Chicken Soup and Lemsips*

* Other brands of powdered cold relief sachets are available...

 

I hate feeling unwell.  Especially when you live alone and there's no one to keep you company, give you sympathy and bring you supplies of food, tissues and DVDs.  I remember when I was a kid and mum would give us chicken soup and toast if we were ill.  And if we'd been throwing up then the first thing we were allowed to eat were rich tea biscuits, which will forever be known as 'sick biscuits' in the Smith household.

 

Do you ever get that feeling where you know that a cold is coming on?  The tingle in your throat, extra pressure in your forehead.  I felt that yesterday morning and by the evening it was a full blown raging headache and snotty nose.  I dragged myself out of bed this morning and went into work only to be sent home by the ladies in the shop at lunch time.  They told me they didn't want my germs... in the nicest possible way.

 

So I find myself in a heap on the sofa surrounded by tissues, a blanket, water, a half drunk lemsip (which is making my teeth hurt), a half eaten box of chocolates (ok, fine, more than half eaten - it was a small box!), my journal, a book, my cardigan and scarf.  My temperature is all over the place.  I woke up boiling this morning, was freezing in work, sweating on the way home and can't get it right in the flat.  I don't often take time off sick, and would much rather push on through it.  But after hardly sleeping last night and struggling to string a sentence together this morning, I'm glad to be taking it easy.  I know I'm feeling unwell because I started crying at the end of the Nicholas Sparks movie I just watched on Netflix (The Best of Me).  Next step is watching clips of puppies on YouTube... save me!

 

It's funny how the brain distinguishes between physical and emotional illness.  Even as someone with experience of mental health problems, I somehow justify physical illnesses in a different way.  I don't have a problem with taking antibiotics or painkillers.  If I had diabetes, I wouldn't think twice about following the medical advice from my doctor.  So why is it different for depression?  Why did I feel like it was admitting defeat to go back on antidepressants again last summer (almost a year ago to the day)?  I tried a couple of different types and dosages, gave up in February because I couldn't cope with the side effects, and then took a complete nose dive.

 

I wrote this in my journal on the 21st May:

So I have an appointment with my GP tomorrow and I think I'm going to admit defeat and ask to go back on antidepressants.  Something needs to change in my life - I can't keep going on like this.  I met up with [a friend] last night and she asked what was keeping me going, what was I holding on for/ with?  I'm not sure that anything is keeping me going apart from the natural passing of time.  I'm not actively fighting through this, I'm just floating down the river.  I feel totally empty inside and just miserable...  Surely life wasn't created to feel this bad.

 

Once again, I used that phrase 'admitting defeat', but why should treating depression be any different from treating any other illness?  Did you know that according to the World Health Organisation depression affects around 350 million people of all ages worldwide (figure from 2012)?!  That's more people than the population of the United States.  So it's not like depression is rare or unheard of.

 

I think for me, I don't like that I struggle with life.  That I might need medication to help me get through.  It makes me feel weak or less of a whole person.  That I'm not strong enough to cope on my own.  But I wonder if those thoughts say more about how I see myself than about my views on medication.  Self-stigma.  Would I say of think these things about any of my friends who were in a similar situation?  Of course not!

 

I've been on a new medication for about 11 weeks now, and it's actually working.  I feel like I'm living again, not just existing.  Is this all down to medication?  I don't think so, but I know it's part of my recovery.  And am I about to start a campaign to reduce the stigma around mental health problems and treatment?  Definitely not.  But I think it's helpful for me to reflect on my own struggles with this topic, and hopefully gain some insight for the future.