Riki's History Part 3: Ups & Downs

Well, like I said, the rest of high school was fairly uneventful.  Toward the end of my sophomore year I started dating a great guy (thanks to my old camp friends, we already have a nickname for him - Beefy).  We were together for a year and a half (until I inevitably messed things up), and he treated me like a princess.  

My mom's side of the family has a history of severe headaches and migraines, and sadly, I didn't escape this fate.  Sometime during my junior year, Mom took me to the doctor to see what they could prescribe for my headaches.  At one point the doctor asked, "Do you have any symptoms of depression?"  Without hesitation, Mom and I both answered yes.  Based on that and a few other questions, I was prescribed Celexa.  

To this day, one of the most meaningful gestures a significant other has made for me was shortly after this.  I had told Beefy about the appointment and the name of the medication, and told him I'd be starting it soon.  The next day when he picked me up for school, he handed me a bunch of paper.  He had gone online and researched Celexa to learn more about it and gave me the results.  He wasn't exactly someone who goes out of their way to read a lot, so it was pretty amazing to know he cared so much.  I'll never forget that.

Eventually, my dosage got bumped up.  And again.  And again.  It would help for awhile, and then slowly taper off.  Beefy stuck with me through a lot of ups and downs, as did a few really amazing friends.  The real problem came if I didn't get the pills refilled quickly enough (and, being a teenager, I was terrible at being on top of things).  The results weren't pretty.  At one point I went three days without my meds and found myself curled up under a desk in an empty classroom, crying and talking to my friend's mom on the phone because my own mom wasn't being any help (so I thought).  Part of it was anxiety about getting things back in line, and part of it was my system being fairly dependent on the Celexa to function.  

I was on Celexa for a few years.  Before I started college in fall of 2002, I went to see my first proper psychiatrist, who threw some wellbutrin in there as well.  Even with that added in, things didn't go so well.  

I don't want to bore anyone with all the details, so I'll just hit on a few things.  The first is that I became an insomniac.  I would be awake for 22 or 23 hours of the day, crashing just long enough to get wired up again.  I was always online, and as much as my roommate tried to involve me, I preferred the world wide web to the actual world around me.  I was dating First again, but he never came to visit and around October I broke things off for good.  (When I broke up with him, he said he had been trying to find a bus out to see me before getting the crap beaten out of him.  I do know that he was severely hurt for awhile, but in my eyes, it was still too little too late.)

Worst of all was the suicidal thoughts.  You know that disclaimer on commercials?  The one that says children and young adults are susceptible to worsening depression and thoughts of suicide?  Yeah, they're not kidding.  There were times I would find myself sitting on the floor in the showers, holding my razor and thinking about how easy it would be.  There were other times when I would lay in bed for hours, missing class, not eating, not sleeping, just crying or aching.  I started burning myself with my lighter (I had recently started smoking at that point).  Things were bad.

They reached a peak in late October when I decided it was just time to do it.  Bestie (who was at college about an hour away) had been wonderful to me, and I felt I owed it to her to say goodbye and to let my boyfriend (who went to her school) know what was going on.  I don't know if I was hoping she could talk me out of it or if I just wanted to talk to someone who loved me or what, but I pretty much scared the ever-loving life out of her.  She told her mom, and they were telling me they would call the police if I didn't stop talking like that.  So, on Bestie's advice, I took my knife to my downstairs neighbor and told him to hold onto it for awhile.

I was too late, though.  Her mom (I think) had already called the police, and soon they showed up at my dorm.  An officer peaked into our room (our door was usually open) and said, "Do you know where I can find Emily?"  Since we actually had an Emily on our floor, I pointed him down the hall.  I was trying to decide if I should make a run for it when two more officers came into my room, asking if I was Erika.  Within 10 minutes there were 4 officers (with 3 squad cars; don't you people carpool or work in partners?) and an assistant dean in my room, all asking me questions.  They almost took my scissors away (until I showed them just how dull they were), and then asked if they should take my pills away.

"My antidepressants?  Uh, I need those so I DON'T hurt myself..."  They weren't thrilled with my response, but they let me keep them anyway.  As the crowd was tapering down, my RA showed up.  He'd been at the library studying, and noticed the cop cars.  He was just curious until he realized they were parked in front of his dorm; then he was alarmed.  He was a great guy, and he made me laugh when he came in and we had this exchange:

RA: I saw all those cops and you know who I thought they were here for?

Me: [Insert other resident's name here.]

RA: Yep.  And for what?

Me: Drugs.

RA: Yep.  

When my roommate came back, she guessed the same things I had, and we joked about it, saying next time they'd be here for the other resident.  After reassuring him that the night's events were over, my RA told me to watch The Muppet Movie (I did) and that the next day he'd take me for ice cream (he did).  Best RA ever.  

The very next night a friend committed suicide.

All I could think was, "That could've been me."  My world was shaken and I finally realized that I didn't actually want to die.  A few weeks later, my roommate helped me tell my parents what was going on and that we thought I could use some time in the hospital.  Mom and Dad didn't agree, but they did agree that I should come home.  They took me to a new psychiatrist, who tried a few different meds with me and referred me to a therapist.

The combination of behavioral therapy and Fluoxetine (generic Prozac) were good to me, and in January 2003 I went back to school.  I kept going through fall of 2004, at which point, I started falling apart again.  This time, my major problems were migraines and falling asleep at the drop of a hat.  I honestly couldn't stay awake, and would find myself sleeping while sitting up with my laptop trying to do homework.  (Eventually, we found out I had sleep apnea, and that was a big part of the problem.)  I was missing classes left and right, and in late November, I decided that it was time to leave again.

But just before this happened, I met Shane.  And that, my dears, is for next time. 

Riki's History Part 2: Pain & Panic

High school, I had thought, was a time to reinvent myself.  The first day of classes, I woke up at 5:30 to make sure I had plenty of time to get ready.  My fingernails matched my sunglasses (which I wore as a hair band, thinking I looked cool), my outfit was great, I was ready to go.  Plus, I finally had a boyfriend, so I thought this would be my year.

My mom always said that most people have a pretty miserable freshman year.  Mine was more miserable than most*.  Things got off to a decent start, but quickly turned sour.  My boyfriend - we'll call him First, since he was my first real boyfriend - and I broke up about 2 months in to the first semester because I had been flirting with another guy. The other guy and I "dated" for six days before I was back with First.  

Things went fine until right around winter break.  I had been putting up with quite a bit of verbal and emotional abuse from First in those few months.  One example that always comes to mind is the time he offered me some of his fries.  I turned them down because I knew he hadn't been eating much lately and I didn't want to take away from his lunch.  Another friend (a guy, of course) offered me some of his fries, and I took a few.  First started yelling at me, asking me why his fries weren't good enough for me, calling me a bitch/slut/etc.  I ran away crying, and when he came after me, he apologized profusely, begging me to forgive him and telling me how much he loved me.  Incidents like this had become our norm (thus earning me the nickname of "Biggest Crybaby at East"), and I put up with it.  

Until the time he used physical force.  I was running away crying one of the times, when he caught up to me, grabbed my arm and yanked me toward the wall.  Fortunately, a few upperclassmen were passing by and told him to let go of me.  It only resulted in a bruise on my arm, but I knew it could get worse, and I knew I had to break things off.

I worked up the courage to do it.  I'll never forget that day.  He was wearing a jacket designed like the American flag and I had dressed up to boost my confidence a little.  When I told him I wanted to break up, he begged me not to.  I stood my ground and the next thing I knew he was walking away from me, telling me he was going home to kill himself.  I cried out to him, told him we could keep dating, and he came back.  I told him we'd talk later.  All day we did this dance.  I'd try to break things off gently, and he'd threaten suicide.  I was frantic, and eventually wound up having my first panic attack.  

Panic attacks are insanely scary.  Your heart races, you start breathing heavy and sweating.  The world around you feels surreal, almost fuzzy.  Everything's a bit tingly (probably because of the breathing), and in my case, I wound up hyperventilating myself into an asthma attack.  Friends got me to the nurse and I had my first nebulizer (sp?) treatment.  While sitting there, trying to relax, they sent in one of the school's social workers, as my friends had tried to explain the circumstances to the nurse.  When I was able, I told her what was going on.  They managed to find First, call his dad and get him home safe, and I thought maybe things would be OK.

In January, when school started up after break, I started dating a new guy.  First caught wind of this and was having none of it.  At first, he just kept trying to give me presents to win me back, including a ring (to this day I don't know where he got it, but it wasn't from a store), but I kept turning him down.  Then he began confronting New Guy.  New Guy and I tried ignoring him and his threats, but things just got worse.  At some point, the three of us ended up in a mediation session (New Guy thought it was a good idea to get everything out in the air with an adult present).  It was actually going well until the mediator stepped out of the room for a minute.  First pulled out a knife, made a few threatening remarks (about New Guy, and about taking his own life again) and ran out of the room.  We told the mediator what happened, and they managed to find him before he really got anywhere (it's a big school; no quick escape routes).

For months, things like this would come up, and I didn't know how to deal with it.  I'd have more panic attacks (and resulting asthma attacks) and wind up at the social worker's office or in the school psychologist's office.  New Guy and I broke up, and I felt more alone than I ever had.  I felt this intense pain that came from so deep inside of me, but never physically came out, and I was frustrated.  I was mad because there wasn't a way to fix the pain, to make it stop.  And so, like too many others, I started cutting.  

It was never anything life-threatening.  Just shallow cuts up and down my arm.  After I'd made the cuts, I'd pour rubbing alcohol on my arms and I'd cry while it burned.  It was a release for me, a pain I could control.  It was a pain that went away.  So much easier to explain than the pain inside.  Eventually, First found out about this, and told some staff member at school.  Word got home to my parents, but the most that ever came up was a brief conversation in which my dad told me they knew and that I was to stop doing it.  They checked my arms at school for a few weeks, but eventually I was off the hook again.

There's a taste of my freshman year.  The rest of high school was relatively uneventful compared to all of that, but I'll save that for next time.     

*Due to some feedback, I feel it's necessary to say that I assume my freshman year was more miserable than most (relative to my peers, anyway).  I certainly know that people had worse years than I did (at 14 or 15, life can really suck), but I also know a lot of people who had much better years.  I'm not saying that my life was so totally awful, blah blah, wah wah.  I'm just saying that it wasn't so grand.