The Real Tooth Fairy

This morning, Penn sulked slowly down the hallway and plopped on the couch. “She didn’t come.” He looked up at me with the biggest crocodile tears you have ever seen and I couldn’t bear to lie for that neglectful tooth fairy woman again.

One of the side effects of the insomnia, which Carissa has been combating by falling asleep cuddled up next to me on the couch while I wait still for sleep to come, is the acceleration of certain veil-liftings like who the tooth fairy really is.


I’ve had a couple of bad days, days where most of real life is ignored, thoughts wander towards darkness and have to be reigned in by distraction, self-medication starts early, and sleep comes late after a handful of pills. At last week’s appointment my therapist said, “Are you sure you don’t want to take something?”

I’ve been on anti-depressants before; I have a degree in psychology, I’ve been self-monitoring my depression for years now. It took 9 months after my divorce (in 2004) for the shock to turn into real depression, and I was on a cocktail of psychoactives for a year.* In 2007 I had another similar crisis and tried a new anti-depressant for about a day before giving up based on those horrible side effects.

Since emerging from that series of bad decisions I’ve used St John’s wort with success to combat a pretty regular depression onset. Since August I’ve been trying to maintain a regular St John’s regimen. Today I started with double my normal dose, which probably puts me at the recommended daily dose; but I’m getting the sense that its potency is wearing off. Or what it is trying to fight is getting stronger.

I’m not as concerned (yet) about a drug decision as I am about what this thing is turning into. There have been cycles of “It’s getting better” that alternate with cycles of “No, it’s getting worse.” The original post of this blog is still just as applicable now as it was then. The amount I miss her every day is unmeasurable, and everything sucks without her.

I need a Tooth Fairy Moment. I need to know what is true, and what this terrain yet holds so I can prepare for it.

* correction

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