I have been feeling, by and large, better more consistently than I have for a while - and, despite my scepticism, I reckon that it is a lot to do with the fact that I have started going to the gym. So, with this in mind. I asked my doctor when it might be wise to start thinking about reducing my dosage, with a view to eventually coming off the tablets completely... She asked me how many episodes of depression I had experienced, so I answered (honestly) that I wasn't really sure, but that it was more than two - two that I have sought treatment for, plus too many in the preceding nearly 20 years of my life that I did my best to ignore.
Her response surprised me, having assumed that she would be keen to get me off the pills. It seems that the current thinking is, given that the Mirtazapine that I am on is not harmful, that it would probably be best that I stayed on them indefinitely, minimising the risk of a further serious relapse.
On the one hand, I mostly content that the tablets have a relatively small impact on my life - a trip to the docs every couple of months and a wee pill every night before bed seems a small price for me generally being easier to be around, better able to function mentally, and as a perk, sleeping way better than I have for many years. The effects of sleeping better are boosted by having a CPAP machine to combat my sleep apnoea.
On the other hand, I don't feel particularly comfortable about being dependent on any drug for the rest of my life - even if it is legal and prescribed. And then there is the cost to the NHS (of which I am a great fan - not just because of what they have done for me, but also because of the amazing things that they have done for my son, Christopher.), which makes me feel somewhat guilty. For now at least, I think that I will follow my doctor's advice - not least because I am still somewhat nervous as to what I would be like without them. I have no desire to blindly hang on to a crutch that I may not need, but sometimes you need a crutch to stop you falling on your pus!
On another topic - I visited the NASA website the other day - as is my wont - and saw a piece saying that the first of February is the annual memorial day to those who have lost their lives pushing back the boundaries of mankind's ignorance while working for NASA. The human cost of our exploration of space (both for NASA and Soviet Cosmonauts) is definitely something that we must remember, but it also struck me that between Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia, NASA have only lost 17 lives on missions and the Russians 4 (I am possibly cheating slightly by calling Apollo 1 a mission, but I think that it's fair since they were in a spacecraft at the time). It could be reasonably argued that those are too many, but I can't help but think that given that manned spaceflight is probably the riskiest thing that mankind has ever undertaken, it could have been a lot more...
No comments:
Post a Comment