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Thursday 4 February 2016

It's back

Welp, guess what's back in my life? Depression yay!!! </sarcasm>

I had a pretty good run there for a few months, but it looks like I'm back to lying in bed fantasizing about killing myself in different ways. That's how I spent Monday evening anyways. Not the healthiest use of one's time, I'm sure.

Then on Tuesday I got hit with kind of a bombshell: the government seized my order of spiro at the border. And yes, I know that's a risk of buying drugs without a prescription, I know those laws exist for a reason, and I know that if I'd been making more of an effort I maybe could have found a trans-friendly doctor by now who'd be willing to prescribe me what I need. But for a known risk it still felt like a punch in the gut. What the hell am I gonna do now? If I halve my dosage I have enough for almost a week. Maybe my best bet is to hit up a walk-in clinic again, that is how I got spiro the first time after all.

Oh yeah, and attached to the official document the government sent me was this paternalistic little epistle warning about all the dangers of buying health products online. Among them was the fact that "buying drugs on the Internet may also pose financial risks. In the some cases, the product ... could be stopped at the border by Canadian authorities." Yeah... thanks I figured that out.

Okay, I wrote the above on Wednesday. Afterwards I took some time to do some catharsis, and I've been feeling a little better since then.

For me the best catharsis comes from listening to that heavy metal music I seems to like so much. I'll start out with some dark, sad songs (like this one), move on to songs about dealing with the shit in your life (like this one), and finally end up at songs that are upbeat, positive and optimistic (like this one). And it really does make a difference. I hope everyone has something in their life that does for them what metal does for me. It's definitely more than just a "favourite genre" to me, it has helped me so much over the years.

After that I had enough motivation to tidy the house a little (it had been a nightmare, now it's slightly less so) and to load the bread machine and set the timer so I'd have bread in the morning. Accomplishing a couple small things helped me feel a little better too.

I'm definitely still in a depressive episode and definitely still running out of spiro, and both of those things suck. But they seem less completely daunting now then they did before. Thank the gods for music.

2 comments:

  1. Dear Ashley, get thee to a doctor! There must be a female doctor you can talk to about this. My nurse practitioner was the making of me. No idea where I would be now if I hadn't opened up to her those many years ago now.

    As for music, cannot possibly live without the guidance of that muse now. What kind of aim would we call high...

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  2. Dear Ashley,

    Thank you for posting such a personal story.

    I'm transgender myself and on HRT, 30 years old now (mtf). I've been on HRT for about 3 months, maybe a bit more. One of the first things my endo told me was that anti-androgens cause testosterone withdrawl (yes it's like any other drug!). And one side-effect of T-withdrawl is depression. It has to do with the way hormones work, it's a two-way process. The hormone itself doesn't do much, it needs a receptor to bind with. As with any person who's born in a male body, you've got (same as me) many testosterone receptors, since that's been your primary sex hormone for the last 20+ years (don't know how old you are exactly).

    You can't just withdraw the testosterone and hope it has no adverse effects. even though you might dislike it, your body is used to it.

    Adding estrogen to the mix won't do much in the beginning, because the body still lacks the numbers of estrogen receptors to process the E. It can take up to 8 months for the body to fully adjust do the new situation.

    This is also why seeking out an endo is such an important thing, because they monitor how things are going and can adjust your prescriptions accordingly.

    Believe me, I know how important this is. I myself have self-medicated without supervision (also through the internet) for over a year. That was 6 years ago, and I've done lots of thinking and had therapy in the mean time. now, all of those years later, I've finally made the decision to continue with this, because I'm sure this is who I am.

    Just give yourself the chance you deserve, because you're beautiful, both inside and out. Don't let people put you down, and always keep looking ahead :). There's so many good things in store for you!

    Lots of hugs,
    Eline

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