One Step Back

For five days now, things have sucked. Not my life, my life is going pretty well right now. My experience of that life, however, doesn't match. 

A week ago, I was feeling fantastic. I'd been making great progress. I had an emotional breakthrough. I was confident in the changes that I was making, so confident that I asked my doctor if we could reduce my anti-depressant medication, and I started blogging again - about self-care, no less.

I had forgotten how much it sucked when I came off of my anxiety medications. While this shouldn't be quite as bad and should be much shorter, it kind of makes me regret lowering the dose. Of course, in a few weeks from now, when I've recovered, I'll be happy and proud to have reduced my meds again.

At least, that's what I keep telling myself. That was my experience coming off my anxiety drugs. After the awful withdrawal, I bounced back and was even happier than before. I think this will be true this time. There is a nagging doubt though lurking in the back of my mind. 

My discontinuation symptoms (it's not technically withdrawal since it's a non-habit-forming drug) have mostly been related to my energy levels. I'M SO SO EXHAUSTED. Being tired sounds like such an easy-to-deal-with symptom. It's not. It's really challenging to deal with. It's intense. And it affects everything I do. I can't focus on anything. I can't make decisions. Cooking dinner tonight took all the motivation I could summon. I can't get anything accomplished either because I have no energy to, so I'm even more anxious about not being productive. UGH. My heart rate is up too. I took a self-care day yesterday, and it helped a bit. For me, a self-care day does not involve the couch, pyjamas and Netflix. It involved waking up early, getting ready like I normally do, exercising, eating 7 servings of fruits and veggies and drinking plenty of water throughout the day, having a warm lunch (soup), getting some sunshine, two power naps, CLEANING and planning in my journal. Why cleaning? Because a huge aspect of self-care is your environment. I neatened up, cleaned the bathroom and opened a window to let a nice breeze in. Yes, it was a lot of work considering my low energy, and I had to relax after, but it made me feel accomplished and it made my environment nicer, both important aspects of self-care. I also went to bed earlier, getting a bit more sleep than I usually do.

All that led to a decent evening last night, and a somewhat normal morning today. However, my job is fairly physical, so I crashed quickly after lunch.

I've struggled with keeping certain parts of my normal routine. I'm completely unmotivated. I just want to nap. But, this will pass and I will go back to making progress again soon.

I'm sharing this because it is part of my recovery experience. A bad day, or in this case several days, does not mean I have stopped recovering or reverted to my old ways. It's part of the process. All I can do is accept it for what it is.