Yes. I take psychiatric medications, so what?

Let’s go back to my first psychiatric appointment, in which I was diagnosed with depression. 2011. I recall it like it was yesterday, and one of the things I remember the most was the horrific ideals that surrounded the fact that since that day, I was supposed to take medication. Psychiatric medication.

I remembered all of the following new year wishes, shooting stars and blowing up birthday candles to be directed towards that: Not taking medication again. Ever. Why? Because I was told, and even the ones that didn’t told me directly let me know by their attitude, that when I stopped medication I would be fine. That would be the day I was cured. That would be MY day.

And even if that’s correct for a number of people in the mental health patient population, who only need medication partially until they’re stable, there’s me. And like me, there’s millions out there. We, the misfits and outcasts, who are tired because we’ve finally learned the lesson: we’ll always need medication. Why? Because we have chronic conditions, and we need a pill to function correctly, to keep up with life.

To understand this requires a huge, and I mean a truly immense acceptance challenge, in which we know we are more than a pill. We are more than a prescription. We are way more than the stereotype that says that taking pills make you weak. Because yes, psychiatric medications as all medications have tons of side effects and in a truly ideal world, we wouldn’t need any type of extra help. But we do. We need pain killers when we exercise a lot, when we have a hungover, or we need chemotherapy when there’s cancer or certain autoimmune diseases, and insulin if we ever encounter diabetes. And so on.
Of course it isn’t what we had in mind and that’s not how the plan was supposed to go (Because no one grows up saying “Oh I wish I could battle a mental condition my whole life). No. But that’s the way it is, that’s the way it goes. And if you are one of those who won, or lost, in life’s genetic mine, you gotta use and work with the tools you’ve found on the road. That being said, if you get the chance of having the opportunity of going to a good psychiatric and afford the medication, take it. Take the freaking pill because it will freaking work despite the freaking stereotypes that surround it.

So here I stand. I’ve had a LOT of twists and turns along the way, but finally I found a medication and a diagnosis that works. I don’t waste my wishes on stop my medication because I know given my situation, I need them in order to be as functional and as alive as I wish to be (I waste them in more realistic things instead). And more over, I know I’m not any less for having to pop a pill with every meal.