August 12, 2007
PMS, Yelling, and Exclamation Points!
Posted by coolbeans under Anger Mismanagement, Health | Tags: Handbasket Rides, I'm A Survivor, Is There A Pill For That? |Last year I started taking medication to treat depression and post traumatic stress disorder. At that time, I started seeing a psychiatrist to help “manage” these medications.
manage ‘ma-nij:
1 :See for five to ten minutes every couple of months so I can tell him, “I’m fine and yeah, your secretary already called in those refills for me. Thanks. Here’s a hundred bucks.”
The last time I went in, we had the following conversation:
Me: Can I stop taking this one pill every day?
Him: Uh, no. That and the other - very good combination. Very good.
Me: So as long as I’m on one, I’m on the other?
Him: Yes. They work really well together.
Me: (Starting to cry out of frustration. I am trapped.) Okay.
Him: Is there anything else?
Me: Yes, actually, I have two or three days every month when I am just really, really angry and emotional. Is there anything I can take just on those days to manage that?
Him: No.
Me: Blinkblinkblinkblink.
Him: Nothing for just a few days. You’d have to take something every day. All month long.
Here’s the thing: I wanted to be more assertive here and say, “Now waaaaaaait just one minute, mister. I know that’s not true!” But communicating with this doctor is difficult. We have a thick accent barrier. I don’t always understand him and my extreme sensitivity to not ever doing or feeling or appearing racist at all even a little bit keeps me from saying, “Could you repeat that?” or “Hey, at $10 a minute could we maybe get an interpreter up in this joint?!” This is stupid, I know. I know.
My therapist had suggested I ask the psychiatrist about this because she has clients who take something for a week - ONE WEEK - every month and get a lot of relief from it. When I reported this conversation to her, she suggested I see another doctor. Not switch doctors, but go to my ob/gyn and ask this same question. But that means I have to find one of those because the one I used to see is retiring (and scary) and I’m afraid of the other one (also scary) and know nothing about the new guy really (which is its own kind of scary.)
I talked to the chiropractor about it and he gave me a little kit I’m supposed to drool into at specific intervals during the day. Then I overnight the saliva bombs to this lab with a check for $150 and they tell me my hormones are messed up. Then the chiro looks at the results and gives me stuff to help balance them out. But I have to do this on a Sunday or Monday and can’t have coffee and garlic and a whole list of other things and really? A day without coffee? I need it to be a day I don’t have to do anything at all because my head? It will be sawing itself in half. I think next Sunday will work.
In between when I’m not experiencing PMS breakdown? I don’t think about it. I’m fine! Next month will be FINE! I will take a walk or a long bath and I’ll treat myself to something and rainbows and sunshine and roses will burst from my ears and nose and ass.
That brings us to today. Do you SEE any rainbows and sunshine and roses? OF COURSE YOU DON’T! Because there ISN’T ANY! ANYWHERE! IN THE WHOLE WORLD! I NEED TO BREAK SOMETHING!
This isn’t pretty. I went to church today and listened to my pastor once again poo-poo modern medicine and dismiss depression and anxiety. “Trust in the Lord! You can’t get that in a pill!”
I KNOW I can’t. My psychiatrist won’t prescribe it! Will Jesus call that into the pharmacy, please?
I sat in the front pew this morning and tried really, really hard not to cry and I literally bit my tongue to keep from calling out, “And how does one DO that, exactly? And you just used the word “put” but nothing man can do can fix anything. So PUT! Which is taking action! But I can’t because nothing I DO is worthy because that’s all about ME and glorifies ME. And you just said that’s BAD! We could be having pancakes instead!”
Do you get this way each month? If so, what do you do to get relief? Do you break things? Do you have something I could break?
August 12, 2007 at 12:59 pm
Try looking for information on Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD). I hear lots of women with predictable cycles and this problem can take an antidepressant (commonly Zoloft) one week or two weeks a month to manage that problem.
I’ll refrain from calling your preacher nasty things, but I’m thinking them. Most church officials in most churches recognize that diseases sometimes need to be treated, and that faith healing is no more effective on so-called mental disorder than on any other.
Ask your therapist to recommend a different psychiatrist, because this one is clearly not meeting your needs. And in future, do not fear appearing racist if you need someone to help you understand what a physician is saying. It’s important for your help, and a good doctor knows that you need to understand clearly, even if that means bringing someone else into the room to repeat information in an accent you can understand.
Me? Bossy? Nah…
August 12, 2007 at 2:58 pm
You could be me. I am a total bitch for one week of every month (and totally depressed), which adds up to, say, one quarter of my life. I have a sticky note on my computer telling me to look into PMDD also. And my psychiatrist? I also talk to him for about 10 minutes a month, during which time I give him $15 and he gives me antidepressant samples or a prescription. Good luck. Let me know if you come up with anything.
August 12, 2007 at 8:05 pm
The older I get, the worse it gets. Seriously? I think my head is going to explode. But, I have this abiltiy to talk myself out of my tree REALLY WELL. It is my defense mechanism. If I can talk myself out of anything being wrong, there IS nothing wrong. Even if I have just talked myself into something being wrong. I know. This is what I will be taking pills for someday. Can’t wait. Neither can my sisters. They then will laugh at me and say See? I KNEW you were the crazy one! They suck. See how I am hosting my blog here. Ick. I suck.
YES. Pms sucks and I have nothing you can break, though I do have something to break things WITH.
If you come to my church? I’m sure my pastor will tell you to take as many pills as you see fit. And, surely then, we would have pancakes.
PS find a new shrink. Seriously. Nothing is more important than your mental health and this guy sounds like an asshole.
August 12, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Wow, see, I am amazed that you can still WRITE when this happens to you. Me, I sit at the computer and nothing. funny. ever. comes. out. I am either yelling at the kids for walking too loudly, or crying into my pillow because I have NO PURPOSE and I can’t remember how to smile. And yes, it happens every month. I spent $500 this summer on a therapist and felt better for about an hour afterward each time. She said I didn’t need drugs. My husband thinks I need a different therapist. I’m definitely going to ask the new one about part-time Zoloft.
August 12, 2007 at 9:51 pm
Thank you all for reading and sharing. I’m sorry other people are feeling this way, but I’m glad I have company. I’ll try to respond to all your comments in a more personal manner soon. In the meantime, I should tell you that I don’t think my psychiatrist is doing a bad job. I think he is a fine doctor. But he’s not an ob/gyn and that’s who I should see if I want medication to deal with this problem.
August 12, 2007 at 10:52 pm
If your pastor thinks that no one, at any point in time, needs meds, then he probably never has needed meds.
He’ll change his story one day when someone close proves him wrong.
Meds are not the spawn of satan, although I’m quite certain that PMS is certainly, at the least, a by-product.
August 12, 2007 at 10:58 pm
Aw yes… those times of the month. Lovely. I, too, get the same way. I have joked in a couple blog posts that my readers can just tell when its that time, because my emotions are so strong and I get LIVID with certain things. Enough to have a friend recommend that “Yaz” stuff, with that stupid commercial, you know the one. LOL
I am also on medication for anxiety and sometimes I wish I could just double up or just sleep through the whole week of the cloudy times of the month. I hope you feel better talking about it and I hope something can be figured out soon! ((HUGS))
August 13, 2007 at 12:40 am
I think by now, most of my readers almost expect one or two ranting, bitter, depressed, tear-drenched or bitchy post in the month and I am not severe compared to what a lot of women go through before their periods.
Even if he is well intended, your pastor is (Obviously) woefully ignorant. Medications for things like this ARE a godsend, in my opinion. God gave humans the ability to create medications to help conditions that require medical treatments (Are you supposed to shun meds for cancer and just pray, too? Same thing in my book.)
I hope that his words never cause serious harm. Pastors have huge influence and this could just result in more than frustration and hurt feelings, ya know?
August 13, 2007 at 12:24 pm
Okay, sounds to me like you need a psychiatrist that’s not going to cause you ADDITIONAL stress.
I’m too on anti depressants and was also told the same thing that I can’t just take them for the shitty week and not the rest of the month, it has to be all the time. Sucks.
I’m on Effexor and it’s GREAT, I never lose my cool and I just let things slide instead of fighting it out. Which I NEVER EVER did before. It think it drives Mike even more insane because I just let everything go now. LOL LOVE it!
But, honestly, if you’re not happy with the psychiatrist or the drugs, you need to seek out different help. You deserve that much!!!
*hugs* Hope it works out!
August 13, 2007 at 5:57 pm
Country Mouse - The antidepressant my therapist mentioned was Prozac. I should have been clear with the psychiatrist that I’d heard that specifically for treating PMS. I really need to get over being intimidated by him. Thank you for the encouragement. Bossy is something I’m familiar with, for sure.
Stimey - I will definitely let you know. Thank you.
allthepretties - YES. It’s getting worse as I get older. Cramps are less and less an issue. It’s the fist-through-a-wall rage that really brings me down.
Amanda - Thank you for your comment. I was gritting my teeth and hissing, “I’m WRITING over here” at my family when I put that together today. Then I left the house for a few hours. It helped.
OMSH - He doesn’t say it outright but he makes these little jabs. When I was severely depressed last year he used the phrase “pop psychology” in one of his sermons - like it was a curse. Fortunately, the other pastor was very supportive and encouraged me to continue seeing my therapist and getting help from doctors if I needed it.
Kelly - The Yaz commercial makes me violent. Seriously. I imagine every one of the women in that commercial punching themselves in the head for acting like such idiots.
Loralee - I do know. Sometimes I wonder if I’m totally misunderstanding him, if he’s talking about people making mountains out of molehills and “This doesn’t apply to those of you who have been squashed by the real mountain.”
sam - I don’t mind taking an antidepressant every day. I just want something else for those 48-72 hours of the month that I’m so angry I can’t stand myself.
Thank you all for sharing. You’re all invited back next month to talk me down again. Partay!
August 13, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Me, I happen to love medicine.
Truly.
Chemicals in our brains cause the monthly anger/fear/depression/whininess. I see no reason not to take chemicals to help turn the volume down on things. Really. It’s a medical problem and there are medical answers.
Tom Cruise be d*mned.
Go see a new M.D. A good internist/general practitioner would be able to help if you can’t get good recs for an OB in your area. But I hope you can.
August 14, 2007 at 8:52 am
whymommy - I agree that it’s a medical problem. I hate to sound like a whiner/giver-upper, but it is so hard to find a doctor I trust here. I see a nurse practitioner in an internal medicine practice, but she doesn’t deal a lot with depression.
I’m going to do the drooling thing and go meet the new ob/gyn. Soon. Soon.
August 21, 2007 at 8:12 am
There’s an old Arab proverb, “Trust God, but tie your camel to a tree.”
If there’s something that will make you feel better, and it’s not illegal or immoral, do it. Does your pastor work out at the gym? That may fall under taking care of the Spirit’s temple, but it also increases your endorphins. Those who don’t have the problem are never going to be as sympathetic as those who do.