Old Dog, New Tricks...

My therapist once told me that the hardest thing in the world to do is to change. It's so difficult, most of us literally have to have a heart attack before we change... at least our diet and exercise. This I have found to be true. In fact, many people don't even change their lifestyle after a heart attack.

I've spent a lot of time trying to catalogue and understand the roots of my behavior. This has been helpful for a certain part of coping with depression. Unfortunately, it doesn't account for all behavior. I've come to find that some behavior exists merely out of habit. Even once the initial reason for the behavior is gone, the synaptic pathways are loathe to change. I find myself slipping into depressive behavior now sometimes out of habit, not out of cause. I'm simply used to moping around so I do it. I am finding this is difficult to change. Because it's a habit it's hard to notice that I'm even doing it.

I am finding more and more that I have to rethink behavior modification. I'm used to looking for causes and circumventing them, or finding more mature responses to them. That is increasingly not working. So I'm working on a new strategy to deal with this next layer of problem. Fortunately, in terms of depression, these are problems I don't mind having, given the alternative. I'll be writing another article soon on more specific behavior modeling.

"The butter melts out of habit,
You know that toast isn't even warm"
-Ani Difranco, Out of Habit

New Look...

I decided to ditch the all black page, a little too depressing for a depression page. Plus I just realized I can change the code on the page, and therefore change the color. Enjoy!

Headaches and Withdrawal: Addendum...

A quick note in regards to the last post, the other night I began to get a headache after I began drinking a caffeine soft-drink. I hadn't had caffeine in a couple of days. So now I'm wondering if the headaches aren't just withdrawal, but re-introduction of caffeine to blood stream as well.

Headaches and Withdrawal...

I have recently been suffering from a number of headaches. Some of it is probably because I'm cutting back on coffee. At first I didn't notice any physical signs of withdrawal, just a disgustingly rabid desire for more coffee, I suppose my first inclinations of what coming off an addiction is like, though I'm aware this is nothing in comparison to other forms of addiction. Why would I decide to curtail the drinking of such a wonderful beverage? Heartburn. I'm not sure now how I linked to two together, but a couple of weeks ago it occured to me that my awful bouts of heartburn (which I had never had before in my life) where being caused by the coffee. It was around the time I started actively treating heartburn with vinegar (it really does work, and clears up acne and cuts down on dandruff, believe it or not) that I made the connection. It made sense once I thought of it too, since I did start getting heartburn around the time I went into the hospital, annnnnnd... that was not long after I started working at Pfizer where the coffee was given away free and I became an active coffee drinker, unleashing an orgy of caffiene on my body.

I now have another problem (funny how these things seem to domino) which is that I've yet to completely cut off my coffee intake as working third shift two days a week I find it helpful in keeping me awake. But I'm afraid if I'm only drinking it twice a week I may be setting myself for a state of perpetual withdrawal, which would be undesirable. Sigh.

The other kind of headache I'm having I'm wondering if is from the Celexa. It seems that if I miss so much as a day I get the "depression headache" I can only describe as feeling like my brain has been scratched up with sandpaper. It's not so much painful, but it makes me feel like crap. I used to get this more when I wasn't on medication, now I tend to get it if I stop taking it. This I know moreso from the last time I came off the medication. Now I get it once in awhile if I miss so much as a day, which does happen now and then. This worries me because I'm worried I may one day build up a tolerance to the medication and have to make more, or who knows what. It's not a scenario I like. It's also making me consider more the thought of switching over to Saint John's Wort.

Pro's and Con's

Pro's - St. John's Wort (SJW, my own abbreviation) is an MAOI. "MAOIs act by inhibiting the activity of monoamine oxidase preventing the breakdown of monoamine neurotransmitters and so increasing the available stores. There are two isoforms, MAO-A and MAO-B. MAO-A preferentially deaminates serotonin, melatonin, adrenaline and noradrenaline. MAO-B preferentially deaminates phenylethylamine and trace amines. Dopamine is equally deaminated by both types." - Wikipedia.

What I take now is an SSRI. "Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are a class of antidepressants. They act within the brain to increase the amount of the neurotransmitter, serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine or 5-HT), in the synaptic gap by inhibiting its reuptake." - Wikipedia
I can buy SJW pretty cheaply, and while the Celexa is now free through my insurance, that may not always be the case. So there's a financial incentive. SJW is also not a drug, and I am coming to like drugs less and less. I also wouldn't need a prescription for SJW. Lastly, from everything I have read, MAOI's work better than SSRI's. So, why aren't MAOI's presribed more? That brings us to the con's.
Con's - "When ingested orally, MAOIs inhibit the catabolism of dietary amines. Sufficient intestinal MAO-A inhibition can lead to hypertensive crises when foods containing tyramine are consumed, or hyperserotonemia if foods containing tryptophan are consumed. Hypertensive crises can sometimes result in stroke or cardiac arrythmia if not treated. This risk is not present with RIMAs. Both kinds of intestinal MAO-inhbition can cause hyperpyrexia if levodopa-containing foods are consumed.

Examples of foods with high levels of tyramine include liver, Chianti and other aged wines, aged cheeses, meat extracts (e.g. Bovril) and yeast extracts (e.g. Marmite, Vegemite). A separate list of foods containing tyramine has been established. Examples of levodopa-containing foods include broad beans.

Although the "MAOI diet" is not necessary for those taking selective MAO-A inhibitors, the same drugs should still be avoided. Since the selective MAOIs are not 100% selective, taking a drug metabolized by MAO-B will still be dangerous while taking a selective MAO-A inhibitor.

Combined use of non-selective MAO inhibitors or MAO-A inhibitors and serotonergic drugs (such as MDMA) is likely to lead to serotonin syndrome."

So there lies the problem. Sigh, again.

I am also trying to modify learned behavior, realizing that a lot of what leads to depression now for me are simply learned behavior problems I've yet to change. I'll talk on that more later.

Long time....

Been a good long while since I made an entry, which I suppose is a good and a bad thing. Good in the sense there hasn't been a whole lot to write about on the subject in that time. Been the ups and downs, but that's about it.

I have been in a decent slump for the last month or so, however, which has had me thinking on the subject again. It hasn't been the depression in the sense of not wanting to do anything, or not doing anything period, it's just that I haven't had much enjoyment in any of it lately. Guess I'm just muddling through at the moment. Not really sure why that is, maybe it's just getting ready for winter months.

On the other hand it could also be simple accumulation of stress. I'm coming to believe we're like ships that collect barnicles on our hulls. By themselves, daily stress can be insignificant. Start piling it on top of each other without cleaning it off once in awhile and it'll drag you down. Maybe that's were I'm at now. I've been so used to fighting major depression perhaps I tend to overthink the mundane slumps these days. Going to be approaching it from that point of view, I'll keep posted on how it goes.