rodeo

Medication can only work if you're taking it. I never mean to skip a pill. Honestly, I never do. It just happens, more frequently than I'd like, because I'm always running.

But I can't keep myself from getting that sort of pill-popping ambivalence that people on attitude-altering drugs feel sometimes. I feel weak when I take my pills. I am letting ten milligrams define my personality. My entire life, I have not been able to achieve what those ten milligrams have achieved in a matter of weeks.

Ten milligrams of Lexapro. One tablet every morning (or afternoon or night or whenever I remember, I'm not picky) as directed. That's all it took to change me. Ten milligrams of Lexapro, the smallest prescribed dosage of anti-anxiety medications on the market is the thing that keeps me sane.

And I love what it's done, truly. I am a happier person because of Lexapro. Six months ago, this is what I stayed up until three saying:

I've gotten to an incredibly dangerous place. I don't want to go to college.  I don't want to spend time with my family. I don't want to be loved by anyone. I don't want to go near anyone or anything  because I don't deserve it, and I don't deserve it because in my own mind I am dying and I'm only going to complicate it all, only going to cause them pain.

 Realistically, rationally, logically, I need this medication. It fixes me.

But damn, I cannot stand when I am in a bad mood or I am upset and the first question is, "Did you take your anti-anxiety medications?"

I am still a person with feelings and layers and I am allowed to be upset over understandable and sometimes even irrational things about the world despite my constantly-medicated state.

I don't know what I'm saying.

I'm pulling at my hair again.

back to normalcy.

It is difficult to come to terms with things that are long over, possibly more difficult than fresh wounds. When something happens that tears you away from your comfort zone like a tornado, you have to rebuild yourself wherever you land. You can't go back to the way it used to be - you have to take things the way that they are.

It has been over a month, possibly almost two, since everything that happened at work came to an end. It's better now, a better environment for me there. Everyone laughs with me again and talks to me again. I am liked again, I suppose. 

The thing, though: I'm not any better. A lot of times, when I'm talking to Isaias usually, I'll laugh and say, "I'm still bitter." I know he sees some truth in it, but it's not just bitterness and anger that keeps the past on my mind. I am still hurt. I am still sad.

It wasn't just some "shameless work drama" I got involved in that has affected me so deeply. These people were who I considered to be my best friends. I went to Nashville with two of them, stayed in a hotel for the weekend. I loved my job with all of my heart because I thought the people there loved me as much as I loved them. I guess I was wrong.

All it took was Emily's leaving to shake everyone up. Isaias and I tried very hard to make sure it didn't even appear that I was getting special treatment, even making sure I had a couple crappy shifts to keep people from talking. But girls will be girls, I guess. All it took was Emily's leaving to shake everyone up, and the tornado came to my house.

I don't talk about it anymore, but I think about it all the time. No one says anything, I think, because they're embarrassed of the way that they treated me. They're embarrassed that they isolated me, that they talked behind my back without concrete evidence that I'd done anything wrong, and that they lied to each other about me to create an entire web of complete misunderstandings around which their disdain for me was centered. No one else talks about it anymore, so it's no longer acceptable for me to tell them that I am still not okay.

I didn't do anything wrong. I worked hard whenever I was there. I never got better shifts or more hours than anyone else. I never got any say in the things that Isaias did, and I never tried to step on any toes. I just wanted to be kind. I thought that was enough.

It hurts. It still does. It might very well hurt until the day I quit.