Category: 10mg

Back to drugs

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Third day of Fluoxetin, 10mg. Dr N. said ok. I am surprised he gave me the answer via phone, through his assistant. Usually he requests an appointment (300 chf please).

I decided not to be stubborn this time, and to take the medicine immediately, as I am starting feeling that depressive emotion again. I am familiar with the symptoms: when I start thinking of going away from Switzerland, when I want to go to Canada and find W. and when I want to change job, that’s the alarm bell for me. Last year this time I was in a terrible mood, this winter I want to be better, be good, be great. Despite the fall, despite the challenges at work, despite not having W. in my life.

I feel disappointed that I am back to square one, but I have decided not to feel sorry or ashamed for taking Fluoxetin again. Like my friend says: “be happy that you have found something that works for you”; she is right; this medicament is helping me, and I will take it. Possibly for a short while, during winter maybe, until the sun shines again and Corona ends.

After 4.5 years I am still thinking about W.. Will it ever end? I tell myself that I will forget him when I find a new love. Good luck here in Switzerland, where it’s so hard to make friends, let alone find love. I don’t go out enough (and now with covid even less), I should get into more social circles. I need to find a way to meet people from the IMD, or similar international schools; people who come here to do masters degrees, people my age, that come from all over the world, one I can fall in love with.

But W. is my special love, the one with the big L, the one I would like to grow old with… well if he ever decides to speak to me again. For now I have no chance. I emailed him.. nothing; I sent him a message on FB, he blocked me; I reached out on LinkedIn, he makes himself invisible to me; I even delivered a letter to him via an acquaintance of mine who so kindly went to Banff to give it to him in person, and he received it, saying he was going to read it. But I never heard from him. This was last year. Now what should I do? I tried forgetting him and get over him. it’s been almost 5 years. No chance. He was my steady star, we completed each other, now I feel empty.

But: when I was with him I had already signs of depressions. I was crying a lot, I was dissatisfied about my own professional battles, things were hard also when he was around, loving me and caring about me. So I wonder: even if I saw him tomorrow, would his love make me happy? Would I make him happy? Or do I still need to search inside me a while longer to find happiness? That’s what I am thinking right now. I need to get back to my feet for good, before I can find someone (or him) again. I can’t rely on someone else to be happy.

If I were with someone, I would feel less lonely.

Does depression get under your skin?

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There we go. Not even two months since I stopped taking the antidepressants and I am finding myself crying on the couch since yesterday. Is this thing ever going to go away? I meditate and all, but it’s come back. And the looming lockdown ain’t gonna help. Che palle. Shit! Merde!!

If you ask me, it seems as though this disease, that we should be able to control in our mind, is very strong, and is looking for a host, like a virus; it requires I don’t know what, to eradicate it. You know that virus that you get when you have herpes (like on the side of your lips): that virus stays in your body forever, silent mostly, and then it comes up when your immune system is low and stress goes high. I feel depression is the same. I hope not, but damn, I thought I had progressed in the past year, and here it comes again. Do I have to live with it all my life? Why has it entered in the first place?

I have so much to do for work, and I cannot concentrate. I have an important call with an international client, and I am afraid of the results. It could turn into a tough conversation, and I don’t want to deal with it, it scares me. No it doesn’t scare me, it stresses me. I am worried that I may make mistakes, I am worried of what the CEO thinks of me. I feel as though I had had a burnout and I have a hard time getting back on my feet.

Burnout: we never even knew this word 10 years ago. And now all I hear around me is burning out, risk of burnout, stress at work, stress in life, tension, expectations, challenges, etc. I had a simpler life before, I had my man beside me, I was younger, life was easier. And now I feel stuck again. While a few months ago life was good again. I had closed an important deal, I had found new friends, I have spent two beautiful weeks at the sea, I have bought a SUP for the lake and a wetsuit for swimming in winter. And now I am back to square one? No way.

I feel like a child who cries when he cannot have what he wants. Work is difficult right now? I cry. I miss W. so much? I cry. My sister in law doesnt want to talk to me? I cry. Now, is this me being spoilt and unable to cope, or is it a disease where I see all black? Cause I wasn’t like that in the past. Or maybe I was and I just had to wait and see? No, I remember when life was easy, during my studies, in Rome, living with my parents and traveling to study languages. Now, 20 odd years later, I feel my life is an echec. But in truth it’s not, I just perceive it as such. If only I could find a balance in me. Happiness is inside, not outside. I shouldn’t care if a client isn’t happy with me. who cares. but I am, to a point that I stress and depress.

I have written to Dr. N. and asked if I can resume Fluoxetin. 10mg. Let’s see what he says.

Familiarity

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It’s been way too long since my last post. A lot has happened. First I went on holiday. It was really good. I have thrown away cell phone, laptop, and all I did was eat, sleep and swim in the sea. Second I finished my antidepressant. Yeah! 4 September 2020 is the first day off Fluoxetin. In June I had gotten prescribed half dosage for 3 months, meaning 10mg instead of 20mg, and then basta, give it up and see how it goes. My spirits are high, I am rejuvenated from the holidays and I like my job. It’s a good start to test my time off medicaments.

What I would really like to highlight here, is that I think familiarity was really key to this whole process. Alain de Botton says this about love. Have you heard any of his conferences? You can check Ted Talk. Great guy, a philosopher with lots of knowledge and a great look at modernity through the eyes of the Greek philosophers. He basically says that when we fall in love it is usually with people that don’t make us feel necessarily good, but familiar, as we unconsciously seek for the feelings we are familiar with. “We chase after more exciting others, not in the belief that life with them will be more harmonious, but out of an unconscious sense that it will be reassuringly familiar in its patterns of frustration.” (quote from one of his books, see it here). Sounds like a side track to my story, but it all makes sense to me! I had a great time at the beach in Italy, 2 weeks of bliss, without doing anything special, but I was at the campground where I have spent most of my summers since my first year of age. And that’s the recipe: I needed familiarity, I needed to go back to what I know and am accustomed to, the love of my parents, a routine, etc. Four years ago, when my life changed for what I thought was the worst, this is what I was seeking all along, without exactly knowing. When I left W., the love of my life, I was going in this direction, but I couldn’t see it then. I went through hell, to get where I am now; I had to leave him in order to find me. I had lost me on the way, I wasn’t feeling the earth under my feet. I had to go back to what was familiar; stay in one place, refind balance, finding a routine… all things I have despised for the last 20 years.

And here I am now, four years after moving back to Switzerland, leaving W., changing jobs, coming closer to my hometown (1’000 km instead of 9’000 km), having a stable job, paying retirement insurance, saving money to buy a house, visiting friends a few km from my place in Geneva, etc. I didn’t have to give up W., but that’s what it took in my case; I miss him dearly every damn day of the year, since 4 years; he doesn’t want to talk to me, 14 years together, and I threw that away; and he didn’t pick it up for us. He let us go as much as I did. But that’s another story. For another post.

I am happy and serene. Gained 4 kilo, but am sort of pleased by the extra “ciccia” :-). I want to get back in shape, it will come. For now I look at my belly and I smile. Abundance is welcome, also in the flesh. Anything, but not depression. Ok, no cancer either, thank you.

The North Wind

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A month and a half ago I halved the intake of Fluoxetin, otherwise known as Prozac. From 20mg to 10mg every morning. So far so good. A couple of changes occurred, but I cannot tell if its psychological suggestion or chemical adjustment in my body. I want to understand this better, and discern between self induced effects, placebo effects and real medical effects. No matter what happens in my body, I am still happy and satisfied about what I am doing. Work is going well, very well indeed, I have closed a major deal for the company, and in a new field, aviation, which I like much more than automotive. I am very proud of how I handled this deal and the negotiations since January. It all went pretty smoothly and quickly. 6 months of talks for a very good outcome. I gave myself a good pack on my back. And so did my CEO and the whole company. We popped two bottles of good champagne at work, and F. made a speech announcing I had made the biggest deal in the company’s history. What a good satisfaction. And if I think that only 7 months ago I wanted to quit.

One thing I am learning about this anti-depression process: to cultivate patience, and to fight my perfectionism. More things I am learning, which I will write as I go.

Patience is a big deal for me. And acceptance of a certain routine. I realised that over the last 14 of my relationship with W., and even before, basically since I left Italy to go and live in Germany in 1998, I have not been in one place or one job for more than 2-3 years. Events in life, jobs made redundant, W. entering my life (he is still the love of my life, although we are no longer together), new passions being born, the quest for film making, the eagerness of seeing the world, the choice we had to change our lives when we saw fit and how we pleased, made me wonder around the globe, traveling across oceans to beautiful places, living in the turquoise beaches of the Caribbean, moving to South Africa to pursue a film career, going to Canada to work at the Olympics, going back to Italy for a short while (3 years) setting up a company I didnt want to create, getting angry at life in Rome, leaving again, etc etc. I realised I have not been in one place for more than 2-3 years in the last 20 years. Whereas my childhood and my youth have been very regular, filled with routine. And my youth was very happy. I realise now that Alain de Botton is right when he says that in love we seek to reproduce the familiarity of what we are used to in our childhood. I recommend one of his speeches at Zeitgeist. Where I am getting at is that, also in life, not only in love, we seek balance based on what is familiar to us since the beginning. Now, I still need to understand why I was so attracted to a life without rules, and I still am, but why this has over 20 years damaged my self esteem, my happiness, and my relationship to the greatest man for me. Everytime I didn’t like what I was doing, I (I should say, we) would pack up and leave. I am like Juliette Binoche in Chocolat: I leave from village to village at the blow of the north wind.

Once I returned to Switzerland, helas without W., it was 20 years after I left my home in Rome, the home of routine, familiar habits, and the love of my family. I wondered in this world for 20 years, 14 of which with the love of my life, and now that I am back in CH, my life has been shaken from the core. I had to stop, in a very harsh and hard way, and depression has been the climax of this journey. There’s more to say, but I need to get up and go to my next meeting. Life is full of surprises, definitely worth living every bit of it, even the suffering parts. I am growing through this process. I am learning to be patient. I will find my answer, but not yet today.

10mg

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I am back in Rome for a week. My mom had an urgent surgery due to a hernia that was pushing against the root of the nerve (L4 level), and caused her tremendous pain plus was preventing electric impulse from flowing in her left leg. Bref, as we say in French, I had to rush down to Italy from Lausanne, which was not easy, since COvid measures are still not totally relaxed between countries, and I had to start a sort of pilgrimage to the holy city, which entailed taking the train from Zurich to Chiasso, walk to the Italian border with a big luggage, the laptop bag and a plant for my mom, catch a bus to Como station, and jump on a train hoping it would lead me to Milano Centrale. Almost, it took me to Porta Garibaldi, a few metro stations from my destination. I slept in Milan at an Airbnb, and at 6am the next morning I took the Frecciarossa train to Rome. It took me almost 24h to get there.

A few days earlier I had asked my psychiatrist to reduce Fluoxetin. As I said in another post, the self isolation time has helped me work on myself, and do mental exercises that have helped me get stronger, and feel that my core happiness that I am regaining is due more and more to me and not to the medicament. He agreed to reduce from 20mg to 10mg. Big step for me. I was worried about the consequences, and the effects or side effects it would have on me. I am still very careful, and am being vigilant to the mood shifts I may have. I started 10mg on 5 June, and today is 15 June. Already ten days.

I can’t tell what exactly is the effect of the reduction, but I can certainly tell that my stomach is adjusting to the new intake. I was taking another brand of Fluoxetin, which was in gel capsules (with powder inside), and I had to change it to another brand (solid tablets) because I need to cut the tablet in two (there is no 10mg pill, at least in CH). I can tell that my stomach has been burning during the day, and I am sure it is because of this change. So, that is clear.

What is less clear is whether the reduction is making me more angry, or whether it is my hormonal state. It so happens that I started the reduction just as I was about to have my period. I take Estrogens and Progesterone regularly because in the past years I had started having less and less menstruation (at about 42), as if I were in pre-menopause. I know now that this pre or peri-menopause is due to the stress my mind and soul found themselves in, a slow process towards depression that has blocked my body functions. Just like a high level sportswoman who has no more menstruation because of the strain the training has on her body.

In the past 4-5 days I have found myself angrier, and more “delicate”. I love this word, delicate, Roy from “The IT Crowd” very cutely says it at the episode called “Aunt Irma”. You have to watch this : Series 1 Episode 6 . Hilarious. So, yes, I think I am sensitive because of my period, but my period started and didn’t continue at this round, so that’s another story. I am guessing that I have been hormonally challenged, and on top of that work has been exciting yet stressful, a lot to think about and to follow up on; couple that with the long journey to Rome and the worry that the surgeon might injure my mom even more, I was ready to kill somebody 3 days ago! I didn’t literally kill, but I was very vocal with my words, and found myself being angry at every little thing that was happening to me, all the more when the little thing was against my self. Example: a colleague who didn’t want to help me at work, or the train manager who didn’t want me to get on the train; the lady at the Airbnb who was not talkative and was rather dry (she did her job though, handed me the keys to the room and showed me the kitchen), but I wanted her to be more lovely, just like I am with my guests at home.

Bref…. (long story short), here I am in Rome, I finally made it. My mom had her surgery, she is fine and now I will work from Rome remotely, nursing my mother and giving my father a break. They are getting old. I still don’t know whether my mood swing towards anger had to do with the 10mg, or with my period. Maybe a bit of both? I will monitor the situation and will revert asap.

More soon.