I took anti-depressants for a while, several years ago...12 years ago, actually. Didn't everybody? Seriously. They're practically handed out as condiments beside the salt and ketchup packets. They did their job though, that's for sure. Those little oval pills turned every single one of my serotonin (happy feelings) receptors into wide receivers. There's just something about those bad boys that a glass of red wine just can't compete with. What they didn't do though, is deal with the underlying personal issues that needed attention. Nothing huge... just stuff that I needed to work through in order to be the best me.
Eventually I was able to self-regulate (get a grip) enough to face my stuff and as I worked through it all, I went down on my medication. Anti-depressants tend to numb the sense-receptors... all of them. And as a person comes off of them, all the senses come back alive almost to the point of pain. Everything feels felt and seen and experienced for the first time and it can at times be overwhelming. I'll never forget the day I was running up one of the streets in my old neighborhood and I caught sight of a tree blowing in the wind. Have you ever needed glasses and not known, only to put them on for the first time and be overwhelmed by the detailed visuals? That's what it was like. I stood still, mouth agape, absolutely in awe of this stupid tree blowing in the wind. I could see each leaf, each vein on each leaf, and it did something to me that I can barely put into words without sounding like I need to be back on the medication. Beauty. Awe. Like all my walls were down and that tree, that leaf, that vein, was inside of me and all around me and everywhere, all at the same time. And I would have missed it if I hadn't stopped running.
After feeling numb for so long, I welcomed the sensual overload. Of course, there are painful times when the load is too much to bear and it's those moments when I wish I could take a fistful of the numbness one more time, just for a night... for a reprieve from the heaviness. I had a night like that recently. I picked up a book a friend had given me and I read this:
"A cocoon is no escape...it just takes time. The dangers of leaving a cocoon too soon are obvious. A child once found a cocoon. Wishing to set the creature inside free, he took his pocket knife and pared an opening at the bottom of the chrysalis, making it possible for the butterfly to wriggle free. But when the creature unfurled its wings, it couldn't fly. With the butterfly's waiting cut short, its wings were hopelessly unformed." -When the Heart Waits by Sue Monk Kidd
When I read this I was overwhelmed with that "awe" feeling, like when I saw the tree for the first time. Pain is as sacred as pleasure conducted through the body but felt with the soul. Pain, if we have the courage to sit through in our cocoons, produces growth. Pleasure is our reward, felt through our wings, seen in the blowing wind of the trees. If we can just stop long enough to take it in.
