________  ________  ________
   2019-05-27                                   /        \/        \/    /   \
                                               /       __/         /_       _/
   Ok,  ok. I know I'm starting to get a bit  /        _/         /         /
one-note but  this'll be another pharma file  \_______/_\___/____/\___/____/_
for y'all and  then I'll try to get back  on    /        \/        \/    /   \
to writing about other stuff.                  /        _/         /_       _/
                                              /-        /        _/         /
   The  drought,   at  least  for   me,  has  \________/\________/\___/____/
thankfully  broken.   Firstly  I  was  lucky
enough to get given a box of acetaminophen/codeine by my family, let's call it
a  bachelor's party  gift,  and  secondly I was able to secure some pregabalin
(aka Lyrica).  I feel like "cat" is back and firing on all cylinders again and
everything is super good.

   Did I write about  the pregabalin thing?  I forget. I remember I did a file
when I first took  it but  that  was a much higher  dose than  what I'm really
using so let me recap anyway.

   For a while my local pharmacy couldn't get codeine, I mentioned that in the
last file, so instead I was taking 150mg pregabalin  and  it is very cool. The
lower dose is a  very different experience to  what I had when I took 300mg. I
like it a  lot  and, though it feels  like I'm betraying a childhood friend to
say it, I maybe like it more than codeine.

   Unlike codeine, it goes  beyond just comfy  cloudiness, the pregabalin also
punches right through my anxiety, it's amazing. I'm more engaged in everything
I  do, at work and in  my personal life, I'm chatty and creative and agreeable
and comfortable with people. The social anxiety is still there but it makes it
vastly easier to push past it.

   There are negatives though, even at 150mg I sometimes get really scattered.
If you read my write up on the 300mg dose[1]  you'll remember I wasn't able to
hold a thought for more than a nanosecond and at 150mg it's nowhere  near that
bad but i still find myself easily distracted so, while I am solving  problems
and getting shit done it's not always problems I need to be  solving or shit I
need to be  doing.  This is especially problematic at  work when I  should  be
grinding on Salesforce  but instead I'm doing stuff like writing FAX SEX files
about taking drugs. There's also periods  where I just click off and space out
for a minute or two which, again, nice but kinda a pain at work.

   There's also some unpleasant  physical action, I find I'm  clenching my jaw
every now and then  and chewing on my cheeks. It's  not  bad, just sometimes I
catch myself doing it and get annoyed.

   One last negative, a silly one, is the 150mg pills  aren't cute cartoon red
and white like  the  300mg ones, they're just plain white and look like lizard
eggs. Aesthetics are important! Interestingly the 75mg  are red and  white but
are small, like miniatures. They made me smile without even taking them!

   To conclude, if codeine was a comfy,  warm beanbag, pregabalin  would be  a
hoodie. It's still comfy, warm and safe but  I  can  still  get out and about,
metaphorically.

   Does that even make sense?


[1] gopher://baud.baby/0/phlog/fs20181213.txt



EOF