On A Scale of 1-10...

Every time I see my psychiatrist, she asks me to rate how I've been feeling on a scale of one to ten, with ten being the best I can possibly feel (without being manic, I assume).  I've been giving myself a seven normally, since I've been doing better and not crying all the time or not interacting with my children like before.  Like I mentioned in my last post, I don't feel sad.  When I told her I felt "not sad" all the time, she told me that wasn't a seven.  When I told my husband about the conversation, he was surprised that I'd been saying seven, too.  He said that I've always been a four or five; never over a six.

Anything under a six sounds so low to me, as if one should be crying much of the time.  Six still sounds kinda low to me.  I don't feel tremendous pain anymore.  I'd like to feel happy, but if I did I'd be a ten then.  So, is that really all that far from seven?  My husband educated me.  If I feel not happy, not sad, then that's middle of the road and pretty much a five.  I never thought about it like that.

See, I'm not the histrionic type.  I have a high pain threshold, which I guess includes emotional pain as well as physical pain.  I've never been able to answer the pain chart question for physical pain, either.  It confuses me.  After I had my kids, each time my doctor would come in surprised that I wasn't asking for pain meds.  Sure, I didn't feel like I could run a marathon or anything, but the pain wasn't so bad that I needed even a Tylenol.  She forced a prescription for Darvocet on me all three times I went home with a new bundle.  I never filled the first prescription.  I did the other two, because after a bout with meningitis, I found out how handy a bottle of Darvocet can be.  At any rate, I never took pain meds for post-natal pain (and I had good size kids).  I don't whine about being in pain.  I will say something about it, but I don't moan or writhe about, etc. etc.

I guess it's the same with my current state.  I'm just glad that I'm not as low as I was before and that translates to a pretty good score to me.  I guess I need clarification on that scale thingy so I can give more reliable information.  Who knows, I might be able to feel better than I imagine I can.

I am still having issues taking all these meds though.  The other night it was very frustrating to me.  The side effects have been tempting me to just stop taking them.  I'm tired of having no coordination in my left hand, being uber-sleepy every afternoon after 4pm, having a diminished libido, having dry mouth, grinding my teeth, and not being able to sleep without an Ambien.  I'm also just tired of gobbling a handful of pills every morning, trying not to take the wrong amount of certain pills (which I have done a couple times).  They make me feel blunted, it seems, and I'm quite tired of that too.  I want to feel like me again.  I said to my husband that maybe that me isn't so great of a person, but at least I know who she is and what she feels like. 

Obviously there are greater concerns about me going off my meds than me just being unstable and subject to being manic or depressed again.  There's the whole possibility of another psychotic break now.  As I've said before, I won't stop taking my meds ever.  I have a firm commitment to my family that I will not break.  It just gets tough sometimes, and I get tempted.  Besides, I wouldn't have the first idea as to how to wean myself off all this crap safely, and it would probably take too long for my taste if I even tried.  Yes, I've thought about it, but that's just part of the frustrated feeling.  I haven't given up on feeling better than this yet.  Talk to me in about six months though.  This could get harder if nothing changes.  I will have to find some deeper inner strength to get through that, because there are certain medications that I flat-out refuse to take.  (Any of the medications that cause weight gain).  That is the only way I will become a difficult or non-compliant patient.  For now, I'll just keep the faith I have.  Everything has worked so far.  If I ultimately have to settle for not sad, then I may have to do just that.