antidepressants

I feel a bit wierd this morning. Yesterday, I joined the happy millions on fluoxetine, which is probably better known by its trade name, Prozac!

For the past five years I've exercised my right to choose which treatments I do and do not have and so, have chosen not to use any such drugs; but I'm afraid the point has come whereby I need to take this sensible precaution, as I've really not been feeling too good lately - and to be honest to a degree that I normally prefer not to be, it's getting worse.

I have to say, I do resent being in this position again - which has largely come about because of extreme social isolation! Apart from my mother (who is a decidely mixed blessing - more of which later) and the good folks down at the Salvation Army - many of whom are currently away on holiday; my ongoing lack of meaningful occupation (as the mental health system likes to call it these days - it gives them a cop-out clause, as regards offering you help to return to actual employment, you see) means that I've not really had much opportunity to get to know anybody or develop a personal friendship circle, since moving to Edinburgh over four months ago. And four months is an awful long time to spend on your own - even in one of the world's most interesting and beautiful cities, complete with a free, go anywhere anytime bus pass...

Maybe I bit off more than I could chew when I moved, I don't know. I just never envisaged it would take so long to find some kind of work! The trouble is, I'm neither experienced nor qualified in anything really; and while I was given to believe I might be able to get into some kind of social care as I've done a little bit of that in the distant past and much of my experience as a mental health service user relates to it; that's not proving so easy either - not least because the mental health system here is a full two years behind that of Hampshire in terms of modernisation & development - and rather more in terms of culture - or at least, the type of culture that would actively consider employing service users, at any rate!

Indeed, I found out yesterday from one of the Salvation Army's social services centre managers, that all social care staff are expected to have qualifications these days. Now that's probably no bad thing - but to make matters worse, you actually need to be employed in social care, in order to access the vocational qualifications they require! So I don't quite know where I'm meant to go from here. I have an appointment with a Disability Employment Adviser next week - perhaps she'll have some ideas...

Depression's a funny illness really - one of those conditions that you never really know how much you're over without risking a paddle in the waters occasionally - and likewise the therapeutic value of antidepressants! That's wht I stopped taking them back in 2002 - it was really the only way of finding out whether I still needed them...!

Okay, so maybe moving to what is effectively another country was more of a complicated dive than a discreet paddle - but you know, all I actually want is a life. Is that really too much to expect?