So last night I asked Nikki to reconsider his resistance to antidepressants and talk to Bethany(our doctor) about finding the right one.  It has been 20 years since I was on one, and my understanding of the modern choices is that the different kinds aren't just different brands, but work differently on different types of issues.  I assume Bethany will know more, she's been concerned about his mental state for a while and wanting him to talk over the options with her.  She's not a pill pusher, in fact she swings the other way, let's try to control things first through behavioral adaptation, if not, then lets start with the lowest dosages possible and slowly increase until we reach a workable effect is her approach.  I trust her not to zombie him out, but help us choose the right medication to ease him back into his emotions so that his therapist can better help him work with them.  The therapist has also been talking about them to him. 

The more we talked, the more clear he made it to me that he ONLY feels sadness, numbness, anger, or extreme high happy.  All the other emotions of life are just gone.  This isn't unusual for depression, but it does make it such a hard condition to defeat. 

I have taken them during my first bout with depression, it was what made me able to deal with the actual issues going on in my head and know what I really actually felt about them because it restored my ability to feel.  It took six months and two different prescriptions to find the right one for me, but it was worth it.  The frustrating part was i was a minor and my parents kept me on the one that wasn't working for four months, two months after my therapist told them I needed to be switched because there should have been an effect.  And I think the depression never had a chance to get as deep into me because I was already in therapy for the add and the Dr. recognized the symptoms of the second disorder sliding in and treated it very quickly with the two prong medication and therapy approach.  And taught me how to self treat without the pills once I was recovering.  Which is how I pulled myself out of that I feel nothing pit I was in in 2011.  I don't think Nikki ever pulled out of it, I think he just quietly slid deeper and can't find his way out. 

I honestly don't know if I'm surprised or not, but he agreed to do so without much discussion, and most of the discussion about antidepressants was me making sure he understood that I wasn't asking him to take the pills as a cure, that doesn't happen, but as a tool to be able to regain his emotions to help him sort out what is happening to him and cure himself with therapy and healthy living.  Still no suicidal issues I can see, but l know what long term lack of emotion does to people.  Been to those memorials. 

He remembers being happy up until around 2011, even when things were hard, remembers emotional ranges and the sheer variety of feelings and thoughts, he just can't touch them anymore.  That breaks my heart for him.  They aren't something I can find for him.  But I can do my level best to make sure he is trying to get better, and has the tools to do so.