mister roboto

just got an email from my mom. SEE YOU GUYS MON. PM! ok, for the whole week and a half that they've been gone, i've been thinking the would return on saturday. noooo..... we have a whole other weekend in which we may or may not have to police my twenty-going-on-seventeen year old sister!

my brother still gives me crap about calling him when i walked in the house only to find her stoner friends rolling a joint on the kitchen table AND THEY DIDN'T EVEN FLINCH. i don't like being the bad guy. i like the rapport i have with my sister - i think it's important because there were long periods where we didn't talk - and i don't want to destroy it by acting like a parent. my rationale for having him do the dirty work was i get paid to yell at children. i'm not going to do it for free on my vacation and besides, mom did not put me in charge of her, she is not my responsibility. (side note - funny how i still call this my vacation while i'm working 40 hours a week!)

not that i have anything against the kind of activity in which the perpetually stoned kids were participating (in fact i'm all for scientific studies on it) but not in my parent's house; it's just disrespectful - they would not be doing that if my mom were sitting at the kitchen table. actually they probably wouldn't even be in the house if my parents were there.

anyway, mrs. s yelled at my sister last saturday and told her no more friends. my sister actually had the gall to tell her that she's been waiting SO LONG for my parents to leave! i myself yelled at the stoner kids (well not really yelled, more like pleaded) that don't you guys have HOMES to go to? if you want to hang out with keri that's fine but please hang out at your place from now on, ok?

later keri told me about the people she hangs out with. they've been on their own since they were like sixteen; brad started doing drugs when he was 12 and says that his five-year-old brother "is ready for pot." i told her don't take this the wrong way, but your friends sound like perfect jerry springer material. AND SHE AGREED! is that where you see YOUR life headed? don't they have any ambitions or goals? and she didn't say anything except it just makes me thankful for what i've had. (which i love to hear because whenever we'd argue she would always say things like how mom and dad liked us more than her; how she never got anything, etc.)

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i now understand why you should 1) not go off your meds without first speaking to your doctor about it; and 2) gradually decrease your dosage.

wednesday and thursday were difficult days. forgetting that i had increased my dosage and that i had to see my doctor in order to get it refilled, i called the script into walgreens. they told me that it had been denied, and i should call my doctor.

to make a long story short, i was at fault for not paying attention and so was my doctor for not making sure that i understood what i had to do to get a refill. so they refused to refill my prescription and i ended up speaking with a crabby nurse who took a tone with my that sounded like she thought i was abusing my medication. honestly, it is highly inappropriate to use an insensitive tone with a mild depressive who has been off her meds for two days. after that conversation i went to the bathroom to cry and get it together. then i wrote a complaint against the nurse. instead of offering a solution to my problem (ie, offering to get me in for an appointment that day or the next) she just treated me like a drug abuser. but honestly, does anyone know of a way one can abuse an anti-depressant? they take two weeks or more to have any noticeable effects, and they're subtle if they in fact affect you (unless you're not depressed, then they can have the opposite effect and make you want to throw yourself out a window.) no self-respecting drug abuser would ever even think to abuse an anti-depressant.

so wednesday (the day of the CrabbyMeanNurse) was tough; i actually cried but i felt a little better when i put away the dishes, scrubbed the sink and counter till it sparkled, and filtered all the useless crap from the silverware drawer. then, two friends came over just to chill, and i couldn't stop talking. thursday was worse. i had my appointment at 10:30 so i got to sleep in - which was nice. however, i was feeling really agitated - like my mind was racing, like i'd had ten cups of coffee. i was also kind of dizzy. the dizziness was something i'd noticed when i began treatment, but it went away soon after. this time however, it was to the point where i wasn't sure i'd be able to handle the rest of the day. not that the dizziness actually affected my balance or coordination. i just felt dizzy and it was pretty uncomfortable. i guess in the psychopharmacology lingo (because i'm reading Let them Eat Prozac: The Unhealthy Relationship between the Pharmaceutical Industry and Depression by David Healy) i could describe the way i felt as "agitated." i didn't have any "suicidal ideation" but when i was shaving my legs i had this vision/fantasy of seeing blood dripping onto my legs. then i accidentally, i swear, nicked off a scab from a previous shaving incident and dropped the previous thought.

so don't ever go off your anti-depressants cold-turkey.

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i came across the most interesting surname today: Interdonato. he was a candidate we interviewed. consequently i have been singing domo arigato mister INTERDONATO in my head all day!

and having once read the title of this post, i'm sure you will be too!