I believe in keeping things as real as possible here, bearing in mind of course that I am committed to respecting the privacy levels requested for everyone who is in or interacts with our family. When I put pictures up showing some of my makeup, while my shots are not filtered or Photoshopped, I do often pick images using lighting and head angles I prefer. That is what is real about how I present myself. The above image was taken in lighting that shows every line typically on my face plus my facial hair. Sometimes when my hormones are out-of-whack that gets even longer, and if a person really wants to encounter my snarky/grumpy side, they claim to be a vendor e-mailing me an offer for a free facial hair remover in exchange for a review (not now, not ever do I participate in that kind of system BTW) and tell me that I was only offered that because I needed it. Yes, that has actually happened. The lighting in this photo does emphasize my facial hair, but normally it is not so obvious in person or on film.

I try to write as accurate a picture as possible of what we are going through for those things that do appear on these pages. Sometimes things happen off scene that don’t just rock my boat, they flip it over entirely and leave me trying to find a way to get to shore. I run the best mental health game I can, but life has been rapidly launching an assault of high-stress cannon balls at our circumstances for years now. I can’t seem to get passed one high-impact event before I’m getting swamped by another.

Earlier this week I had a bit of a tipping point for my boat. Something happened that will certainly be remaining off stage here, and it was like something just broke inside of me. My body was producing so much adrenaline I couldn’t sleep, not even after taking a cocktail of Benadryl and melatonin. I felt like I had been drinking 10 cups of coffee every hour for days- and I haven’t drunk coffee since my standing heart rate initially went up in January (the current status of my POTS is that it can be managed with lifestyle choices, but part of that is that I can’t really tolerate caffeine).

Yesterday morning I called and asked for an appointment with my primary care doctor, and they got me in for a telehealth appointment just an hour after that. As I told K.L. when we were talking about this, none of my usual yoga/meditation/deep breathing/mindfulness/CBT hacks were even touching this. I felt like I was trying to put out an engine fire on my boat with a Q-tip. I think my body just hit “SOS- Way Too Much Stress Going On Here!!!” overload.

So I talked to her about what the best non-addictive options would be for providing me some support over the next few months. Typically I might have waited a couple of weeks to see if all of those self-care pieces could help calm my system down eventually, but I noticed after night three of sleep being suppressed by all those stress hormones that my POTS was getting a little grumpy and my standing heart rate was starting to go up higher than I would like in comparison to my sitting or laying down heart rate. So I decided being as proactive as possible would be the best thing to prevent exacerbating my POTS or any other element of my health while I am working through this. So after explaining my circumstances, my health concerns, and my desire for this being only a short-term support, K.L. recommended we try Lexapro for the time being.

I do not believe you can medicate away life. Some things are just hard and they are going to be hard for anybody. And some times things can just be hard for long enough anybody can find themselves in a position of needing a rescue ship. And that is OK. I like to think of myself as a survivor, and part of that is a recognition that it is important for me to be honest at any given moment about what I need, not just for myself but for my family. If there is a tool that’s going to help me keep my ship afloat, the best path to survival is reaching for it right away. In January I knew what was happening wasn’t directly related to anxiety. But this week I knew that if I didn’t quickly respond to the maelstrom of stress hormones that was sucking me in despite my best efforts to navigate away from it, my overall health boat could end up getting sucked under and broken apart on the rocks of life.

When it comes to things that I share about what is going on in our world, I know sometimes other caregivers visit these pages. So I want to make sure I am always as real as I can be with them and with each of you about the impact all of this can have on a person’s mental health at any given moment. Sometimes the pressures can be handled with lifestyle hacks, and sometimes they can’t. Either way, the best thing for anybody in this position to do to keep their boat from being swamped on the sea of life is to respond as quickly as possible with whatever level of support is required to keep themselves afloat.