Next to Normal is a musical that I saw in St. Louis several years ago. It’s about a woman with bipolar and how she and her family navigate life through the lens of her illness. One of the songs is about the relationship between the mother, Diane, her husband, and her psychopharmacologist. It is worth listening to in it’s entirety for more context; the lines I quote here are just some of the humorous lines.

My psychopharmacologist and I.
It’s like an odd romance:
Intense and very intimate, we do our dance.

My psychopharmacologist and I.
Call it a lover’s game.
He knows my deepest secrets.
I know his… name!

Yesterday I had an appointment with my psychiatrist and I told him that my job was stressful and I went into detail to explain why. This has been an ongoing conversation over the last three visits. Then I let him know it will be improving, because we just had a meeting and the circumstances are changing to make it less stressful for me. But his response was still, “No, this is not the right job for you. You’re already showing some symptoms of depression, and the stress of the job doesn’t allow for your medicine to work to it’s full advantage and blah blah blah.” The blah blah blah was all me, because he was being very eloquent and I was just not wanting to hear it. He kept talking with me in circles, I would say the situation was improving, but he would mention another reason why the job wasn’t a good fit and I need to find something less stressful.

I understand his perspective, and I am having to talk my brain into being a super duper cheerleader each work day to go through the motions, so I can’t disagree with him totally, and I know sometimes the fear of the unknown stands in my way. Like what else would I do for a living if I couldn’t do this job, this field is all I’ve ever really known and also yuck I hate interviews, I am terrible at them. So I put up a lot of roadblocks. I truly do believe the changes to be implemented Monday already have me more excited about the job, and I am more hopeful. By now you must be so sick of hearing about my job, that I will leave you with the song “My Psychopharmacologist and I” so you can enjoy something other than my talk talk talk!