Medication

In the last couple of weeks I’ve noticed that everything was getting harder. Just getting through the day is harder when I find it difficult to do practical things like shop or prepare a meal or take out the compost, when I feel sad when people leave,  and feel that old “push push” that I “should” be doing “something worthwhile,”  when I don’t bounce back from small triggers but stay down.  I had lowered my medication from 175 mg of Imipramine to 150 mg over the month of October by taking them alternate days.  From the beginning of November until about a week ago, I was taking 150 mg.  A friend reminded me in December that it could take weeks for the new dose to establish a new blood level.  So I started watching carefully, noticing that my resiliency was still good.  I had two weeks of astonishing happiness after the Winter Solstice at Stanstead.  But then it began to get harder. Many little signs told me that I needed to raise the medication back to 175mg.  Just making the decision helped.  I started feeling better right away, long before the raise could be effective.  In the past, when I’ve had to acknowledge that trying to lower the dose was not working, I felt defeated.  This time it just felt necessary, like going out to sprinkle ice melt on the skating rink of my front walk, instead of expecting myself to negotiate the slippery territory.  When I told my friend Lynelle about raising the medication, she reminded me that, though giving the Megalithic program raises my spirits, it also brings up a lot of old painful feelings from my unsupported childhood.