I hated the idea of medicating when it was first suggested to me about 4 - 5 years ago.
It was brought up to me in a session with my therapist. She suggested that I should consider some more "help" in the form of a pill.
Immediately, my suspicions started flaring up, and I asked her: was this a big pharma move? Would this therapist be getting more money if they succeeded in prescribing me whatever it was they thought would be good for me?? Would it make me more crazy than I already feel like I am???
My therapist laughed, and explained to me that she wouldn't be the one doing the prescribing. I'd go to a psychiatrist for that. I cocked my head to one side. "A psychiatrist?" I asked. "Why can't you do it?" She then went on to explain the nuances of the mental health world, and it made some sense. But I digress.
Then, I said no to medication. It was 2019, so I had only one experience with a panic attack at that point. I thought things were managable with my anxiety and my thinking spirals, and they were for the time.
Fast forward a couple of years to 2021. I was in a new city (which I didn't like) in a new job (which I liked but wasn't super fulfilling) and not doing so good with the whole finding-emotional-outlets thing to deal with these transitions. My partner took the brunt of my anxieties spiraling out of control, my listlessness, my inability to manage the overwhlem my emotions caused. I knew that it wasn't healthy for me to lay it all on him, and that furthered the issues I have with guilt and worthiness, which then caused my anxiety to rev 'round the track even faster.
After a panic attack took me out of work, it was then I knew that therapy wasn't enough. If I couldn't even be "well" enough to participate in everyday life, I couldn't wait for the answers to click and the lessons to solidify. I needed help, I needed to create safe time for me to work through my shit, and I needed this solution faster than I could reasonably expect myself to make major mental changes that would stick.
I'll go ahead and say this right now: my first psychiatry experience sucked. Not because the medication didn't work (I'm actually still taking that prescription), it was because my psychiatrist messed up the dosage and then my insurance was confused and said that sort of dosage didn't exist. To my psychiatrist's credit, she chose a lower dose to ease me into the meds, but the pills didn't come in that low of a dose. It was a confusing process full of me trying to make multiple calls to my insurance and then connect them with my psychiatrist... who I had found on Teladoc. Teladoc doesn't have a way for patients to directly communitcate with your healthcare providers, so I called them and told them I had to get a hold of my psychiatrist because she's written the prescription dosage incorrectly, giving me something that essentially didn't exist. (tl;dr my psychiatrist tried to give me a 5 pack of beer when only 6 packs exist. 🤷🏻♀️)
Mind you, I was doing all this while in a significantly fragile mental state. As if I didn't have enough anxiety already!
The medication I am on (escitalopram) is an SSRI. I feel pretty lucky that I didn't have to experiment with a bunch of different drugs to find one that fit for me, though I know I would have (and will, if the future dictates) if I needed to see different results.
The effects were noticeable a few days after I started taking them; I started at 10 mg per day, 5 in the morning and 5 in the evening. My mind felt... less noisy. And because of that, I felt more in control and settled. What anxiety does is it causes and endless hamster wheel of thoughts, so with the medication I was able to give my little hamster a much needed break. With that break, I was able to give myself the mental space to "do the work": think about life lessons, make choices, essentially take my life back out of my future-worried head and into my present-moment hands.
I have since then had more panic attacks, so my dosage has been bumped up. Similarly, I had the same feeling a couple of days after I started the increased dosage: a noticably calmer state in my mind.
The truth is, the medication helped. It still helps, though I think I am fast approaching the time to experiment with something new. I'm not ready to dismiss the need for some chemical help just yet, but I truly believe that I will be at a point in the next few years to come off of it entirely.
I used to be worried about my pride and ego being hurt by my taking medication.
What I mean is that to me, taking medication meant that I was inherently weak. This is a false line of thinking with no reality. The truth of the matter is that I have a mild chemical imbalance that causes my mind to get in the way of my life, and I currently can't manage the effects of said issue without medical intervention. The truth of the matter is that I can choose to stop taking medication at any time. Currently, I choose not to.
Medication does not control you. You choose, with the help of experts and trusted people, to take it... or you don't take it. It can help get you out of your own way enough to focus on long term solutions. There is no right or wrong answer. There is a choice. And you can always change your mind.
So breathe. Just because you decide to try medication to help you with your current mental health struggles doesn't mean it's a lifelong sentence, and doesn't mean you can't get to a point where you no longer need them. It doesn't mean you're weak. It means you acknowledge and accept (both - very healthy things!) that you need and want a little extra help.
To get started on your psychiatry journey, I recommend looking up folks on Psychology Today.