29 Mar 2017 - Overwhelmed
I'm not sure why I bother start with a greeting. It's like saying "hello" into an empty cave; you know that no one's there, and that no one will respond or reply, but the action is somehow comforting.
Day 34 on escitalopram.
Mood: 3.5.
I had a horrible realization today that I am dangerously close to being entirely underwater as far as my coursework is concerned. Of the six courses I'm currently enrolled in, I feel as though I'm at the cusp of falling completely behind in five, and battling depression makes things that much more difficult. Part of me wants to get a letter or something from my psychiatrist for my instructors, stating that I'm suffering from an illness that will likely impact my academic performance, but I don't know that what good it'll do. I want some proof that I'm not just blowing off classes or being lazy or something, but I also fear that my instructors will greet that information with a shrug.
This will be something to discuss with my psychiatrist in the morning.
Speaking of, I'm going to see my psychiatrist in the morning, a week earlier than I'd originally planned. The Lexapro definitely isn't helping, and if the past four or five days are any indication, the depression is getting worse. Yesterday, and the day before, I had periods where I felt extremely numb, which is a very new and, frankly, very scary development for me. Likewise, I've felt rather unstable, like there won't need to be a very big push to make me fall someplace very dark very quickly.
I decided to schedule a wander this weekend with Favorite Person. I want to say something to her then, but I don't know what. Perhaps I just want to be close in a way that won't generate an intense guilt...Hopefully the fact that this is pre-planned will prevent me from rethinking things and bailing. Exactly where we'll go, I haven't decided, but I think that I want to go to the Japanese garden on campus and feed the koi. It's enjoyable, it's low-key, and the setting is conducive to conversation. Who knows, we might dump a canister of food into the pond and then just sit quietly together. That would be nice.
In other news, and good news in my life these days is exceedingly rare, I'm a proud guppy mom now. As part of my biostatistics class, we're required to design and carry out some sort of biological project. My partner and I decided to look at whether or not salt concentration affects growth rates in guppies - I believe that it does, since guppies are freshwater (but amazingly salt-tolerant) fish, and will have to expend energy on osmoregulation. If more energy is being diverted to excrete excess salt, less energy will be available for tissue growth. Ergo, more salt in the water translates to slower-growing guppies. We ended up purchasing more guppy fry than we needed for the study, so the larger ones (and a few platies that somehow made it into the mix) went into my sculpin tank as live-in food for him, and the remaining 15 or so babies are in my 2.5 gal. They're all so, so cute, and they have so much personality already. The biggest of the bunch is barely half an inch long, and the smallest look like swimming eyeballs and are transparent.
I hope that my new babies live long enough and get big enough to be suitable food for Extant the banded sculpin - what, did you think that I just wanted to keep a whole bunch of guppies or something? - but it seems like every animal that I love dies no matter how well I take care of them. My best seems to never, ever be good enough.
I'm going to bed early today for a change, partly because I can and mostly because I'm tired and in pain.
Until then.
29 Mar 2017
Day 34 on escitalopram.
Mood: 3.5.
I had a horrible realization today that I am dangerously close to being entirely underwater as far as my coursework is concerned. Of the six courses I'm currently enrolled in, I feel as though I'm at the cusp of falling completely behind in five, and battling depression makes things that much more difficult. Part of me wants to get a letter or something from my psychiatrist for my instructors, stating that I'm suffering from an illness that will likely impact my academic performance, but I don't know that what good it'll do. I want some proof that I'm not just blowing off classes or being lazy or something, but I also fear that my instructors will greet that information with a shrug.
This will be something to discuss with my psychiatrist in the morning.
Speaking of, I'm going to see my psychiatrist in the morning, a week earlier than I'd originally planned. The Lexapro definitely isn't helping, and if the past four or five days are any indication, the depression is getting worse. Yesterday, and the day before, I had periods where I felt extremely numb, which is a very new and, frankly, very scary development for me. Likewise, I've felt rather unstable, like there won't need to be a very big push to make me fall someplace very dark very quickly.
I decided to schedule a wander this weekend with Favorite Person. I want to say something to her then, but I don't know what. Perhaps I just want to be close in a way that won't generate an intense guilt...Hopefully the fact that this is pre-planned will prevent me from rethinking things and bailing. Exactly where we'll go, I haven't decided, but I think that I want to go to the Japanese garden on campus and feed the koi. It's enjoyable, it's low-key, and the setting is conducive to conversation. Who knows, we might dump a canister of food into the pond and then just sit quietly together. That would be nice.
In other news, and good news in my life these days is exceedingly rare, I'm a proud guppy mom now. As part of my biostatistics class, we're required to design and carry out some sort of biological project. My partner and I decided to look at whether or not salt concentration affects growth rates in guppies - I believe that it does, since guppies are freshwater (but amazingly salt-tolerant) fish, and will have to expend energy on osmoregulation. If more energy is being diverted to excrete excess salt, less energy will be available for tissue growth. Ergo, more salt in the water translates to slower-growing guppies. We ended up purchasing more guppy fry than we needed for the study, so the larger ones (and a few platies that somehow made it into the mix) went into my sculpin tank as live-in food for him, and the remaining 15 or so babies are in my 2.5 gal. They're all so, so cute, and they have so much personality already. The biggest of the bunch is barely half an inch long, and the smallest look like swimming eyeballs and are transparent.
I hope that my new babies live long enough and get big enough to be suitable food for Extant the banded sculpin - what, did you think that I just wanted to keep a whole bunch of guppies or something? - but it seems like every animal that I love dies no matter how well I take care of them. My best seems to never, ever be good enough.
I'm going to bed early today for a change, partly because I can and mostly because I'm tired and in pain.
Until then.
29 Mar 2017
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