A couple of weeks back I wrote about making an appointment to see the doctor about depression, lack of motivation, lack of drive etc. etc. I didn’t – and still don’t – want to ask for help, but I know that in my current state I have/had to.

Yesterday was the day of the appointment. 7am and I’m at the doctors. That’s never going to be the start of a good day…

Anyway, I talked through some of the stuff with the GP – who’s extremely wet and wanky, but means well. Better than being completely useless I suppose. But you never really get the impression he could give much of a damn one way or t’other. I suppose that’s one of the risks of being a GP though.

And now I’ve got a prescription for Citalopram, an SSRI anti-depressant. I’m going to take them, and see how things go.

I’m not happy about being on these pills, but I’m at the point where I know that I need something to break the cycle/spiral I’ve got into. This is the first step in that process. Well technically it’s the third step, I suppose- the first one was acknowledging I’m in that cycle at all, and the second was doing something about it by going to the GP.

I don’t like the thought of being reliant on pills or medication – I’m crap at even taking painkillers unless I really need them.

Also I can’t help but wonder what I’ll be like on anti-depressants. I’ve been living with depression for such a long time now, I wonder what changes there’ll be if it’s not around.  It’ll be interesting to find out, anyway.

Sometimes it’s really quite scary seeing just how disturbing some bunnysuits are.

Bizarrely, I was doing some research on a writing idea to get me to that site.  That’s quite worrying in itself…

It won’t give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head

© Nine Inch Nails, “The Becoming”, Downward Spiral album

That’s not quite where I am at the moment – but somehow it still seems to be the best lyric for describing things at the moment.

I’ve written before about my regular issues and history with depression, and the way I normally fight my way through it. Recently though, that’s not been the case. If I’m honest, the last three or four years have involved fighting, but only getting to an impasse, a holding action to keep ground, rather than a victory.

I’ve made lots of plans, and had the intention to do things. It’s just that I never seem to find the time or the final motivation to get them done.  I keep on trying, and I keep on failing – and at the moment there’s no good reason for Why. I just don’t get to it. That final bit, that final push, is missing, AWOL.

So I’m working on getting through it, but I’m also going to go a different route this time. I’ve a doctor’s appointment in a couple of weeks time, and I’m going to aim to get some anti-depressants. Not something I’m overly happy about, but I think it’s time for me to try them again.

I had a very negative experience with them many moons ago, so I have some really serious reservations about them. But if I can give them a go and they work, so be it. If not, it’s another avenue tried and I need to find other options. But at least I’ll be trying the avenues this time.

One of my challenges for April is to take part in Script Frenzy – a challenge to churn out 100 pages of screenplay during the month.

I don’t yet know if I’ll manage to do it – there’s a lot of stuff coming up over the next month what with one thing and another – but I’m going to give it a go. I had my reservations back in November about the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) but this time round it’s something I feel a bit better about having a go at it.

I won’t make any promises or guarantees about this right now – I had intended to have some plans and idea in place before the start of April about what’s going to happen and where it’s going to start/run/go, but I haven’t. We’ll see.

This weekend I was supposed to be at Brighton Shock, the 2010 the World Horror Convention.

Next weekend, I was supposed to be at Odyssey 2010, the SciFi Eastercon.

As it happens, plans have changed (now there’s a common theme) and I won’t be at either.

This weekend ended up clashing Brighton Shock with both WebSourceEast and the Peter Gabriel concert at the O2, plus I figured I couldn’t really justify being away for two long weekends on the trot with work and home. So Brighton Shock got the boot.

As for Eastercon, when I signed up for it I hadn’t realised that Easter was the date it was, and it would’ve meant being away for Herself’s birthday. (Less charitable souls might suggest that me not being around would be a good present in and of itself, but that’d be nasty) Additionally I did some maths and figured out that the cost of it all would be feckin’ expensive, as it’s at the Radisson hotel at Heathrow – not a venue known for its low prices, I think it’s fair to say.

So instead I’m at home for the next two weekends and not travelling round the country like a loon. In some ways that’s disappointing, in others it actually makes a lot of sense.

This may be a really really bad idea, but I’ve signed up for this year’s Script Frenzy in April.

The challenge is to write 100 pages of screenplay in the 30 days of April. Should be interesting – assuming I can get my brain and motivation into gear.

Anyway, I’ve signed up, and we’ll see how it goes.