I’ve had anhedonia for 13 months now and I need encouragement.
I’ve read here and there that it can take 2-2.5 years. That gives me hope but I’m terrified I'm stuck like this because I haven’t seen any improvement whatsoever—other than that I couldn’t cry for the first month, and I’ve been able to cry now for 12 months.
I feel like an anomaly. I have my physical and cognitive abilities. I even have my personality — my creativity, my work ethic, even my sense of humor. I can make people laugh and can completely fake being happy. And things can make me laugh. But I can feel NO joy. No desire. No desire to be alive. To do any of the things that once made me happy.
It is so painful to be alive in this state, I have to distract myself during all waking hours with work. I can’t communicate with friends or family because I can’t feel the love or the joy.
It’s not depression.
It’s not fatigue.
It’s not emotional blunting—because I can feel the pain, the deep sadness, the fear and anger.
In a way, the "anomaly" makes sense because it's a receptor issue. My neurotransmitters are there--but they're just not able to reach certain areas of my brain involved in joy because of receptor shortages. But I also haven't come across anyone with this experience.
Has anyone been through this level of anhedonia? Or any form of anhedonia for this long?
My story:
I was polydrugged, misdiagnosed, and subsequently C/T’d off of klonopin (0.5mg 1-2x a day ~ 2 years) and an opioid (a prescription tincture taken daily ~6 months) (both taken as prescribed) in 11 days.
I had about a week of physical symptoms (cold sweats, shaking), as well as anxiety and a resurgence of my OCD. Then those went away by week 2 and I went blank. Later came to find out it’s anhedonia.
I’ve had severe depression before but this is different. On another level. I pray I'm not alone and that better days are to come.
Edit: Content
