Manic Depression

11 Pages 2656 Words

of painkillers and allergy medications. PAXIL. That was the one. I slipped a few into my pocket and put the bottle back in its original position. Later that night, at the dance, I went to the bathroom and swallowed the large pills.
The next morning, back at my father’s house, I woke up feeling dizzy and nauseous. I went to the bathroom to get some water. I glanced in the mirror and realized there was no color in my eyes. My pupils were fully dilated. Almost fainting, I stumbled to the kitchen and called the poison control hotline. The woman on the other end asked me in a barely concerned tone what I had ingested. I told her that I had taken eighty milligrams of my mother’s Paxil, and her tone immediately changed. She informed me that most people begin building Paxil in their blood stream with 5 milligrams a day. I had carelessly swallowed thirteen times that amount. She warned me that an overdose of Paxil was related to the development of Serotonin Syndrome, and advised me to get my stomach pumped immediately.
Frightened, I decided to wake my father and tell him what I had done. Instead of the concerned parent I expected to find, I got an angry dad who I had never meant to upset. He screamed at me to do the dishes. When I almost fell over in my attempt to reach the kitchen, he yelled louder.
“You just took them like they were speed! What the hell do you have to be depressed about? If you want to go to the hospital, call your mom. She can take you if she wants, but I’m sure as hell not!”
His voice echoed in my chest and my tears moistened the black circles that had replaced my eyes. For once, I wanted not to feel the fog of depression looming over me. He didn’t understand. That day I moved in with my mom.
I spoke with my mom while waiting in the emergency room that night. She asked me why I had taken the pills. I told her that I hadn’t felt right for a long time, and that I didn’t understand why. Even when eve...