謝瑤環

that I don't exist.

At least not in any meaningful way that can't be erased just like that.

I know at an abstract level that people aren't much more than the neurochemical balance in their brains. I've even experienced this when I started taking certain anti-depressants two decades ago and my personality changed quite a bit, but this time was different, maybe also because I'm a more fully formed person with stronger convictions and a much stronger sense of self than I was two decades ago.

Anyway, I started taking a new anti-depressant that is prescribed off-label to treat ADHD, and within a few days, all my priorities and my entire value system had not just changed but basically undergone a 180 degree turn. To give a few examples:

For a forty-something-year-old, I live in pretty unconventional circumstances. I have a shared space with a vibe that's not all that different from how I lived twenty years ago. It's completely by choice, and I'm super happy with my place. But once I started taking my new meds, I suddenly felt like I needed to get a bigger apartment that reflected my income so I could invite over colleagues and host fancy dinners (something I would normally never do).

My career goals changed completely. Normally, I'm pre-occupied with finding work that will pay the bills but that also feels meaningful in some way. Once I started my meds, that whole "finding meaning" bit suddenly felt super ridiculous to me.

I normally feel deeply, but for the month I was taking the meds, I was completely emotionally blunted.

I was super functional at work and basically had executive hyperfunction but lost all interest in all of my hobbies and everything I usually enjoy.

I have occasionally wondered if I would have liked to have children, but I'm overall pretty happy living my child-free life. Well, as soon as I started the new meds, I suddenly felt like a complete failure for not having produced kids -- not because I suddenly wanted kids but because I felt I had missed a milestone that was kind of expected of me by society. I was really upset because this was basically an unfixable mistake I had made.

I occasionally date, but overall, being in a relationship stresses me out more than adding something positive to my life. I am currently single again and super happy about it. In all of my life, I have never been in a relationship with someone just for the sake of having a partner. But once I started taking my new meds, guess what, I was super intent on finding a partner and started flirting with three people at the same time, including a 60-year-old and the guy who owns the bar next to my house. Unlike my now unchangeable childlessness, I felt like my being single was a mistake I could still fix, even if it was too late to form a proper family.

And now I'm like, damn, someone can just feed me meds and make me a completely different person with completely different values and a completely different life plan, fuck. Which I kind of knew at an abstract level but had never experienced quite so acutely. And I guess it just never occurred to me that all my deeply held values and beliefs and fundamental priorities in life are really all just neurotransmitters, too.

I am greatly enjoying this book I randomly found in a pile of free books today.