Signs of Hope

Today marked the farthest I've gone from home in over a month. I'm so proud, and I wanted to share this accomplishment. Life has taken me for a hell of a ride in over the last month. I've lost count of the amount of times I thought that things were permanent, and that there was no hope, but time and time again I've proved to myself that's not the case.

After I was diagnosed with panic disorder and agoraphobia in mid-June, things were pretty bad before they started to improve. I vividly remember being too anxious to function. I wasn't able to play games, watch TV, eat, and sometimes even having a shower pushed me to the edge of panic. I was sleeping multiple times a day, and even going to the common facilities within my apartment building sent my mind into overdrive. It took about two weeks until I started to be functional even just at home again, and I found myself gaining more and more headspace by each day. I commenced exposure therapy on week three, starting with small steps. Very small steps. My goal on one day was to simply just go to the ground floor of my apartment building and sit there for a few minutes. At that time, I considered that a win. I remember thinking how permanent things felt in the moment, thoughts like "I'm going to be like this forever", "My life has turned around so quickly", and so on. On June 23rd, I told my therapist that I had only gone as far as walking around our apartment building. On June 27th, I had an enjoyable walk to the Docklands Pier with minimal anxiety. This shows just how quickly things can turn around. I was making progress so great that it was almost bringing tears to not only my eyes, but to my therapist's as well.

Unfortunately, the timing of life's events didn't align so well with my own circumstances. On June 29th our neighbours' apartment got raided by the police in the evening, and the police were outside our door for the next three days. A highly stressful event where we had to provide witness statements that almost put me into a panic just talking to the police officers. My partner and I moved home on July 2nd, and I had a significant panic attack on the moving day and had to confine myself to my bedroom while my family continued moving everything else. I started back at work on July 4th, and had two intensely busy weeks of work while trying to adjust to my new home environment. I lost my consistency with getting outside and stopped going out for several days. After this happened, I notably became more anxious about doing things I had already previously done (such as walking around my apartment building, or going to Coles). I started feeling overwhelmed and increasingly anxious at home, probably because I never gave myself a chance to adjust into the new home and I was so inundated with work.

July 18th was where things really started to take a turn in the wrong direction, when my partner tested positive for COVID-19. This meant that I had to self-isolate from her in our tiny one-bedroom apartment for at least a week, and that I had to manage my anxiety entirely on my own which I wasn't used to doing. Throughout my partner's isolation period I had several panic attacks and was incredibly overwhelmed by all the variables I needed to consider just to even get a cup of water from the kitchen. I was not coping. My appetite was reduced significantly, and on some days my calorie intake was less than 1,000. I had lost 3kg since June by that point, which was a lot for a guy as skinny as me. I was too anxious to even do basic day-to-day housework, like laundry or cooking the most basic meals. I was taking Valium multiple times a day just to keep it together.

As a side-effect of self-isolating and spending every waking minute on our bed, I started to have trouble sleeping during the evening from July 23rd. This was the beginning of a vicious thought cycle I fell into which I would describe as anxiety-induced insomnia. I started having thoughts like, "What if I can't sleep tonight?", "How will I cope tomorrow?", "I'm already so anxious, I need to sleep." I was dreading the evenings as the sun started to come down. This was a week where I would describe as nothing other than hellish. Probably one of, if not, the worst week of my life. I became so helpless, sleep-deprived, and desperate that I called Lifeline and the emergency number because I really felt like I wouldn't pull through. I realised that it was my anxiety that was compounding onto lack of sleep. On July 27th my doctor prescribed me zopiclone which is the first-line treatment sleeping aid for short-term insomnia. I was reluctant to take it, but so desperate that I just went ahead with it. It made me incredibly drowsy to the point where I was able to fall asleep, but it was extremely bitter and I woke up throughout the night twice feeling incredibly nauseous. I tried it again on the second night, and sadly my anxiety overpowered the drowsiness that it induced and left me in a state of feeling both horrifically drowsy and anxious. I laid awake fuelled by nothing but cortisol and adrenaline, and every time I tried to drift off into sleep I would jolt awake in a panic. Come July 29th I was more desperate than I ever was. I wanted to be admitted to a psychiatric hospital because I felt like I couldn't take it anymore. I called my doctor again and asked for a much stronger sedative which also alleviates anxiety. At the same time, I requested a referral to Delmont Private Hospital which is a psychiatric hospital in Glen Iris, Melbourne. My doctor prescribed me temazapam which is a a strong sedative-hypnotic.

The United States Air Force uses temazepam as one of the hypnotics approved as a "no-go pill" to help aviators and special-duty personnel sleep in support of mission readiness.

It worked relatively well enough for the first few days, but left me feeling highly drowsy and bombed out the next day which in turn increased my daytime anxiousness. I then turned to lorazepam after a further discussion with my doctor, which is under the same class of drug, but has more anxiety-relief properties and is more often used as sedation in light medical procedures. Lorazepam has been working better for me, but ultimately it's a short-term solution and managing my anxiety and practicing better sleep hygiene will provide far better results than any sleeping pill will.

I'm thankful to say that things have finally started to look up again since I became better at managing my anxiety throughout the day. I haven't taken my anti-anxiety medication, Valium, for over 2 weeks. Prior to that I thought I wouldn't cope without it, but here I am. In my last meeting with my therapist on August 2nd I told him I was feeling optimistic and while still not good, "the best I've felt in a while." That was the first week where I could see normality again, and started being able to carry out day-to-day activities to a very minimal degree. Yesterday, on August 10th was the day where I felt like I did the most out of the last 4 weeks. I started my morning with a short walk, then throughout the day did some reading, cooking, and colouring. I still felt continuously anxious throughout the day, but the least anxious that I felt since I hit rock-bottom.