Even though it was entirely caused by medically prescribed pharmaceuticals, my confidence - not self-confidence, but my belief I can actually manage to get by from day to day - has taken a really bad hit from the temporary mental instability caused by my bad reaction to the sertraline last week. I slept poorly last night and (less so) this, and I'm waking up afraid I'm going to freak out and not be able to get through the day, one step on the road to just being crazy all of the time (and no possibility of having a parental or sororal house to go to to recover my sense of self, just a quick trip to the home for incurables).

This just really sucks. I know that a bit of the label for what I am experiencing right now is anxiety, but what I am also experiencing is fear. I am afraid.

(Once again, while I realize this is all a bit much for a public post, I believe that somewhere out there is somebody else, either now or in the future, who will read this and find it helpful, either as a roadmap or a history. So I try again to tell the raw truth, the ups and the downs, and not just post happy bunny stuff that makes people go, "Aw, kittens!")

Off to the doctor for another check up in about ten minutes. First we'll see how the panic attacks are coming along, and then I'm going to see what we can do about helping me get an entire night's sleep, preferably during the night and not scattered across the week.