I'm not emo, just depressed.

Ok, so I listed my arthritis meds, but I didn't mention anything about the depression. I have a harder time talking about it lately because I worry people will hold it against me, etc., insert excuses here that really I'm too sleepy to write out.

At any rate, a few weeks ago my new and improved all-purpose doctor (as opposed to my rheumatologist)put me on Wellbutrin. It seems to work well so far; I'm not depressed, and I have more energy. There are some side effects, though.

For starters, I'm dying of thirst all the time. Granted, in the grand scheme of things, a little thirst doesn't even compare with wanting to kill yourself all the time, but it's kind of annoying nonetheless. I'm also having trouble getting to sleep--usually end up laying in bed awake upwards of 45 minutes after turning the lights off. This is a bit more of a problem because, I already get really crappy sleep since I'm constantly waking up, what with all the pain and stiffness, so I am very very tired at work.

And last and most unsettling of all, I'm twitching. Literally. I'll be sitting at my desk, and my hand will twitch, causing me to hit a random key on the keyboard, or to click my mouse. My jaw is also doing this twitching thing--whether I'm talking or not, sometimes it just does this quick spasm jut-out thing. It's annoying when I'm talking.

I saw my doctor yesterday, and I told her about the twitching and other stuff. She seemed surprised about the twitching, though as I understand it, tremors are not an uncommon side effect of Wellbutrin, and I would've thought my twitching was in the same vein. She said I do have a very slight tremor in my hands (I hadn't noticed), but really, some people are shakier than others, so I don't know how I'd tell if that's my normal baseline shakiness, or Wellbutrin-induced tremor. At any rate, she decreased the Wellbutrin dose a bit, to see if that reduces the twitching over the next couple of weeks, and we'll see what happens.

On another note, my Wellbutrin stinks. Some time last week or the weekend before, it just started to smell. I didn't leave it out in the sun, heat, or any humid spot; I didn't spill anything on it; just, one day, it stopped having the normal, slightly unpleasant smell of medication, and started smelling very pungent, like rotting lettuce.

I called the pharmacy. The girl there confirmed that, indeed, their Wellbutrin did not smell (no kidding). When I tried to ask what I should do--in other words, is my head going to fall off if I keep taking this?--, she started chanting "we can't take your meds back" over and over until I hung up.

Yesterday, I asked my doctor about it. She said that generics sometimes have a sort of unpleasant med-y smell. Fair enough. I made her smell it.

"Oh," she said, "it's not supposed to smell like that!"

Duh. So she recommended I...wait for it...talk to the pharmacist. So, ok, after work, we drive to the pharmacy, and I'm determined to shove it under the pharmacist's nose if need be so they can give me some useful information. I don't want them to take the Smellbutrin back and restock it and resell it, for crying out loud; I just want to know if it's safe to take or what.

We get to the pharmacy drive-up window. In retrospect, this would have been better handled by walking up to the counter inside, but oh well.

It turns out that the guy who's manning the pharmacy window is a reject of the Fast Food Drive-Through School. He doesn't understand anything we tell him (we were also picking up some stuff and dropping off new Rx orders). Finally we stick the Smellbutrin in the tray and ask him to smell it.

"Oh," he tells us, "it's not supposed to smell like that."

I'm starting to sense a theme.

He seems perplexed. He thinks about it for a while.

He recommends I go talk to the manufacturer.

No way am I going to try to track down some obscure-ass manufacturer of generic drugs, try to find the appropriate person to talk to, try to explain over the phone what my meds smell like, so they can tell me "no refunds." I DON'T WANT A !@#$!@#$ REFUND.

He gets his supervisor, the actual, non-stupid pharmacist who we are used to dealing with. He smells the meds.

"They're not supposed to smell like that."

I fantasize about punching people.

I explain--or rather, I tell Mr Sporks (while getting exponentially more worked up by the second) again, that I just want to know if they're safe to take, if I should try to get a replacement, or what, and he passes it on, since I'm in the passenger side and the window is next to him. Mr Sporks explains. I fantasize some more about punching people.

Finally someone seems to understand what we're asking, and the pharmacist tells us, "Yeah, I wouldn't take these."

So the Drive-Through reject asks if we would like to get a partial refill to take for the rest of the month, which sounds like a good idea. Except, remember how I said my doctor was lowering the dose for the next two weeks? The idea is, if the twitching and side effects subside on the lower dose, after the two weeks is up, she will put me on the extended release version of the medication, which seems to have good results for people with side effects. Ok, now, try to explain to Mr Drive-Through School dropout that the partial refill you're getting isn't for two pills per day, but just one pill per day for the next two weeks; and that the script (remember how I said we were dropping off some new scripts? Well, the hospital has taken to printing all the prescription orders on the same sheet, so in order to get my regular meds I also had to turn in the order for Smellbutrin XR, which I may or may not need in two weeks) that we just turned in (and spent another twenty minutes earlier explaining that it didn't need to be filled yet) doesn't come into the equation at all...

I'm supposed to pick up my partial refill this evening. I have no idea what will actually be in the order.