked him this afternoon to clean up the sugar, he started bitching about how there are grosser things than sugar on the floor, that it looks like shit.  Well, I told him if it bothered him he could mop it.  Needless to say, he certainly didn't mop the floor- he only did a half-assed job of cleaning up the sugar. 

So, after he finally woke up today, we went for a walk around the apartment complex, and he kept picking on me.  He called me Rainman, retarded, and I don't remember what else.  He says insulting things to me all the time, and it really hurts my feelings, but he thinks he's being funny.  So today I told him that he was being mean, and that he always said mean things to me, and he got mad and started pouting- said he'd just be totally humorless and boring and then we'd enver have any fun.  I pointed out that I don't find being made fun of all that fun, and that just made him madder.  Well, tough.  I'm tired of being talked down to, and made fun of, and belittled, and I'm not going to take it anymore.  It's just that simple.  I deserve better than to be treated like a slightly dim child.  I am an adult, and a relatively intelligent one, at that.  He will either stop treating me this way, or I'll leave him.  No, fuck that, I'll kick him out. 

He says he's going to start school this fall- if he doesn't it's over.  I'm not going to play this game any more.  I'm only still with him because it wouldn't be fair to disrupt his life like that when he's finally going to try to do something positive with himself. 

posted by: ButterflyLane at 23:55 | link | comments |
emotional update

Day Twelve

Another boring day.  Got to spend some time talking with a friend who lives in the same complex as I do.  We took the kids to the playground and let them run.  I told her I'm a little worried that once the meds start working I might decide I don't want to be married anymore.  That's pretty much what happened to my mom- she started thinking straight and realized that dad waws making her miserable.  Admittedly, Oshu has a lot to do with making me miserable, but he makes me happy, too.  My friend said that I needed to decide whether the good outweighs the bad.  Most of the time I think it does, but some days I'm not sure.  I'm not sure I'll ever forgive him for some of the things he has said and done over the years, and I'm not sure I want to keep living with the constant reminder of those things.  Sigh.  This stuff is hard.

Like right now?  I called his work half an hour ago, and they said he'd already left.  Well, he's had enough time to get home, so where is he?  When something like this happens, I wonder where he is, what he's doing, and who he's doing it with.  When I go anywhere that isn't the usual schedule, I tell him or he gets mad.  Oh, hell, it seems like he gets mad if I go anywhere when he's home, unless it's school, work or Walmart.  It takes an act of Congress for me to go do something that doesn't involve him, and even then he pouts.  I very, very rarely get to spend time with my friends without the kids along- and if I do it's most likely because I do it during school hours when I should be doing homework. 

I feel like a prisoner in my own life.  That sounds so melodramatic, but it's true.  If I want someone to come visit, I have to plan it for when he's at work- but he can invite his buddy up to stay for a week straight?  There's something wrong with that.

I'm mad at him for guilt-tripping me into buying the Xbox 360.  Especially since my car broke a couple weeks later and we'd have had the money to fix it if we hadn't bought the game system.

Physical symptoms: Still sweating like a pig.  (Yuck.)

Current Dose: Effexor XR 75mg/day

posted by: ButterflyLane at 20:34 | link | comments |
emotional update

Day whatever it is... oh, Eleven

Today has been an okay day.  No real emotional extremes... it's just been quiet.  Registered for my Summer Session classes.  I've switched back to taking the meds with supper, it seemed to work better- taking it in the morning seemed to make me really sleepy.  I have done some research on Effexor, and I certainly hope this stuff works because it sounds like a bitch to stop taking- nasty withdrawal side effects.  Eek.  Also found out that sweating is a side effect, but it usually disappears after about three weeks.  (Yay!) 

Physical symptoms:  None I've noticed today.

Current Dose: Effexor XR 75mg/day

posted by: ButterflyLane at 21:42 | link | comments |
emotional update

Day Ten

Yeah, I know, I skipped a few days.  Haven't had the urge to blog.  Haven't had the urge to do much of anything.  I've still been feeling this low-level anger/sadness/general pissyness off and on all week.  Yesterday was a doozy.  Did the baby shower, which was a nightmare because Oshu kept bitching at me for doing it, Mom didn't show up until 2:15 because she had Critter, and J spent the whole day babbling about what a loser Critter's dad is.  Well, she's the dumbass that chose to reproduce with him, so I don't want to hear it anymore. 

So, after several hours of frantically making sure everything was ready, and then another two hours of being 'hostess' at the shower, and then an hour or so of cleanup (which J skipped out on because she'd spent the night before with her boyfriend and was exhausted), I was in an unbelievably bad mood.  I was bouncing back and forth between so mad I could just throw things, and so emotional I wanted to cry, at the rate of a switch every two and a half minutes or so.  Mom came over so that I could do her taxes, but I couldn't find part of her paperwork, so instead we did my dishes and she listened to me rant... until her partner in crime (one of her sisters) called and invited herself over.  I hung up the phone, looked at mom and asked why I can't say 'No, this isn't a good time' when someone calls.  Still haven't figured that one out.  Oh well. 

Then Oshu called and I told him I wasn't having a very good day, and his response was, "Well, now I just don't want to come home because I just don't know how to deal with you when you get like that."  He also called my mom a bitch for putting the baby shower on me- which made me really mad- and I told him I was cleaning so he started in about how I shouldn't pile stuff everywhere.  He isn't exactly on my list of favorite people today.  Then again, nobody is.  I'm angry with just about everyone I know for something.  I can only think of a few people I'm not angry at... actually, I'm angry with my family, and his family, and him, and the people I work with, and most of the world.  I'm not angry at my friends, all two of them, because they don't use me.  They actually seem to care about me, and support me, and they don't expect me to solve their problems- although I'd be happy to do anything I could to help them when they have problems, or at least listen to them and sympathise... and all of that sounded so whiny that I want to smack myself. 

I get the feeling that today is going to be another one of those days... and I'm supposed to go to Grandma and Grandpa Z's for a birthday party this afternoon, but I don't think I'm going.  I need a day to stay home and not be sociable.  Friday I was finishing up for the baby shower, and then we had the Brownie tea party (and there was a tornado warning so we had to take all the girls to the basement), and yesterday was the baby shower, and today I'm just staying home, dammit.  I don't have it in me to be friendly right now.  I can't muster up a single shred of willpower to get myself and the kids ready, put on a happy face, and go to a family function where everyone will ask me 'Where's Oshu?  Where is he working now?  How much longer do you have in school?"  He's at work.  (Well, he will be by then) He works the same place he has for six years now.  I have another year for my bachelors and then two for my masters.  Same answers I give every time.  I'd love to see Grandma and Grandpa, but I just can't face the rest of the family right now.  Maybe once the meds start working better I can deal with them, but today, after everything else that's gone on this weekend already, I just don't have it in me. 

Right now, I'm going to go sweep and mop my kitchen floor.  Maybe that will make me feel a little better.  I'll do a couple loads of laundry, do homework for tomorrow's Sociology class, and maybe even take a nap.  Yeah right.  Ain't gonna happen- besides, I'd like to get some sleep tonight, so I better not nap. 

I'll be back to bitch later.  :)

Physical symptoms:  Oh, I forgot- I think the meds are making me sweat uncontrollably.  I actually had to come home Friday and change my shirt because I'd sweated so much.  I generally do not sweat.  I spent 20 minutes on an exercise bike, riding at a good clip, and didn't break a sweat two weeks ago.  Now I walk outside in 70 degree weather and have to change my shirt?  WTF?  I have to reapply deodorant twice a day.  This is gross.

Current dose:  Effexor XR 75mg/day

posted by: ButterflyLane at 10:35 | link | comments |
emotional update

Day Four/Five

Decide to lay off the caffeine.  Only had one can of pop all day Monday.  Fell asleep at 10:30 and slept until 7:15.  Still woke up tired (probably because I woke up every two or three hours all night for some reason).  Only had one can today, too.  Still groggy.  I feel a little numb today- nothing is really touching me.  Of course, I've felt like this plenty of times without the meds, so I'm not sure what it means.  Just thought I'd mention it.

Physical symptoms:  headache most of the day- probably from caffeine withdrawal.

Current dose:  Effexor XR 37.5mg/day

posted by: ButterflyLane at 22:18 | link | comments |

Day Three

Well, last night was a doozy.  Went to bed, tried to fall asleep, but had what almost seemed like a mild panic attack.  I was obsessing about the bills, and the fact that the car needs $460 worth of repairs, and I completely panicked.  I ended up getting up and doing laundry until 7:30 in the morning because I just couldn't lay there for another minute and let it swirl around in my head.  Oshu came down at 7:30 and I was sitting in the livingroom floor trying to unravel a yarn knot.  I'd spent almost two hours fooling with the same bunch of yarn.  It's not even good quality yarn- it's cheap coarse stuff.  Why I was so obsessed with untangling it I have no idea.  He is afraid that the sleeplessness is a side effect of the meds, but I'm hoping it's just the masses of pop I drank yesterday.  Anyway, I figure I'll see how it goes for a few more days before I blame the meds.  Its not like I haven't had nights like that before, anyway. 

Other than that, today was a pretty good day.  No extremes, cranky, weepy or otherwise.  I hav decided to cut back on my caffeine consumption.  If one of the side effects turns out to be insomnia, I don't need to make it worse by overdosing on caffeine. 

Physical symptoms:  Tired, but otherwise feeling pretty good.  A little foggy-headed, but I assume that's from lack of sleep.

Current dose: Effexor XR 37.5mg/day

posted by: ButterflyLane at 21:41 | link | comments |
emotional update

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