off my sertraline
19.02.24 | 6:58 pm
after having been stuck, by myself, all alone in a foreign country, in a tiny tiny studio apartment for three months, technically only allowed one hour per day outside...
after coming home and getting even more obsessed with exercise, beating my body into the ground without ever giving it a rest day out of the intense fear that once i stopped, i'd never start again...
after being consumed with the thoughts of something happening to someone, anyone, in my family, or one of my friends...
after my first heart palpitations, my hands and arms and face regularly falling asleep, the insane amount of fear gripped me...
after literally sitting on the couch afraid to move in case moving made my heart jump out of my chest...
finally, after all that, i was prescribed sertraline. a tiny dose -- 25mg -- but a dose nonetheless. and at that point, i would've taken literally anything that promised even the smallest amount of relief.
but that was back in november of 2020. and here we are in february of 2024. i haven't had a genuine panic attack in at least two years, and any time i feel panic rising in my chest, i can confidently calm it back down.
it took a while -- and about a year of therapy -- but i finally feel as though i'm in a good enough place to continue on without it.
i dealt with horrific brain zaps for a week when i halved my dose, but i haven't gotten those yet. instead, i am insanely parched, hungry, light headed, and i want to cry.
but we'll manage.
--
i turned 34 last week, an age i think will be extra fun since 3+4=7 and 7 is one of my favorite numbers.
i am honestly insanely lucky to have had three different birthday celebrations:
1. the first was with my family to celebrate not only my birthday, but my mom's.
2. the second was with seth, who bought me two fancy bottles of wine from chateauneuf-du-pape, a region really close to where i lived in france and a place i had planned on visiting before covid hit. he paired the wine with a full tasting menu that was specifically designed to compliment said wine. needless to say, it was incredible.
3. the third was with my lovely friends this past weekend.
i feel very, very loved.
--
yesterday, before i left seth's house to come home (and run EIGHT MILES, my longest run yet!!!!), i admitted to him the following:
i think i finally feel ready to consider moving to louisville. probably not this summer, but likely next summer. i want to have another year of experience teaching dual credit english classes and my AP class.
this has truly come after a lot of thought and consideration. when you look at it on paper, i am literally the one giving everything up here: a job i genuinely love, where people respect me and think i do well, being incredibly close to my family (who i kind of ran away from for ten years, if we're honest), seeing my nieces and nephews multiple times a week, yada yada...
i mean, really. i am the one giving things up. i just am.
but i also am just ready to be with seth all the time. and if i can find an comparable job (one that honestly will pay more, considering where it's at) that is at a good school, hopefully somewhere i can implement my AP class, maybe a place that has better administration... i think that could be okay.
and i do enjoy the thought of living somewhere that people actually want to visit, that has things we can do together on a weeknight, that lets us try new things more often.
but i sat there and told him this, and followed it up with...
but if i do this, i have to know that you'd really be willing to get engaged and married soon after. if i am the one giving all of this up, i have to have something in return.
and we discussed this all, and he said yeah, but here is the problem:
seth could not care less about getting married. it is not a priority to him. that's fine.
but because of this, it feels like i literally can't win. it feels like if i do get my way, i've pushed him into it. he won't ever be as excited about the prospect as in am.
and by extension, it feels like that means he wouldn't be excited or proud to be married to me.
and that makes me extremely sad.
i've tried to express this all to him tonight again, but... i just don't think he gets it. and we just end up at a standstill.
because he is saying yes, okay, we can do that... there is just no excitement behind it.
and that makes me extremely sad.
so sad that i would be giving up so much and not even get that excitement about this possibility in return.
a lot of this perhaps isn't fair. because he's never even said he's not excited, or that he flat out wouldn't want to. he just hasn't made me really feel the opposite, either.
overall, things are lovely. i shouldn't complain.
i just sometimes wish that i had someone who would scream out their love for me from the rooftops.
stupid as that is.