About Pills

My relationship with medication

My psychiatrist told me I need to stop taking benzos, because their use leads to memory loss. Immediately my anxiety level rose to a 10. “It’ll be very slow, and you won’t even notice the change,” he said, telling me to step down over a period of months.

I’ve been taking them regularly for years, since the time in my life when I was hospitalized a few times for bipolar disorder. I was very sick then: not so sick now. In fact I’m doing really well. Time has been good for my mental illness.

But quit taking them? Won’t I be anxious all the time?

I hate to rock the boat. But I see his point, and I’ll give it a whirl.

Change, for someone with bipolar disorder, is very difficult. It’s hard for everyone, of course, but when your moods fluctuate a lot they throw a wrench in the works. You’re already spongy internally, so there’s an impulse to keep things absolutely steady externally.

I’ve spent a lot of time masking my moods when I’m around other people, so when I’m depressed or manic to whatever degree I tend to isolate. That way I don’t have to mask. No one will notice, I think. I’m safe by myself.

Telling a professional about my mood changes only leads to trouble; psychiatrists tend to medicate problems. It’s their job. Sometimes, though, the symptoms are bad enough that I ask for help.

The same goes for the other disorders in my chart. For MS I take muscle relaxants for the tremor and spasms, and medication designed to stop my immune system from attacking my nerves. Those medications overlap with those I take for my rheumatoid arthritis, where my immune system is attacking my joints and tissues.

I’m often in pain.

Then there’s the heart medication and the sleep medication. Sleep is hard to come by because of pain and because bipolar disorder is notorious for destroying normal sleep patterns.

Anyway, suffice it to say I take many medications. I’m committed to my regime because of my symptoms.

From the outside, however, it seems to look like I’m overmedicating. I get comments, especially because I don’t tell most people about my symptoms in the first place.

Those comments are often in the form of suggestions. Try functional medicine, or acupuncture. Try this diet or that. There’s this special treatment, and you should try it. Taking a lot of pills leads to early death.

Everyone’s an expert, and when I tell them that I’ve tried those things and remain convinced that western medicine works best for me in combination with the Mediterranean diet, they trail off and give up, but I can tell they think I’ve been duped by nefarious doctors into taking all the drugs I do.

It’s like when you’re pregnant and well-meaning people give you unsolicited advice. Your jutting stomach gives the general public permission to tell you stories about botched births and to slip you their cousin’s midwife’s number.

But for one thing it’s none of their business, and for another, I’ve done my research and I know my body. The medications I’m on help me, and in consultation with my doctors I take them for good reasons.

The people I grew up with are probably the worst perpetrators of this criticism. The comments cut deeply with their implication that I’m stupid and easily led.

I prefer to be asked about how I feel and how things are going with my diseases. What are your fears, are you okay? Let me talk about the enormity of having serious illnesses and their implications for my present and my future.

Anyway, I’ll take my psychiatrist’s advice and taper off the benzos. It’s scary, but it’s the decision I’ve made in consultation with him.

He knows to listen for my tentative hints that something is going wrong. He tends to be conservative in prescribing new medications, and I like that.

So don’t worry, I’m safe. I’m doing my best to negotiate my way through the deal fate has dealt me. I want to tell people I hear their concern as love, their advice as love.

I love you too.