In the weeks that I blew off blogging, me and my life just kept going. Life was stressful for many reasons but I made it through experiencing less stress than I normally would have. I am sure that this is due in part to my medications, my counseling and where my head is at now.


One of my stresses actually came from the effexor I take for my depression. There seems to be a side effect to it that is not really talked about much. It caused me to miss the “big moment” more than once while doing the deed with my husband. I have to admit I really enjoy that part of my married life, so the thought of missing out on the “big moment” for years was a depressing thought. To make matters even more stressful, I tend to get a bit embarrassed when I have to talk about that particular subject, but I knew for the problem to be fixed I would have to talk to my male psychologist about it. For the life of me I could not figure out a way to say what I needed to say with out really saying it. The best I could come up with in my head was “Doctor, I am not having any orgasms because of the effexor.” Somehow the thought of being that blunt about it scared the stuffing out of me.


I called a female friend of mine for courage. She said I just needed to go right into the doctor’s office, the next time I had an appointment, and tell him exactly what the problem was. She assured me that he had probably heard that kind of thing more than once and would know just what to do. She did bolster my courage, but I was still tongue tied at the thought of actually saying it out loud.


A few days after I talked to my friend, it was time for me to go in and see both my psychiatrist and my counselor. I saw the counselor first. We had our usual session, things got talked about, and I avoided talking about the one issue that was in the forefront of my mind. Finally, when our session was about over I got enough courage to bring up the dreaded topic. I told the counselor that I had something that was very difficult for me to talk about, but that I absolutely needed to. She said “Ok”, and had a very strange look on her face. Almost like she was afraid at what I might say considering how serious I sounded. Then I just blurted it out “The effexor is making it so I cannot have an orgasm and I do not know how to tell the doctor that I cannot live that way for years because I enjoy it too much.” She laughed. Apparently, she was expecting me to bring something totally awful up and when I blurted out what I did she was shocked that it was something as simple as that. Her laughing actually caused me to relax and I was able to see a great deal of humor in how I handled the whole situation. The counselor assured me that this was an easy to fix problem, and that if I wanted her to, she would actually tell the doctor for me since the whole topic was embarrassing for me. I decided then that if I could tell her, then I certainly could talk to the psychiatrist about it.


After I left the counselor’s office, I walked over to the psychiatrist’s office. I was able to very calmly and without too much discomfort, explain to him the issues I was having with the effexor. He was great about it. He did not dwell on it, just let me know that if we added a low dose of wellbutrin to the mix it should take care of the problem. However, this fix lead to another problem. My husband would want to know why the doctor added another medication to my depression medications. That meant I would have to tell him that the medicine was to help me experience the “big moment” again, and then I would have to confess the fact that I had been faking things for weeks.


I thought and thought and could not come up with anything that would spare me any embarrassment with my husband. So I figured that I would just tell him, the way I did the counselor and the psychiatrist and be done with it. After much, hemming and hawing I got around to telling my husband about the medication and why I needed to take it and confessed my faking ways. I am so glad he is an understanding man.


All that stress over something so silly. It amazes me the amount of things I can turn into huge problems when the reality is, for the most part, that the problems are really just little bumps in my road and are easier to deal with then I think they will be.


At least this whole experience has made it so I get less embarrassed when I have to talk about this particular topic. Good thing too! The very next week I had an appointment with my medical doctor and one of his questions was to ask me how my sex life was, considering all the medications I am on. If he had asked that before I had dealt with the issue, I probably would have fallen out of my chair. As it was, I was able to look at him with a smile on my face and tell him it was just fine.