Happy Pills!!!!

Well, I’m on happy pills now and have not felt much like writing for a while. I’m taking pills to help me with anxiety and they have sorta taken away my desire to expose my simple little world to others for a while. Now, who would have ever thought I’d be one to get anxious? I’ve always felt like I was able to cope with life with a smile and the ability to laugh at the hard turns. My buddy and I used to say to each other, “just don’t take yourself too seriously and you’ll be able to laugh at most things in life”. I feel like I’m an optimist in the center of my being. I tend to look with confidence at the future and don’t usually have much of a feeling of dread, but because of this cancer medicine I’m taking I could not control my feelings. My wife insists that I’ve been depressed for a while (because of the cancer) but I didn’t think so. Sure, I was irritable and couldn’t sleep and couldn’t control morbid thoughts, but other than that I was fine!

At any rate, I got to the point where I just couldn’t stand myself any longer and got some help. They put me on Lexapro, which is a medicine that helps with depression and anxiety and man it works wonders. In 2 days I felt remarkably better and feel like I’m more like my old self now. I laugh more, criticize less and enjoy others and their company so much more. I am patient to a fault and love my family more like I used to. It’s a nice change and I’ve grown to appreciate these drugs more than I ever have.

In fact, there was a time when I didn’t think people should have to use them. Just man up and get over it, was my mantra and for years it seemed to work fine. But, the human mind is really a fragile thing and we are not as strong as we would like to believe all the time. Of course, my fragile mind was weakened a great deal in the 70’s when I abused drugs a great deal. I spent a month in the hospital unable to communicate effectively because of the accumulation of drugs in my system. Could it be that now, some 30 years later the scars are causing this weakness in my brain? Perhaps, or maybe it’s just a frailty that all of us have the potential to experience. Not sure, and it doesn’t really matter. The point is, I have found a need and these wonderful pills have put me back on track.