It’s 6:26 am on a Saturday. I’m currently stoned on a delicate balance of Bruce Banner, to give me the ability and energy to actually move this meat sack I’m living in, and Purple Punch, to dull all of the joint pain and muscle pain enough to let me stay present in it. The last thing I want to do right now is know more about my situation. But I have to pay attention to what’s going on enough to get through to the other side.
I’m in withdrawal. And I’m feeling very dramatic about it.
It feels so edgy to say that, doesn’t it. I’m in withdrawal. Goodness my oh my what must they think of me.
I’m in withdrawal from a non-recreational substance. I’ve never heard of anyone taking Wellbutrin for the funzies. But I’ll admit I’m pretty fucking naive about stuff and I’m not going to google it. This is a personal essay about my feelings during a medical drug taper and I’m not going to stop this spiral long enough for additional research and facts. So I’ll flag for you right here that this is personal human experience with a sample size of one.
But this one has unfortunately a pretty high pain threshold and the pathological ability to block stuff out that’s too much to deal with at present. It’s an anxiety survival skill, I think.
But as I was saying before I so rudely interrupted. I’m in withdrawal.
Facts first.
I’m on day… twenty-something of a planned taper off of prescribed medications. Medications that enabled my brain to behave less like a muppet on a shopping spree to find a holy object to save some great pillar of civilization, where it’s all or nothing and a french fry leftover from the last time we had a food shame spiral could be the thing that makes the difference between life and death and more like a “normal human” with the ability to open her own fucking mail and keep things moving in life.
Which is to say my ADHD is not treatable with any of the standard meds. They either don’t work for me or my body reacts to them as a death threat. Actually, given my blood pressure, they may BE a death threat. I think that’s actually the point I may have failed to grasp while we tried to medicate me into something that resembles personal executive function.
So it’s before 7 am on Saturday morning. I have done the double wake and bake. I’m talking to myself from my most honest safe place, which is curled up in bed with my best human sleeping next to me.
It’s been close to 30 days on this medically supervised taper, and yesterday I decided to just stop. That I was done. The yo-yo of the tiny dose was too much.
Tiny dose. That’s dismissive and misleading. I was tapered down to 1/3 of my daily medication. Now I’ve gone two days without taking it, which was the next part of the medical instruction. I just listened to my body and started the last phase a few days early.
Mostly because I just could not handle the yo-yo any longer. But timing was also a factor. Handling the shitty part over the weekend seemed smart.
Tiny dose is a stupid designator.
While all of this is happening I’ve been watching Southland.
Yes. ACAB. Deeply and in my soul. But also I watch zombies and space aliens. I enjoy procedurals. And this one has Regina King handling all the fucking business. So yeah I watch cop shows. But I also watch zombies. And anthropomorphs. And Tom Cruise from time to time. And I rank scientologists up there with the worst kind of monsters so… yes I have some shit to sort out.
We started watching Southland looking for some reliable evening entertainment between dinner and funny late night men. It wasn’t holding Rick’s attention but it quickly became a study for me.
I don’t know if we’ve ever discussed the so-called weird thing I do concerning actors. I will hate one or be dismissive of them in a role. Then later I’ll find something they did that was compelling and it fucks up all of my preconceived notions and I have to go back and give all of their characters another chance. It happens on a cadence my daughter would describe as regularly.
In this case the character that had the misfortune of catching me in a bad place was the coked-up poetry meathead Bob Destepello from Grosse Pointe Blank.
Yes, like most self-respecting Gen Xers, I have a deep love of John Cusack in film. How could I not. So of course every line from that movie became eligible for quotable use in our home.
The number-one used quote from GPB?
Well it’s probably “ten years.” Or “you can’t go home, but you can shop there.” But for the sake of this story let’s pretend that “for a while” is in the number one spot. It’s my personal favorite. Despite his quotability, Bob was the character I most marveled in fucking hating.
No idea why. So many meant-to-be-grossed-out-by characters in that movie. Intentionally so.
But I fucking hated Bob with a passion.
So much so that — though I watched The Walking Dead on my own (the violence against women was too much for Rick, but also he isn’t inclined to watch shows where people say his name over and over again) — one day I’m watching The Walking Dead, maybe in my third attempt to watch it all the way through, and Rick stands near the TV and says
For a while.
My brain was like what the fuck. How dare you bring this Bob Destepello energy into my space. I’m watching The Walking Dead.
But then I look at the screen and realize that Abraham is fucking Bob Destepello.
I fucking hated Abraham. Fucking hate. Intense loathing. For all the reasons you would think, probably, but also because he just fucking irked me.
It made me hate Bob more. It made me hate Abraham more.
It also pissed me off that I hadn’t realized.
Fast forward to watching Southland. Michael Cudlitz, the actor I’ve been screaming about, is one of the primary characters — at least for the seasons I’ve seen. Screeeeaaaaaaaam. My nemesis. From annoying Bob Destepello to my most loathed non-villain of The Walking Dead.
No.
But I watched anyway. And at some point I realized the layers of fucking nuance in his portrayal of — checks notes — Officer John Cooper, fucked me up.
I’ve just gotten to the part where I’m so won over by this character and his agave and cactus garden and the while-he’s-gay thing, that I’ve started doubting my loathing for the other characters. I’ve already started to soften on Abraham. I can see the insecurity in Bob without even playing the movie again. Though I do wonder if Rick will sit through it this afternoon.
Anyway.
Just as I had given up and allowed love for this fucking character into my heart, he goes to rehab for his pain killer addiction so he can get surgery blah blah blah, and all I can think sincerely is that poor man has to go through withdrawal.
Which brings us back to bed laying on my side typing this shit out stoned on two different strains of weed, not complaining. Wake and bake is not a sad place.
But what I’m thinking about is how much sugar and caffeine have been reintroduced to my diet to manage the withdrawal symptoms and crash. How much ibuprofen I’ve had to take for the body pain. How many times I’ve puked these last few weeks for no reason. That all of my joints suddenly seem riddled with arthritis. That my muscles feel like solid slab. That I’m thirsty no matter how much I drink.
Sweaty. Cold. Hot. ITCHY. Uncomfortable.
My pores are clogged. I feel like shit.
And I would certainly feel more like shit if it weren’t for everything I’m consuming and applying to balance out the ick.
I crave sugar, salt, and fat.
Someone please. My world for a corn dog and a cherry coke.
I’ve had to work really hard to cut all of that out of my life. I am a creature of habit. I crave repetition and sameness. Sugar and caffeine are necessary for me at the moment. But I’m going to have to give them all up again. And back down on the weed. And rest. And try to let my body find a way to rebuild and seek stability another way.
This was supposed to be an essay about how poorly we treat people in addiction and how hesitant I am to talk about being in withdrawal because of that stigma. About how horribly we’re treating people. About how bad withdrawal is even under the soft pampered circumstances of mental-health-tapered pills in a supportive safe atmosphere. Or about my current obsession with Michael Cudlitz. Or about something else.
But that thread is lost.
It has been.
For a while…
CamiKaos 