One tiny tip for tackling medication

Pills are pills until you make them pretty

On Fridays I write about neurodiversity and mental health. Sometimes I will tell pieces of my own story. Other times I will tell yours. Go ahead and fill out my insightful questionnaire to be part of this project.

There is something depressing about starting your day fumbling with a plastic pill bottle.

Or six.

I walk into the bathroom and look at the pill bottles lined up like soldiers going to war. Instead of being on my side, battling mental illness, hormonal imbalance, high blood pressure, and something I can’t remember now, the army seems to be working against me. With each turn of a cap I am taunted by miserable messages.

Healthy people don’t need pills.

You are not healthy.

It is your fault you are not healthy. (I know…I know…this is a mistaken belief one I battle every day but not in the morning before tea.)

I start most days thinking these things. The sun can be pouring through the bathroom skylight (and often is- it is Denver after all), my day can be full of joyous plans (I mean it COULD be) and yet these thoughts persist above or below my consciousness. You are not well. It is your fault. Welcome to your day.

I notice that I am holding my breath as I rush though my routine so that I can get out of the bathroom away from the judgmental pills. I brush my teeth with vigor, slap on sunscreen, stab myself with deodorant and gulp down the pills so quickly that they become chalky lumps in my throat.

I decide to toss the pill bottles.

Not the pills. I needed them. But the bottles.

I steal one of the IKEA spice canisters from Steve’s masterpiece and pour all six pills together. I take time to notice the blue and brown which look like the eggs from Lara’s farm.

These are actually eggs from Lara’s farm. No unsplash needed.

I  throw the bottles into the sap bucket that we use as a bathroom trash can with a satisfying clunk. Clunk. Clunk. Clunk. Clunk. Cluck. (still thinking of those eggs I guess)

Now each morning I carefully pick through the pills lining them up on the counter and take them one at a time sipping water from a mug my friend made that coordinates with the color of the pills. A little twee…but a impactful. This slight aesthetic change brought on a big mental shift. I am taking charge, I am taking care of myself.

I am not just a patient but a person.The pills are put in their place. Necessary, helpful, and sort of pretty.

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Do you do anything to make meds more tolerable?