Working on another piece on one of the women inside me, but in service of trying to publish something once a week here’s a quick little reflection on what it’s like to feel normal for the first time in roughly 20 years.
It’s hard to say when I knew I was different. Not in the transgender way, but in the ‘I don’t act like other people’ way.
My sleep patterns have been scattered since my early 20’s, and I always seemed to have that time of year when I could lock-in for 8-10 hours a day. Then it would go away for a few months.
It wasn’t until I stumbled into a research program for a new anti-depressant that I was finally diagnosed and found out why I was different.
What those diagnoses are is none of anyone’s business. I have previously been more open about it, and have also previously found out how readily being open in that way can be used against someone.
Thus began my trek through the mental health system in Canada, which roughly falls between frustrating and kafkaesque. I tried tiny bandaid after tiny bandaid.
Those bandaids allowed me to reach high functioning, as one note in my file said. I certainly didn’t feel like I was. I was perpetually living life at 30% and wondered what I had done in a previous life to deserve it.
Then I was sexually assaulted at Vibecamp. I made the mistake of talking about it publicly, and that 30% quickly took a nosedive to somewhere around 5%.
At my lowest point, I made an appointment with my primary doctor. I told her I needed help, that I couldn’t handle things anymore. I begged her for something. Anything.
A chance referral to a mental health clinic in Vancouver 16 months ago led to a chance conversation which resulted in a chance recommendation in my file for a new medication.
She told me that it might take 6 weeks to feel the full effects, but I started feeling better after the first tiny little whitish pill I took.
Now, it doesn’t hurt to live anymore. That 5% changed to 80% almost overnight. I feel really alive for the first time.
The sun finally came out.
