by Hollace Schmidt

COMFORTABLY NUMB?
Blunting is an effect described in a recent study by University of Arizona researchers, who found that SSRIs can make it harder for people to cry, worry, or feel anger, surprise, or compassion. Thomson has heard these same complaints from patients. “People describe it like this: ‘I just don’t have the same range of feelings, and stuff that used to upset me doesn’t upset me anymore,’” he says. But, on the flip side: What used to make them really happy now barely moves the needle— they feel indifferent. To most everything.

Maybe even someone they once loved? For Ticas, that was the case. She and Julio even considered divorce: At one point he packed a bag and left—but returned the same night. They resolved to stick it out and now, four years later, Ticas is off antidepressants and treating her depression by diff erent means (a pacemaker-like device that sends short bursts of electrical energy to her brain every few minutes). “When you’re depressed, you’re in a darkness,” Ticas says. “Taking antidepressants takes you to a kind of dawn. There’s light, but it’s not bright.”

While pills work wonders for some, for her, being off her medication means the light is brighter. The romance is back. And when the lights go out, and she’s cuddling with Julio in the darkness, there’s no place she’d rather be.