Depressions is a serious topic that has affected me and close friends of mine. However, I am the only person I know who has received actual medical treatment for it, so I wanted to share my views on the very well known antidepressant, fluoxetine (Prozac).
First let me try and explain what this medication is and who should take. Well obviously, depressed people shoudl take it. There's something about a chemical imbalance within your brain but I'm sure not everyone out there is a biochemistry major so I won't go in to too much detail. Prozac basically tries to balance that out. You won't ever really receive a high from the drug, it just helps people function better.
When I had first visited my doctor, I was only seeking a blood test because I thought I had a vitamin B12 defficiency since I was vegan. I was always tired, I could sleep for 12 or so hours a day and still feel drowsy. She gave me the blood test, but my vitamin levels were normal. She's been my doctor since I was little and knows about my life at home and what not so she thought I might be depressed so she prescribed me 20 mg of Prozac which she later changed to 40 mg.
While on the medication, I experienced quite a few changes in my mood over the course of three weeks. I started feeling better and was much less irritable. One huge side affect though that started happening within the second was that I had a few panic attacks. I saw her about it, and she said it was normal and would probably stop once the drug had taken full effect. She also suggested I get a therapist which I never did because I was too busy for one of those. Plus I had a good group of supportive friends.
Well the panic attacks did stop and I did feel a thousand times better. I even dumped my dead beat boyfriend and was moving on with my life. I felt so much better about everything that I decided that I no longer needed Prozac anymore and stopped it all on my own which is a HORRIBLE idea. This happened around March of my Senior year. I then just started crashing. I missed loads more school to the point where it would have been impossible to make up all my work. I actually missed so much school that I ended up dropping out during the last month. How stupid, right?
Anyways, I just kept going downhill until about June and then I got a job which kept me very busy. I also enrolled at a community college to get the credits for all the classes that I needed to graduate. I ended up getting a GED because it was easier, but the point is I got my life back together on my own. I never did go back on the Prozac even though it had helped. I just went out of my depressed state and I sometimes think it was high school that made me so depressed.
But even though I was able to recover without medication, I think that anyone who has had symptoms of depression and has had them for a while should visit their doctor and talk to them about getting on antidepressants. There are a helpful drug with no addictive properties. Hopefully my weird story that doesn't really make all that much sense gave someone out there some prespective on the drug. If not, I just hope that the story wasn't too incredibly boring.
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