That's right.
I am.
I know it. I take an ever revolving tray of pills that are tweaked, sorted, counted and changed as they no longer work over time.
I'm not ashamed of it.
Maybe it's Pesach and I'm finally free of that little piece of Mitzrayim. Or maybe it's just age. Or maybe, it's because someone will marry me despite the pill tray and the rest of it. I don't know.
What I do know is that without my meds - I'm batshit crazy. I'm not eccentric or entertainingly dotty. My mum calls them "my spells" but that doesn't mean I just fade out for a bit like some cute character in a movie. It just means she's Southern and tries very hard not to think about the fact that her eldest is mentally ill and has been most of his life. Just last week I had to roll back to the previous tray because I was screaming at the curtains. Yeah, actually screaming at the curtains. Like I said, batshit crazy. They were making too much noise. (They're from Ikea.)
Now I take all kinds of meds. They do a lot of things they tell me - all I care about is that they make me functional. I know all about stigma n00b mental health professional - I actually live with it. I've actually lost the jobs and seen a lifetime of potential go down the drain. So you can talk all you want - but it's not going to make a difference for me and my generation, we're done in the workforce with any kind of mental illness history and/or being low status males. Our time is up. I'm going to start over in another country with a new life and a partner - but most of the guys I know like me aren't that lucky.
But you know what I think one of the most interesting features of so many of the comments on Markos' Big Gaffe - I mean, you would think there was enough to drama-llama about here with the Teahadists intent on flushing our democracy down the toilet of history piece by piece to think that "take your meds" was fairly innocuous - (deep breath) most of the people most offended are relatives of someone or know someone who had something and not a lot of batshit crazy pill takers really speaking for themselves.
So. As a batshit crazy pilltaker - I thought it was funny.
I am not alternatively functional.
I am not reality challenged.
I'm just batshit crazy if I don't take my meds.
Got it?