Self-Care fo' Real: It Ain't All Play

It didn't really hit me in the grocery store just why this med container appealed to me.

I'd been in a serve and return pattern with my GP's nurse for a couple of days.

Can I get a referral to a psychiatrist? My depression is hitting especially hard.

You will probably want to check with your insurance to make sure that is covered and who is in your network. We don't really make referrals as much as advise or recommend providers based on their specialties.

Ok - called Anthem BCBS because I was too overwhelmed to navigate the online info. Also, I was on the phone while driving and maximizing my time. Gotta make those customer service reps earn their suppers, no?

The insurance peon emailed the list of eligible providers to me.

I then uploaded it to the patient portal app with a note:

Psychiatry is covered in my plan. Affordably so, even. Here is a list of providers that I am ok to see - could you please tell me which of them on the list specialize in brains dealing with undue societal gender norms in which we have to be super women? With a ton of traumas and two significant concussions in life? Mmmkay, thanks, bye.

Maybe it was a little different. Same idea. You get the point.

Almost as soon as my finger tips hit send on that hot little note, my phone rang.

It was my doctor's nurse. That woman is my freaking hero.

My doc is out of town, and she urged me to come into the clinic and visit with a lovely NP as well as the social worker (aka Patient Navigator), because it could be more than the depression.

True enough. Though not likely, having recently had all my thyroid and endocrinology panels done at a health fair.

Nevertheless, the message was clear: WE NEED TO SEE YOU.

Not to mention the fact that I was just spent psychologically because working up the nerve to coordinate all that shiz was a lot of Big Steps?

Exhaustipating.

So, yesterday morning I found myself sitting in the exam room, waiting for the NP to come in. I'd seen her before with one of the kids' ailments over the years, though who knew if she would remember me.

Soon as she opens the door, I lose it and turn into the bawling, sniveling creature I've been for the past month.

She is great.

We decide to up my Wellbutrin by 100mg a day since I have been on a conservative dosage. We also change it from standard release to extended release for a steady stream throughout the day.

Then the stuff I knew was coming.

How's the sleep?

Well, while I would totally love to cocoon myself and sleep the days away, I am still somehow a responsible, functioning adult and I make do with what I get. I rarely have trouble sleeping, but with homework and all I find myself getting 4 hrs here, 9 hrs there, etc. I know that isn't healthy and I have to regulate, but....yeah.

How's the diet?

So, it's been a whole lotta fish sticks and Poptarts lately because of time and schedule. What? That's not ok? [KIDDING] No, I know, I need to get back to more produce and whole foods, and I'm pretty good at it, it's just a matter of implementing.

So maybe ask your family for some support there in planning and prepping ahead?

Yeah.

How's your relationship with exercise these days?

Completely non-existent....which explains the newly acquired 10 lbs (since November health fair weigh in) your scale informed me of. Again, I was doing SO GOOD getting to the gym, walking dogs, etc. But since school started this semester....I haven't been to the gym since.

Ok, well, let's work on that.

And by 'let US,' you mean me, but yes, I'm aware of the need and that it will help, it always does.

By now, I'm tallying up the list of "small changes" that I need to implement and my head is about to implode.

After 25 years of dealing with depression/anxiety, I know, logically, intellectually, that these are key components of maintaining my mental health. But knowing and doing, especially when your brain is shutting down your motivational centers, are quite different things, it turns out.

And, the knowing of All The Things combined with the not doing of All The Things when your mind is wonky, turns into the "ONE MORE REASON YOU ARE A HORRIBLE, TERRIBLE, NO GOOD HUMAN BEING!" cheer that depression does, ad nauseum - literally, in your head.

What about therapy?

I was seeing a therapist after Vegas. And, while it helped, I really feel like I could have gotten the same impact by going out with my girlfriend and talking - there were no tools, no exercises to work through that gave new perspective or coping mechanisms, ya know?

We talk about CBT and bio-feedback options and how the patient navigator could help me explore options regarding providers with those qualifications.

The patient navigator comes in and thank you, Jesus, she is amazing at her job.

We talk a lot about how difficult it is to disclose when you're in the field of helping. How you know people and they know you, but do you want them to know that? How while we preach no stigma, it is almost doubly stigmatizing to disclose our own diagnoses and struggles.

We talk Brene Brown and apps like Calm (which I've had on my phone for several months) and other mindfulness/self-help tools.

I show her the brilliance that I found on the website Unf*ck Your Brain, and she is impressed. The woman behind the site, Kara Lowentheil, is a BAMF feminist with the smarts to use cognitive neuroscience in her coaching - Sweary Magdalene approves.

"See, you got this!"

Heavy, shaky sigh.

"Yeah."

I go to the grocery store to get my new RX, determined to buy the fixings for a healthy dinner, but hey depression has my executive functioning by the balls, so to speak. I can't think of anything.

I have a Pinterest account with eleventy-one thousand recipes, most of them health conscious, at the ready on my mobile life manager - but that idea never even lands.

I walk to the magazine aisle, look at a couple of food mags, and snap pictures of a couple recipes that call out to me, then proceed to buy the items I don't have at home. How's that for coping mechanisms? Outta the box, I know. :pats self on back:

Go to the pharmacy department, pick up new meds. We're out of vitamins, so I grab some while I'm there. I recall being low in vitamin D, so I grab some of those. Out of the corner of my eye, the pill boxes call to me. The one I already have is too small for everything I need to put in it.

And then I see it, the rainbow stacker pictured above. Toss it into the cart, and don't think anything more of it.

Until this morning.

As I took my meds and the promise of a new day glimmered anew before me, it hit me.

His promise.

I "subconsciously" picked a daily pill box that will constantly remind me.

You will not be destroyed. 

You can do all things with Me. 

Nothing will EVER change that.

So may it be.