Withdrawal

Good news - the withdrawal symptoms are easing up. It's been about a week and a half since I stopped the antidepressants altogether and although I'm still by no means settled, there is certainly light at the end of the tunnel. The hallucinations are reduced to occasional bits of simple coloured light in my peripheral vision (it's actually rather pretty) rather than complex hallucinations like seeing and hearing people. The paranoia is resolving itself into what I would define more as "stress and tension", I feel... edgy, but I'm not jumping out of my skin every time I hear a noise outside or thinking I can hear people upstairs in the house when there is no one there.

Nightlight candles with a slight (as opposed to choking) lavender scent are helping me to get to sleep and get better quality rest. However I find myself putting off sleeptime because I am having horrific nightmares.

My brain unfortunately is so much rice pudding, I can barely read or type and have been avoiding MSN because I really cannot think about more than one thing at once, even if it's just someone saying "good morning" it completely derails my train of thought.

My body is really really unhappy, dealing with the withdrawal AND the ME. The hot flushes, sweats, shivering, cramps and the extra muscle pain from the stress and tension is a lot to deal with. I am focusing on posture and breathing to try and minimise the problems but I hope it eases up soon. I'm taking my maximum pain relief but that scrambles my brain even more.

In other news, those of you who knew Steve's work contract was up for renewal - the contract agency (which shall remain nameless) were for some reason incapable of getting a full copy (electronic or paper) of the new contract to him so he could look at it and read through it before he signed it. You'd think that "I would like to read the contract before I agree to be bound by it for the next three months" was the most ridiculous request they had ever come across. They still haven't managed to give him full access to read the contract at his leisure. However by late afternoon/early evening, a day's lost work/pay, much stress and the accumulation of what is going to be a monster phone bill for Steve in trying to sort this mess out, he managed to get someone at the agency to find his contract, go through it, reassure him on the points he was concerned about (like on call not being a part of his duties at all in any way shape or form) and then to send him an email confirming all those points.

As a direct result of which Steve has accepted the contract for the next three months and is going to work in the morning.

We went out for dinner to "celebrate". I managed my starter, but despite a full load of maximum painkillers then by the time our main course arrived the pain in my head was so bad I had no appetite at all and I wasn't capable of any conversation either. I could just about sit there with my head in one hand and my orange juice in the other trying not to be an embarassment.