The Drug Dance

I'm stumbling around like a zombie who feels like she's on the verge of getting the flu. That's what I feel like--a sick zombie. Lucky flippin' me. Somehow in the middle of my brain-stem driven level of functioning, I realized I have to sleep or I cannot exist. It's that simple, and that dramatic. Otherwise I feel so awful, riddled with anxiety and such severe pain, all I can do is drink to escape my misery. Needless to say, the after affects of a bottle of Burgundy only further serve to enhance my zombie-like, anxiety-riddled state. So I am now back to drugging myself to sleep. And the dance begins...

To medicate or not to medicate is an overwhelmingly controversial topic. Not enough, and functioning isn't possible. Too much, and functioning isn't possible. Then there's that whole "two strokes as a side-effect of a very popular antidepressant" thing I went through six years ago. So needless to say, I try and medicate as little as humanly possible. But the bottom line is what this illness does to my body makes me want to die, physically and emotionally. I found a way to mitigate such a dire reaction by completely changing my lifestyle. After years of prep work, my fibromyalgia salvation came in the form of green juice and dumbbells.

But today the flu-ish zombie writing this is so many miles away from the capable woman who managed her illness with holistic lifestyle dedication, I'm struggling to figure out where I am. No, I'm nowhere as bad off as I was in 2011--when I was 100 lbs. overweight, in so much pain I couldn't walk down a flight of stairs, and shattered from six months of high-dose prednisone, but I ain't squatting 95 lbs. either. So here I sit at square three or four, admitting I'm sicker than any one thing will fix, and putting my faith back in that tenuous combination of kale juice and pharmaceuticals. All in an attempt to try and find my footing on the path to traversing year eleven with the fibro beast eternally on my back.

Thanks for joining,
Leah

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