[tw/cw: frank discussion of suicidal ideation and feelings surrounding it ahead—the first two paragraphs are okay, and some mention in the conclusion, but if you just want to see what I’m reading and what I’ve added to my massive TBR pile, skip down to the /////.]
Hello! It’s September! And after a bit of a disastrous start last week, I’m finally back on an ADHD medication! *triumphant fist pump*
“Disastrous” is either an overstatement or not enough of one, but we’ll get to that in a minute. And while I admit that fist may have been pumped a little too soon, joyfully tearing through a book in 2 – 3 days instead of taking my usual (month – forever) gives me reason to feel cautiously optimistic. I also feel more like actually writing and actually sharing that writing! I told my new doctor that I’ve never felt like myself on antidepressants, but back in the day when I was correctly identified as ADHD and prescribed stimulants, the depression waned for literally the first time in my life. Who knew that being able to do stuff could go a long way to wanting to do stuff, and perhaps even getting stuff done and feeling good about accomplishing stuff? Not my last doctor, who just wanted to prescribe an anti-d—definitely not anti-anxieties for the occasional panic attacks—and, I think, feared that a stimulant would push my fat little heart over the edge if we didn’t do something about my blood pressure… which turned out to be white coat hypertension. Two years of this. Not because I couldn’t be bothered seeking a different opinion—but that different opinion wasn’t seeing new patients yet, and there was an additional medical conundrum unraveling through the majority of last year that required frequent check-ins, so between that and health insurance (the Great American Enigma, filled with people who magically know better my doctor, my pharmacy, and myself) I kind of had to stick with who I had.
As for disaster: as most folks with ADHD can probably tell you, you can drink caffeinated beverages all day long and barely feel a tickle. It sort of becomes a baseline—when I’m unmedicated, I usually drink more coffee than water during the day, which, I know, but coffee has water in it, so it counts, and that’s what I’ll tell the Hydration Police if they show up at my door. I’ll drink coffee when I’m sleepy, when I’m awake, when I’m happy, when I’m angry, when I’m crying, when it’s time to go to bed. It’s less about needing the caffeine to stay peppy and more that I like the taste and enjoy the warmth—but of course, when you’re consuming that much coffee and you’re not on prescribed stimulants, it feels like normal.
Enter the New Meds.
I don’t know if we simply didn’t talk about adjusting my caffeine consumption during the appointment (I took notes, but not that many notes), or if I only skimmed the pamphlet that came with the meds, or if—per the feeling of normality—I truly didn’t remember that coffee is a stimulant, but the first day on the New Meds, I consumed the regular amount without even thinking about it.
This was a mistake.
The beautiful thing about mistakes, in my estimation, is that they often teach you more than when things go right the first time. When I was an active DuoLingo user, I upgraded my account so I’d be able to make as many mistakes as possible and not have to wait for the hearts to fill back up, because it takes me using a word wrong or breaking a grammar concept several times before the correct way cements itself. And when I was teaching myself how to crochet last year—just as I taught myself how to knit two decades prior—it took a lot of yarn and a lot of misshapen rectangles before I could understand what my hands were supposed to be doing. In short: I learn best by doing it wrong. But of course, not all mistakes have the soft landing of an encouraging cartoon owl or the quiet jubilance of neat, tidy stitches. Some mistakes have you pacing the length of your living room, suddenly irritated at literally every sound, unable to fathom the idea of speaking to anyone ever again (combination of “I fucking hate every person on the planet right now” and “I’m the most unloveable creature god thought to slap together and why the fuck would I inflict that on anyone?”), not seeing the connection between the medication and the coffee. Some mistakes have you crumpling to the floor, howling, sobbing, aware that the neighbors can hear you, but not able to stop the cacophony suddenly pouring from your mouth, because you are extremely sure that you don’t want to exist anymore, so it doesn’t matter anyway.
I am fortunate that the situation only lasted a couple of hours, probably because I’ve lived with some form of low-grade suicidal ideation for most of my life—which made answering my doctor’s pre-appointment depression screening questionnaire awkward, but I graded the question of suicidal ideation honestly and added an asterisk, writing at the bottom, “I live with it and deal with it pragmatically.” And I do! I’m very good at having over complicated conversations with the occasional wish to self-delete, or finding something to do until the moment passes and the urge no longer exists. I don’t have a “plan” for killing myself—I have an anti-plan, which is to do the best I can to stubbornly stay alive to spite every force in the world that would prefer I not exist, and the anti-plan did a great job at holding me steady. But it was still exhausting and slightly scary there for a moment. It’s been a long time since I’ve questioned reality (e.g., who am I? Am I real? Is any of this real? Are all of the people I know figments of my imagination?), and it was an unwelcome corkscrew on the already tumultuous rollercoaster of wanting, however momentarily, to die.
So, to recap:
- finally got on new meds, yay!
- Continued to drink my regular volume of coffee! Oh no!
- Wanted to die! Like in a way worse way than normal!
- Switched to decaf, which makes me want to die in a more metaphorical way!
- (It’s drinkable, but it smells like burnt hair)
- Learned a very important lesson about cutting back on caffeine while assessing the effectiveness of a new ADHD medication!
I also think it’s kind of hilarious, as a bisexual person who grapples periodically with wanting to die, that our “awareness week” [Wikipedia, there’s too many sources otherwise] is tucked away in the third quarter of National Suicide Prevention Month (per the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention). I gather it’s a scheduling coincidence—after all, we have a lot of awareness weeks and only 52 available in the year—and I’m not exactly drawing a correlation between a complicated (often ignored, misunderstood, dismissed) sexuality and feelings of not wanting to exist—or feeling like you can’t talk about either of those subjects whether separately or in combination, because they’re “uncomfortable”—but feel free to speculate among yourselves. Anyway, happy week to my fellow fruits and happy month to my fellow fruits that sometimes want to die!
Maybe being confessional and honest on the internet is for chumps, but you know what they say—if one (1) person reads this and feels that they’re not alone in all of this, or reads this and remembers to ask their doctor about how to safely begin a new medication, or reads this and thinks, “well, at least I’m not her,” then I’ll have accomplished something with my life.
Even if nobody (0) reads it or gets anything out of it—I had the wherewithal to do it anyway, despite the often-disabling ADHD, the imposter syndrome, and the inability to stick to an independently determined schedule. I believe this is also an accomplishment.
Take that, dad.
///////
ADHD BOOKCLUB OF ONE UPDATES
Here’s what I’ve currently got in progress and how much of them I’ve read, beginning with two eagerly-awaited preorders that materialized magically on my kindle Tuesday morning, and ending with the one I think I’m too dumb to finish reading but BY SOMEONE’S GOD, I WILL:
- Sure, I’ll Join Your Cult, Maria Bamford (28%)
- I’m a Fan, Sheena Patel (11%)
- Camp Damascus, Chuck Tingle (41%)
- The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires, Grady Hendrix (48%)
- Creating Short Fiction, Damon Knight (10%)
- Terminal Park, Gary J. Shipley (69%)
There’s a few more but they’ve been in progress for so long that it feels ridiculous to talk about them, but I will mention A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman, which I started on May 30th. It’s the audiobook version, and I confess that I only got it because it’s narrated by J.K. Simmons, whose voice I love, love, love. I’ve actually really enjoyed it—I’m 41% of the way through—and it was my first serious attempt to really listen to an audiobook. During those first few hours I learned that I do this best while doing a handcraft, like crochet or diamond painting, solving two problems: feeling guilty for spending time on a pleasurable hobby, and staving off the potential boredom of entertaining only one sensory input. This is a wonderful discovery, of course, but—as evidenced by my current reading pile and the massive towering TBR behind it—once I realized the world of audiobooks was genuinely open to me, I had to see what was out there, and I began with YA horror because I am who I am (a late blooming teenager in the body of a middle aged hermit). After so many years unable to consume books like I did when I was a child, I’m interested in reading everything, especially that which I am not currently reading, so I’ve actually finished about four or five complete audiobooks since I started listening to Ove (or: the growth arc of a grumpy, misunderstood, most likely autistic Swedish man). I’ll take this as a plus: I actually can take in audiobooks and comprehend them like print books, which I think is what kept me from them for so long. I don’t think I’d have tried if I hadn’t realized “hey, if I can listen to a podcast for an hour and then tell someone all about what I learnt/spoil the best jokes, then goddamn it, I can listen to an audiobook.” (Shoutout Werewolf Ambulance!)
I’m a little slow, but I’ve got a willing spirit.
As for a glimpse of the Tower of TBR, here’s six other titles vying for my attention:
- The Wicked Unseen, Gigi Griffin
- Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl, Andrea Lawlor
- Man, Fuck This House, Brian Asman
- Delicate Condition, Danielle Valentine
- X: A Novel, Davey Davis
- Tell Me I’m Worthless, Alison Rumfitt
I do have a Book Vibes review for Grady Hendrix’s The Final Girl Support Group coming down the pike—with hope, before I finish off Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by same, because I’m only halfway through and ready to pop off about condescending husbands. Grady Hendrix writes awful people SO well I automatically talk back to the page. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve said “Carter, you dick” while reading, and can only assume I’ll quadruple it by the time I’m done.
If you’re still here—holy shit, how. But also, thank you! I know it’s easier to read succinct tweets and watch short videos, but that’s not how I operate, and I’m glad you’re here. And if you also experience some faulty want-to-live wiring like I do: hey. I really do mean it—I’m glad you’re here. You deserve to exist, even when it’s hard to do things. You have value, even if it’s hard to see it. And it’s okay to talk about feeling reluctant to live. We get a whole month, after all! (Lol. Lmao.) Treat yourself kindly, friends, and I’ll see you here for the next [whatever this is] ♥️
Cosmic’s Read-o-Rama 