Zyprexa has by now been completely eliminated from my system. What it’s done is bring back my emotional states. It’s nice to finally feel sad and happy again, also enjoy things or despise things. It’s been really interesting that even negative emotions are at the same time interesting and I’m curious about how they feel.
For instance, last night I found out that I didn’t get into a food co op that I had previously been a member of. It brought back a lot of feelings of rejection and loneliness. I felt friendless and a little betrayed. After my parents went to bed, I couldn’t hold it in any longer and I started tearing up and felt awful. I wanted a beer. But at the same time, I didn’t want to numb the pain at all. I cried on my birthday, but it was this odd crying without a really sad emotional state supporting it. Now I finally had an emotional state that I lacked for a long time. I was entirely curious about it. Part of me didn’t want to shut it off, but wanted to experience it.
And that desire to experience emotion has crept into every facet of my life. I feel emotions from everything and I love music that produces actual changes in my emotions. It doesn’t really matter what emotion it is, it just matters that I emote. I’m in love with experiencing moods again. Another curious aspect is that the emotions feel more intense than I ever remember them being. It’s almost difficult to concentrate at times because it is so intense. I’m going to make a guess and say that it’s from not experiencing emotional states for the better part of a month and now I’m hypersensitive to them. That would explain the curiosity and the intensity.
The only down side is that I feel naive about emotions. I haven’t had to deal with them for a while. And now that they’re so intense, I feel that I don’t know what to do with them. I don’t know how fast they should change, or how sensitive they should be. I also don’t know if I will stay in this hypersensitive state indefinitely. I’m not adverse to that, the world just feels beautiful and wondrous right now. And it’s not even a manic state, I’m inclined to keep this and I’ll learn how to deal with the emotions later as I experience more of them.
But any which way it’s sliced, the result is a peculiar side effect. I would have never guessed that this would have happened. Yet, it did and I’m not sorry for it. It’s wonderful to experience the hight of my moods again. I’ve missed them terribly. I don’t know how I went without them for so long and didn’t notice them. This drug holiday has given me back so much of what I’ve missed. It’s incredible. It’s probably the best decision that I’ve made all year.
Thinking back, I spent the better part of last year on antipsychotics. Numbing me to my emotional states. I now wonder what sort of damage abilify did to them. I was kind flat on that compared to this. And so long as the random suicidal ideation stays away, along with the suspicious thinking and paranoia, I’m not going on antipsychotics unless I must. And that would only be for psychotic episodes. As terrifying as they are, I’m banking on lithium to control the moods and prevent those blackened manias from happening again. But even if I have one here or there, I think I’ll take them in exchange for having my emotions back. This decision is bolstered by the fact that I know that I have an antipsychotic combo waiting to take care of any psychotic moods. And that’s in keeping with the interesting way that my psychiatrist is handling depressions as well. That’s a whole different piece though, I’ll probably write one up later.
Happy Holidays!
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Student of philosophy and mathematics at UW Madison diagnosed with Bipolar 1. I'm particularly interested in philosophy of science as of this moment as well as the intersection of academic life and mental illness.
Zyprexa has by now been completely eliminated from my system. What it’s done is bring back my emotional states. It’s nice to finally feel sad and happy again, also enjoy things or despise things. It’s been really interesting that even negative emotions are at the same time interesting and I’m curious about how they feel.
For instance, last night I found out that I didn’t get into a food co op that I had previously been a member of. It brought back a lot of feelings of rejection and loneliness. I felt friendless and a little betrayed. After my parents went to bed, I couldn’t hold it in any longer and I started tearing up and felt awful. I wanted a beer. But at the same time, I didn’t want to numb the pain at all. I cried on my birthday, but it was this odd crying without a really sad emotional state supporting it. Now I finally had an emotional state that I lacked for a long time. I was entirely curious about it. Part of me didn’t want to shut it off, but wanted to experience it.
And that desire to experience emotion has crept into every facet of my life. I feel emotions from everything and I love music that produces actual changes in my emotions. It doesn’t really matter what emotion it is, it just matters that I emote. I’m in love with experiencing moods again. Another curious aspect is that the emotions feel more intense than I ever remember them being. It’s almost difficult to concentrate at times because it is so intense. I’m going to make a guess and say that it’s from not experiencing emotional states for the better part of a month and now I’m hypersensitive to them. That would explain the curiosity and the intensity.
The only down side is that I feel naive about emotions. I haven’t had to deal with them for a while. And now that they’re so intense, I feel that I don’t know what to do with them. I don’t know how fast they should change, or how sensitive they should be. I also don’t know if I will stay in this hypersensitive state indefinitely. I’m not adverse to that, the world just feels beautiful and wondrous right now. And it’s not even a manic state, I’m inclined to keep this and I’ll learn how to deal with the emotions later as I experience more of them.
But any which way it’s sliced, the result is a peculiar side effect. I would have never guessed that this would have happened. Yet, it did and I’m not sorry for it. It’s wonderful to experience the hight of my moods again. I’ve missed them terribly. I don’t know how I went without them for so long and didn’t notice them. This drug holiday has given me back so much of what I’ve missed. It’s incredible. It’s probably the best decision that I’ve made all year.
Thinking back, I spent the better part of last year on antipsychotics. Numbing me to my emotional states. I now wonder what sort of damage abilify did to them. I was kind flat on that compared to this. And so long as the random suicidal ideation stays away, along with the suspicious thinking and paranoia, I’m not going on antipsychotics unless I must. And that would only be for psychotic episodes. As terrifying as they are, I’m banking on lithium to control the moods and prevent those blackened manias from happening again. But even if I have one here or there, I think I’ll take them in exchange for having my emotions back. This decision is bolstered by the fact that I know that I have an antipsychotic combo waiting to take care of any psychotic moods. And that’s in keeping with the interesting way that my psychiatrist is handling depressions as well. That’s a whole different piece though, I’ll probably write one up later.
Happy Holidays!