I can no longer afford my medication. It has been months since I have been able to take the medication my doctor prescribed for pain, headaches, anxiety, depression, etc. The car crash has turned my life into a train wreck. To be clear, I did not want to stop taking the meds. They were helping, it turns out that they were helping a lot more than I realized. There is just no more money. I have cried many, bitter tears over this “choice”.
I have exhausted my savings. I am grateful that it lasted as long as it did, but it is gone now. There is no income. The pain from my headaches and left arm coupled with the ever-present exhaustion don’t make working an option. I applied for Disability months ago. At this point, I have been denied twice and have to wait another 18 months for a hearing that will determine whether or not I meet their criteria. While I wait, I am not supposed to work. Medicaid has denied me three times. Apparently Medicaid is only for adults with a verified disability. So I pay private insurance premiums every month. Financially this is a disaster.
I am terrified. Fear has become another one of my constant companions. So I pray. I pray partly because I believe that God answers prayer and partly because I don’t know what else to do.
Not taking the medication has been a dark and challenging experience. I did talk to my doctor before I stopped taking the medications. The problem with not being able to afford medication is that you cannot afford to renew prescriptions at lower doses to ward off withdrawal symptoms.
All of the medications had varying levels of withdrawal associated with them. Instead of stopping them all at once, I stopped taking them one at a time. (I think that I was also hoping that something would change a long the way and there would be money to start taking them again.) It has been five months of withdrawal from one medication after another. I am starting to believe that hell might not be any worse than this experience. The withdrawal symptoms have been coupled with increased pain, depression and anxiety.
I am a strong person. I am also a stubborn person. Those two combined means that I face every challenge armed with tenacity. Fortunately, as a mental health therapist, I have had the knowledge and the insight to talk myself out of some dark days. Intellectually I have been able to identify the difference between wanting to die due to my body being very confused by changes in chemistry and simply wanting to die. I would not recommend this course of action to anyone. Looking back, I think it was probably a pretty stupid thing to do. I have ended up with a life filled with shadows and darkness and pain. Some days it is difficult to discern the difference between exhausted and depressed.
But there is light. There has to be light. I search for it. Sometimes I find a glimmer of it. In my daily journal, I write about the things for which I am grateful. Some days I write down ridiculous things. One day I was grateful for dirt. Not sure why, but it made the list. Maybe I was thinking about gardening and growth. I have learned that despite the darkness and shadows there is always gratitude. Gratitude is a gateway to hope.
#medication #madness #choices #lifelessons #expectations, #choices #resilience #consequences #challenges #surprises #hope #SenseOfHope #TBI #pain #darkness #prayer #faith
Comentários