Thread by @mattmarks

Hey I wanna get real for a minute. About a year ago a good friend of mine offhandedly mentioned that he had started taking anti-depressants. I was pretty surprised, he always seemed like a confident had-it-together dude.

He explained pretty matter-of-factly that he sometimes got depressed and, since starting on anti-depressants, things had gotten better. I didn't ask him to go deeper into explaining his depression, I just said it was awesome it was working out for him. But it stuck with me.

I'd never taken anti-depressants or any mental health drugs. I had the common perspective that periods of mental stress could be solved through exercise, meditation, work, therapy, & other non-chemical solutions. I was also someone who suffered from chronic anxiety & drank a lot.

My anxiety could range from mild social awkwardness to debilitating self-destructiveness and suicidal ideation. But it was omnipresent. I tried managing it through all the above methods and it helped, but it always with me to some degree and it was fucking exhausting to manage.

It grew worse and worse over the last year due to a number of internal and external factors. I was having sporadic panic attacks and my self-destructive tendencies grew to a point where I had developed some serious addiction and substance abuse problems.

One day I woke up feeling completely lost and, remembering my friend, I just up and walked to the nearest Urgent Care and said to the doctor: Hey. I'm suffering from anxiety.

He gave me a prescription for some hydroxozine (a very mild sedative) and referred me to a psychiatrist

My psychiatrist asked me a bunch of questions and was like "Yup, you have an anxiety disorder" and started me on an anti-depressant (geared toward anxiety) called Venlafaxine (Effexor) and gave me Clonezapam for panic attacks

It took a month or two for the Venlafaxine to really take effect, but I can honestly say

It is one of the best things I have ever done for myself.

All the bullshit I used to think about anti-depressants: I would lose myself, they're happy pills, etc. Fucking FALSE.

I am 100% me. Weird fucking brain-zipping-all-over-the-place strange-sense-of-humor nerdy zany me

What is gone is the constant undercurrent of doubt, suspicion, fear, worry, paranoia, etc that I struggled in vain to live with

I still feel these things, they're just not constant

I realized that not only had I been anxious, my notion of *reality* had been warped. I assumed people were thinking bad things about me when there was no reason for them to. I believed terrible things would happen based on no credible evidence. I was thinking *illogically*

Quite simply: My brain was working incorrectly.

Just like when you sprain your arm your arm works incorrectly, or your stomach works incorrectly when you have a digestive disorder, I needed to set that shit straight.

I feel SO much better since starting on Venlafaxine. I wish I would have started when I was 18. The stigma was (and still is) that there's something wrong with you if you do, or you're lose your true identity, or you'll be unable to feel sad, or whatever horseshit people say

My friend telling me frankly that he had started taking anti-depressants made me feel like it was ok for me to start.

So if you've been unhappy, or depressed, or anxious, or scared, please know:

It's *ok* to seek help.

It's *ok* to treat your illness.

It'll be ok.

❤️

Thanks, I was hoping some people might identify and consider doing something about their anxiety.

A related addendum:

It's worth considering the actions of other people, and how anxiety, depression, might be causing them to act the way that they do

External Tweet loading...
If nothing shows, it may have been deleted
by @kylebruenning view original on Twitter

Honestly, I'm sure quite often my anxiety read to people as me being cold, snobby, abrasive, manic, quiet, rude, disingenuous, when it was really just me fighting to keep it together.

Consider this the next time you write someone off when they're not socially open or warm.