Work and Zoloft

Sometimes I wish I could work everyday.

Now Sunday I was to decorate the Christmas tree and all I have done is destroyed two strands of lights by trying to remove all the bulbs from one and put them into the other. Now neither strand lights. The house is a mess, the breakfast plates still sit on the table. (The husband made the breakfast.)

There's no chance in hell I'm going to get anything done today. It is 5:30pm and dark.

Let's face it, this is pretty good for me. I have been getting along ok at work. It is an easier job than what I had had before. And while I feel it is less prestigious, prestige does not make me feel good. Unless it is for the two seconds when I would tell someone what I did and they seemed impressed. So now, when I get the feeling I should be doing more to live up to my potential, I try to remember how miserable I was when I was doing that. And even then I wasn't sure I was living up to my potential anyways. You know.

But still I do like to work, so I wish I could find a job where I was good at it. All the jobs I have held in my life, I am pretty much barely mediocre. That is not a good feeling for me. I did have moments of doing really well in school, so I had thought that I would replicate that in my adult years, somehow, but it has not happened. Who knew getting an A in calculus was the high-point of my life, as far as achievements go. I try to talk to the husband about this, but he just immediately explodes. Maybe it is because I have asked him 1,000 times what he thinks.

I'm certain part of my disappointment with myself and my working career boils down to two things. My lack of social skills and just going in the wrong direction in college. I majored in engineering. My lack of social skills has always been an albatross, but in some strange way I feel a glimmer of hope regarding this. I believe I can work my way through this, in time. It's going to take a while though. I've never focused on fixing just that, sure I have forced myself to do social activities here and there, but I have never launched an depth self-analysis and come up with some cures for myself. I think I can do it. Years of therapy helped me get over my child-hood and begin to see how to get over depression, but for this next part, I don't need a therapist. I'm just going to write about it, and I know I will see a solution in my writing.

Figuring out what else I could do, besides engineering type jobs, is more difficult. When I suggested this to my therapist she really seemed shocked. Like why would someone want to throw away an engineering degree? And if I had made it through engineering school to begin with, surely I must have some aptitude. You don't just make it through engineering school without any talent, right? Well I'm here to say, yes, I think anybody can make it through engineering school, ok well maybe not anybody, but most people of college-bound intelligence. If you put in the time. Which I did, every evening at the library. Nobody ever believes me when I say that, but it is true. It was not easy for me, and I had little social life.

So I think back, how did I get on this dumb engineering idea? It all started when I was 15 and we moved from a suburb of Washington DC to Pennsylvania. To live with my Grandmother. It was hell. Trust me. For some reason I went from a girl who loved to read and imagined myself being a writer or a historian, to not thinking about any of those things. And for some weird reason, I started aceing every math test I took. My math teacher suggested I double-up on math courses the next year so I could take calculus my senior year. I did that and continued aceing tests. Then I took physics my senior year and did the same, aced every test. It was so strange, as I had never shown any aptitude for math and science before moving to Pennsylvania. I personally think it has something to do with going to a rotten school system and everybody in Pennsylvania was just dumb. I believe that. I received so much praise through this time, and I was a girl to boot! A girl being good at math?! Teachers got hard-ons; I got mis-directed. (Girls supposedly being good at certain things and boys at others is so last century, I wish the whole world would just get over it. My eye doctor always exclaims, "Oh it's the woman engineer!, and I just want to punch him in the nuts.)

I have considered going back to school, but for what? I have a list of about 10 things. But is it worth the time and money? What if I do all that and then I don't like it? So on this I'm thinking about it, but have not gone beyond that. One thing that getting through engineering school did for me, is I do believe I can figure out anything, eventually!

So my job now is technically still 'engineering' but more administrative than what I had been doing. While I'm bummed at not being more prestigious, I am glad I don't feel the stress as much now. Two months ago I stopped taking Zoloft. I had taken it for like 7 years, I think? I can't remember. Over those years I tried numerous times to stop. I remember at the beginning I thought I would take it for a year, and I did. And then I went off of it for a year. And that year got very bad. So I went back on it. I would try now and then to go off of it and would last a week or two. Only to scramble back onto it in a panic. So the past 2-4 months now, I have not taken it. And I did not plan it. I just stopped. Like unconciously or something. That's why it is hard for me to figure out how long it has been since I took a pill. It's like I knew I didn't need it and just stopped. I still have a full bottle in the cabinet.

I'm sure this is connected to having the less prestigious, less stressful job. I need to take advantage of this time. I can't just throw it away worrying about my prestige. I need to use my clear head and think. What can I do now? My head is clearer sans Zoloft. I know it is. My feelings are sharper. Hopefully the dark feelings will not grow like a weed and choke out everything else. I know the dark feelings are there, yeah, I know you're there. You are part of me, but not all of me. It's time to let the rest of me come out, and develop, and maybe pop out a bloom here or there.