Well, here I am, with a new quit date ready to go. Depression hit so hard I could not function. I would sit around the house and stare at the walls. I just shut down completely. Slowly spiraling into darkness. So, since I'm in the psych field, I of course did nothing about it.... except smoke. So, I of course did nothing about that, either, for several days, and then I came to, and said to myself, self, what are you doing?
The long and the short of it is that finally I went to the doctor and they said "you're depressed". Duh. Shrug. Whatever. So they put me on Wellbutrin/Zyban and said set your quit date for 5 days after you start that, and then add the patches. Shrug. Whatever.
I already feel loads better. It's very strange, but I have done more in the last 3 days than I did in the previous 2 months. I would think that I would be more aware of the symptoms, but it's so very insidious and has such a slow onset. And of course, you don't really care about much of anything when you get to that point.
So if you are not doing the things that you used to enjoy (like posting here on the SSC) or reading, or video games, or cards, or gardening, or your favorite craft, or anything like that, please do go get checked for depression. It seems that smoking tends to mask depression quite a bit, per my doctor. Who knew?
So, my new quit date is 1-17-07, and I will be back online again. So sorry to have just dissappeared, but I did not seem able to mobilize much thought or action at all, and I hope this helps others who are struggling with depression as well.
Parrot Lady [IMG]http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p300/DeeKaySss/flamingo3.gif[/IMG]Denise
[B]My Milage:[/B]
[B]My Quit Date: [/B] 1/17/2007
[B]Smoke-Free Days:[/B] -2
[B]Cigarettes Not Smoked:[/B] 0
[B]Amount Saved:[/B] $0
[B]Life Gained:[/B]
[B]Days:[/B] 0 [B]Hrs:[/B] 0 [B]Mins:[/B] 0 [B]Seconds:[/B] 0