Why am I still here?

I've been asking myself this more and more frequently, many times a day now. Why am I still alive? Why haven't I killed myself?

The anxiety continues to get worse as well as all the other problems I have. More often now, there is anger accompanying the panic attacks, due to my frustration. If I wasn't the passive, easy-going person that I am, I would be throwing things and breaking things and insulting people. I've gone past depression to shear despair. I don't look forward to anything. Not even the thought of being able to go on a great vacation or winning the lottery or finding the perfect woman sounds like fun.

I've also been thinking about the word "recovery". I have often talked about my attempts to recover from all of this.. but recovery implies that at one time I didn't have these problems, and that isn't true. They've always been there, so there is no place to recover to for me. I am now passed the point where even if my faulty sympathetic nervous system was fixed, I would still be unhappy, simply because... oh hell it doesn't matter so I won't even say why.

So why have I not killed myself? Is it because I hope things will get better? No. I know the truth. I can justifiably say "I'm screwed". After years of talking with doctors and therapists of all makes and kinds, and years of studying and researching the underlying causes and what kinds of things can be done, I know that there is nothing I, or anyone, or anything can do that will cause me to be free of my disorder. At best, I can hope for a slight reduction in the symptoms, but that's it, nothing more. I find myself getting angry with people who refuse to accept that and hold on to their ignorant faith and hope that "there has to be something that will work".

So why have I not killed myself? Because of the anxiety. The anxiety is so severe that my body will do anything to escape that fear, even if it means death... but, the anxiety is what is keeping me alive. Ironic? Actually it makes perfect sense to me. My "fear switch" is turned on all the time. I'm not necessarily afraid of dying, but when I think about suicide, the anxiety gets very severe due to realizing all the consequences that would have. How it would cause emotional suffering to my friends and family, the hassle they would have to go through in arranging a funeral. And also the realization that I'm not the only out there suffering like me. I still have one hope - it's a long shot by far - but my hope is that I can convince some researchers to study people like me who have had the disease since birth, and who are treatment resistant. I've searched and searched, my psychiatrist has as well, and we can not come up with any studies that have been done on long-term treatment resistant people such as myself. It's really sad that no such study has been done. All the studies I see of anxiety related disorders only observe the subjects for a time measured in weeks... not years. And that maybe, many many years down the road, such studies could eventually lead to a cure for this. This would mean altering genes. Something that the government is currently against and many people are scared of.

So, I'm pissed off. The anxiety won't let me live, and it won't let me die. And I don't have the funding at my disposal to do the long-term invasive research that so desperately needs to be done.

Still don't know what day it is...

Well, gosh, what day is it again? I'm still having trouble keeping track of the days... they go by without me really noticing them with my odd sleeping patterns... and I seem to be less aware of what is going on around me... and my moods have been wierd, almost like frequent emotional trauma without any real external source for it... and I'm starting to have more level 9 and 10 panic attacks.

Anyway a reader of the site sent me some links about Benzodiazepines, a class of medicines frequently prescribed for short-term anxiety relief that also have side effects of addiction, withdrawal symptoms, and... as with many other medicines for anxiety, the risk of making anxiety worse and not better. Sucks, don't it?

Anyway, if you want to learn more, here are the links:
BENZODIAZEPINE DEPENDENCY AND WITHDRAWAL
Frequently Asked Questions
BENZODIAZEPINES: HOW THEY WORK
AND HOW TO WITHDRAW

I also recently read the full unabridged version of Flowers for Algernon... and boy that book just really struck me, I can see so many parallels to my own life... from my point of view the book tells the story of a young man struggling to balance his emotional maturity and his intellectual maturity. It's the kind of book that I think most people can get something from.

hmm... What day is it?

Boy I didn't realize it's been about a week since I last posted... where have I been? Mostly groggy, heck most of the time I don't even know what month it is...

My psychiatrist and I decided to stop taking Gabitril cold-turkey in an attempt to alleviate the hyper-somnia and grogginess. My fear is that I will return to where I was before the Gabitril - severe insomnia, which I hated as much as I hate this grogginess. We're frezing my levels of Xanax at 7mg a day, and we'll wait and see for a few weeks how things change.

Since I can't afford the nutritional/herbal/mineral/etc supplements I've been on, my psychiatrist suggested a "free" method that may help.

Check out www.solarhealing.com to find out more about what he's asking me to try.

To sum it up, I'm supposed to stand barefoot on the ground and loot directly at the sun during the 45 minutes before and after sunset and sunrise, each day for nine months in gradually increasing amounts of time. The theory is that this will alleviate hunger, physical ailments, mental ailments, and also bring about spiritual growth. I'm keeping myself from making a judgment on wether or not this is all just a hoax, and keeping an open mind and willing to give it a try. Problem is with my current hyper-somnia I haven't been able to actually be awake during sunrise and sunset.

Unlearning Fear: Lessons From Mice

Link: Unlearning Fear: Lessons From Mice
Interesting this article was published on my birthday...
Anyway it talks about a subject I feel was beat to death in my psychology courses in college, that of conditioned responses, but some of you may find it interesting, although this study doesn't really tell us anything we haven't already known for years.

Antidepressant Side-Effect Gene Found

Link: Antidepressant Side-Effect Gene Found
Something else to consider... why I often see side effects but no relief...