Thursday, November 11, 2010

Dread Attack (Dosage)

I had a dread attack yesterday.
 It's different from a panic attack.
With a panic attack you have great uncertainty and great anxiety.  
With dread you have great anxiety because you are certain that things are going to suck.


Thanks to the average half-lives and known times-to-stable-blood-level for Prozac, I can be pretty sure that it will take at least a week from when I change my dose to when the shit hits the fan, for better or for worse.

The last few weeks,
ever since I stopped having visions of offing myself,
I've had mini-explosions going off in my legs whenever I sit still or lie down.
         ( I can't explain why I don't get them when I'm working online...
                             it's very suspicious.)
Having the sensation of bugs running around inside your thighs is
               not fun, whatever Timothy Leary says.

Especially if it means you never get a good night's sleep.
The word of the middle-of-the-night is.... side effects!
So I lowered my Prozac dose, first from
             20mg to 15mg, then down to
             10 a little over a week ago.

Yesterday I got creeping dread, this feeling of hurtling toward another major fucking depression
   (depression being a hole in the ground) and
               not being able to slow



             down.
Not yet completely depressed,
                but feeling it coming, and knowing that even if I
                        increase the dose again it won't help for at least
a week.

3 comments:

  1. Oh shit, I know the feeling; I've just never put such an eloquent name to it. But sometimes upping your meds can have an immediate placebo effect, no? I hope that's the case this time!

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  2. I am an old friend your brother, Jeremy from Rochester. I am a mental health therapist. I, too, was recently diagnosed with Bi-polar II after years of being told I had MDD. It was such a relief(so far) to get on a med reg ( Lamictal, Prozac 20 and PRN Klonapin) that has been working for 8 months. I went through 4 psychiatrists before someone said my anxiety and irritability were actually hypo mania. I wish you the best with the management of this crappy illness... Megan Papponetti

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  3. Dread attack, fits way better. Hope you are having some sparkling moments.

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