Another waiting room, this one in a ritzy office in a wealthy part of San Francisco—tree-lined streets of little boutiques, bistros, salons, crowded with people in excellent shoes who have nowhere better to be in the middle of the day. This psychiatrist charges a mint and doesn't take insurance. Her office is a study in expensive furniture and fabric; soothing tans and creams prevail. The first visit, she puts me back on a hefty dose of Depakote, the med Lentz had me on in Minneapolis, and she also gives me a generous prescription for Klonopin, the tranquilizer he gave me to "take the edge off" the anxiety.
"I'm telling you I'm losing my mind. I can't take this," I say, pacing in her sunny office, tapping my nails on the walls, playing with the plants.
"What, precisely, can't you take?" She's very tall, extremely well dressed, and exceptionally poised. Her poise makes me a little insane.
"I can't take these fucking mood swings! It never stops! I'm all over the fucking map!" I fling myself onto the couch, then fling myself up again and pace some more, gripping my head in my hands. "Aaaagh!" I yell under my breath, keeping my voice down, trying to hold still. She makes me incredibly nervous, sitting there smiling her mild smile. "And I can't take the anxiety. It feels like something is wrapping around my chest and squeezing. I can't breathe. My heart's racing. My thoughts are spinning. I can't keep up with them. It's all right when I'm writing, or when I'm at school. But the minute I'm alone again, the thoughts start up. I can't see for all the thoughts. I'm terrified all the time."
"Are you taking your Klonopin?"
"Yes! It doesn't help!"
"Maybe you aren't taking enough of it."
Klonopin's a benzodiazepine, and those can be very addictive. I used to love it, when it still worked. It was like mainlining a drink, the mellow calm instantaneous and complete. Now I have to take handfuls for it to even make a dent, and the last thing I want to do is run out. If she says I'm not taking enough, by all means, bring it on.
"How much can I take?" I ask, perking up.
"Take as much as you need," she says, waving her hand. "I'll write you a prescription for more."
"But it doesn't seem to matter how much I take," I groan. "It wears off too fast. As soon as it wears off, the thoughts start up again and I get all panicky." I want something that will knock me flat and keep me there until the world goes away.
"More should help. Just take it whenever you feel the anxiety coming on. And it's important that you don't forget to take it. If you miss a dose, you could go into withdrawal. It acts on the same neuroreceptors as alcohol," she says.
"So I might as well just have a drink," I say, finding this a little odd.
"It won't be as strong," she says. "Take the Klonopin."
"Speaking of drinking." I sigh and fall back on the couch. "I went to an AA meeting the other night."
"Why?"
"My friends talked me into it. They keep telling me I'm an alcoholic." I click my nails against my teeth. "Obviously I'm not an alcoholic," I say, rolling my eyes. "But I'm drinking an awful lot." Not that I want to stop. I have, however, begun to notice the vast difference between the way I drink and the way everyone else drinks. And everyone else in my life drinks quite a lot.
"I don't think you have a problem." She dismisses this with a sniff.
"I got alcohol poisoning again the other night," I say. "I was still drunk when I showed up to give a lecture. And I still wasn't sober when I got to the AA meeting."
"So you had a little too much to drink. It happens. How much did you drink?"
"There were four bottles of wine in the trash the next day. And I'd already been drinking before I started in on the wine."
"Well, you don't always drink that way," she says.
"Yes I do."
"Really, how often do you drink?" she says.
"Every day."
"Lots of people have a drink every evening."
"That's true," I say, reassured. "So you don't think I have a problem?"
"I think that's a little melodramatic," she says, raising an eyebrow at me. "Listen, I wouldn't work with you if I thought you had a drinking problem."
"Well, that's good," I say. "I knew my friends were just overreacting."
"So what else is going on?" she asks.
"School is great. Everyone is completely brilliant. The classes are brilliant. The professors are brilliant. I'm sleeping with my professor. He's brilliant."
"You're sleeping with him?"
"Jeremy and I broke up. I can sleep with whoever I want."
"Who else are you sleeping with?"
"Oh, a few people here and there. No one in particular."
"These are one-night stands?"
"No," I huff, "I wouldn't call them that." I am dropping into beds left and right. I'm juggling half a dozen sometime-lovers and it's not enough. Periodically, I dismiss the entire cast of characters and start looking anew.
"Well, it sounds like things are going really well," she says, looking at her watch.
"They're not." I suddenly feel very small. I gaze at the expensive cream-colored carpet. "I can't deal with it," I nearly whisper. "It's too much. It's going too fast."
"What is? What do you mean?" She sighs. She has that here-we-go-again tone.
"Everything. I don't know what I mean." I stare out the window. The air conditioner hums. She sits with her long legs crossed, not getting it at all. I don't know how to make her get it. I don't know what I want her to get. For all her obliviousness, the fact is that I'm not telling her everything. I allude to the chaos, mention the drinking, say I'm scared, but I still make light of these things.
"It's just kind of a nightmare," I say. "My life is a nightmare. The affairs are a nightmare. The stress is a nightmare. The book is late. I'm turning into a monster. I don't care about anything. I feel like I'm going to explode. It never lets up. I feel like I'm choking on it." I look helplessly at her. She gazes calmly at me.
"Are you taking your Depakote?" she asks.
"Yes," I say. "I'm not sure it's helping too much." A psychiatrist with any wits at all would be alarmed at my own admission that I was drinking too much, and would make the obvious connection between the fact of the drinking and the fact that my meds weren't working. But apparently she doesn't have any wits. Depakote and alcohol are an especially toxic combination—both are processed by the liver, and in high enough doses, both can seriously damage it. Even alone, Depakote's not a med to be played with, and its levels in the bloodstream are supposed to be carefully monitored. This psychiatrist doesn't check my levels once, despite the fact that she's upping my dose almost every time she sees me.
"I think the Depakote's working. You'd be in much worse shape if it weren't." She looks at her watch and writes me a prescription. She rips it off the pad and hands it to me. "I'll see you next week."
They ask me at parties, So, what do you do? I say I'm a writer. Really? Fascinating! Fabulous shoes! I pretend to be one of them, but I'm not and never will be. I begin to have anxiety attacks at the very mention of dinner parties.
But here I am at yet another one. The woman across from me mentions that her mother is a psychiatrist. Brightly, she turns to me. You're on medication, aren't you?
My wineglass stops on its way to my mouth. I am mortified. Everyone at the table is mortified. Except the chipper woman who asked. I am a freak show. I am not one of them. I am a failure as a wife, already divorced at twenty-five. I will never get married again. I will never learn to play house. I will never be a success.
Yes, I say, and my wineglass completes its route to my mouth, and I take a swallow and set it down. I play with the stem of the glass and stare at my place mat. Surely someone will say something soon. Surely we will not sit around here staring at me much longer. Soon someone will say, Anyway—
Thank God, someone clears his throat. Anyway—
So what are you taking? the bright woman chimes in.
I want to die. Depakote, I say.
I've heard it's a good med, she says. But aren't you on tranquilizers? she asks. Will this never end? I should think you'd need something to calm you down? She smiles at me.
Klonopin, I say, and stand and push my chair in. Excuse me. I hurry to the bathroom, my face burning, near tears.
Because I have no other hope of keeping myself from total collapse, I trust my therapist completely. She tells me to take Klonopin, I take Klonopin. She tells me to take massive, toxic doses of Depakote, I take them. She tells me I don't have a drinking problem, so I don't. She's the professional. I swallow my pills each morning and night, with my bedside wine.
I'm working around the clock on the book and school and teaching two classes, drunk or sober, it doesn't matter, and my stress level is through the roof. I've blown through almost all the money I made on Wasted and the advances for the novel as well, and I'm not quite sure on what. My friends are giving up on me. I'm not sleeping, I'm having compulsive, risky affairs, hardly eating. Why eat? There are plenty of calories in booze.
Another night, another party, another fabulous red dress: I am in my bathroom putting on red lipstick. I am made up like a little garish doll. I will be the perfect guest.
But I am not well.
My hand shakes. I smear the lipstick. I try to clean it up, only smearing it more. I am gripped with terror. I cannot go. I cannot go to this party. They will see and laugh at me. My lipstick is crooked. My dress is not right. I am not well, and they will know it. They will see it. They will say, She is not well. Oh my. She definitely is not well.
I am sitting in the closet in the laundry basket in my dress and fabulous shoes. There is lipstick all over my face. I am sobbing. I hold my head in my hands and pull my legs into the laundry basket. I pull the laundry over me. I am very small and well dressed and my lipstick is done poorly and I cannot leave or I will die.
I am not well.