Treated, Never Cured

When people talk about anxiety, they talk about the restlessness, the nervousness, the panic. When they talk about depression, they talk about the sadness, the hopelessness, the boredom. What a lot of people fail to talk about is the anger. The feelings of rage that spring up out of nowhere and obliterate all reason. This rage is familiar to me. This rage and anger, coupled with the feelings of anxiety and depression, has been with me my whole life. When I was young, and my mind was not yet filled with the angst of the teenage years, I remember the anger and the anxiety manifesting itself in my father. To a younger version of me, I didn’t always recognize the anger and anxiety as something to be worried about.

When I entered the perilous times of my teenage years, I started noticing I was losing a lot of hair. Not the normal couple of strands that fall out in the shower or when I brushed my hair, but clumps when I put my hair into a ponytail. At this same time, I started sleeping a lot more, and my mom was getting concerned about my irrational fits of anger. This worried my mother, and she took me to my pediatrician, where he told her to take me to a psychologist. I thought I was fine, and was against speaking to a doctor about the things that I believed were perfectly normal. The psychologist diagnosed me with general anxiety disorder and clinical depression, and recommended to my doctor that I be medicated in the same way as my father. I was receptive to this at first, remembering to take my medicine every day and I started to see an improvement. I felt better all around; I wasn’t as tired, I found enjoyment in more things, I was hanging out with my friends more often. Life was good for a little, and I felt that I was better. So I stopped taking my medicine, without the advice from my doctor or my family. My reasoning was, that if I was feeling this good, then the drugs must have done their job and made me better. Of course, this was not the case, and my depression and anxiety came back full force. I couldn’t get out of bed, and would sleep all night and take long naps during the day. I couldn’t get my homework done at home because of this, and would rush to do it all at school or not do it at all. I wasn’t interested in doing anything with my friends or with my family. Activities that I used to enjoy, such as reading and going to my grandma’s house every Sunday, were uninteresting and boring. One night at dinner, my sister was chewing too loudly and I screamed at her until I was in tears. My mother and father knew what was happening, and made me take my medicine again. They watched me take it and made me show them that I had swallowed it. I was angry at first, but as I matured I understood why I needed the medicine and how it helped me be a healthy person.

I’m doing better know, thanks to my medicine and talking with my doctor. I no longer go to therapy, but I know that if I ever need to, it is an option for me. I understand the importance of being on my medicine, and have talked with my doctor about the future. I still struggle with my anxiety and depression every day. Sometimes, I have to fight with everything I have just to get out of bed in the morning, and find enough stimulation to keep me from just sitting in a dark room all day. I have to learn how to control my anxiety. This means that sometimes I have to stay an extra minute in my car in the morning to calm myself down, or make sure I keep breathing evenly. Sometimes, I have to reign myself in from bouts of rage over seemingly inconsequential issues, such as someone asking me a question that I didn’t like. I am currently being treated for depression and anxiety, but I will never be cured.