Let me attempt to illustrate to you guys what it's like to live unmedicated. Through that, I hope you'll understand why Amber's desire to live that way is not only laughable and bizarre, it's outright dangerous.
Imagine a pressure cooker. Not one of the smaller, home use ones. I want you to imagine one of those big, industrial motherfuckers, the ones Chic Fil A can bang out thousands of sandwiches at a time with. The type where the lid screws down and secures with a resounding THUNK and a SHLORK as the lid seals shut.
I want you to imagine that this behemoth of a machine, is you. Every day, you feel the walls suck in a little more, you feel the lid come closer and closer to caving your skull in, what little, microscopic spec of light you could see, make it's way through the impossibility of the lid, vanishes. Every day, this repeats, and things get tighter, tighter, and tighter. There's no escape, no regulation of the pressure, it's all beyond your control.
Normal people, regular people, however you want to phrase, I'd argue, are very good at regulating their pressure. They understand what they're feeling, they understand that X will cause Y, they understand how to regulate their emotions and ensure that they can exist in whatever environment or emotional state they might find themselves in.
Now take that away. No ability to regulate. No ability to understand what causes this crushing pressure, this tightness, this impending sense of doom. You have to sit there and take it, grapple with it, and try, somehow, to make sense of it and build your life in spite of it. Sure, maybe there's a couple methods you've piece mealed together that give you some sense of relief, maybe take the pressure away just a touch or keep it a constant percentage. But it's not guaranteed. One day, your favorite piece of music doesn't stop the pain anymore. Some day, going to the gym doesn't give you any reprieve. Some days, any kind of positivity or effort just sinks you deeper and deeper and deeper. All the while, the clock is ticking. Your skull feels like it might pop out the front of your face, your joints are contorted, your ribs are about to splinter outside of your chest. And still, you exist. In spite of everything, in spite of praying for anything other than the constant desolation, isolation, and PRESSURE, in spite of praying for death, every single day, you exist.
You say, fuck this, I can't possibly live like this any longer. I can't possibly continue to exist like this. I am going to die, I am going to die, I am going to die. So you see someone and you start to unravel years of bad behaviors and learned patterns. You start to break down and analyze traumas, pick apart painful memories and attempt to make sense of yourself analytically, logically. Slowly, you can regulate yourself. You learn how you can look at yourself objectively, evaluate what you're doing and correct it before it kills you. Slowly, ever so slowly, the pressure lessens. You can breathe again and life seems to open up, little by little. Seeing someone weekly is hard, but it's worth it. Holding yourself to a higher standard of existence is hard, but it's worth it. Constantly introspecting and re evaluating and re re valuating is almost back breaking..but it's worth it.
But some days, all the hard work you've seem to have done, and everything you've accomplished so far, doesn't seem to matter. The fact that you're still existing is a monumental achievement. You count the time since you started this arduous work. 6 months, a year, 2 years, 5, 10. But some days, and let's be honest, most days, it doesn't seem to matter. The walls close in faster than ever, your brain wants out, your brain wants everything to end. But you get up, go to work, go to the gym and you try. And you look in the mirror and you say to yourself, I only have to make it one week at a time. Because for an hour every week, you are saved.
Anti depressants or any kind of depression medication (I'd argue short of things like anti psychotics that stop auditory and visual hallucinations) are not cure alls. They are simply enablers. They enable you to exist in a much clearer space, to start working on yourself with a clear mind and to start working towards the person that you want to be, the person that you see inside of yourself. You can't take Lexapro twice a day and act like 1) your problems don't exist anymore or 2) to devow the work they are doing for you. To say, oh these make me feel numb and dull is so fucking stupid. You are experiencing life through a lens you've never used before, so yeah, it's gonna feel a bit off. Brain zaps, brain dumps, and numbness are all common symptoms with anti depressants, but it's important to remember that they are not a primary solution. They are meant to foster an environment within yourself that allows to live your fucking life and better deal with other kinds of treatment. I'd probably feel numb too if the fog of my mental illness was lifted and then I looked around and all I saw was tubes of ground turkey and notebooks full of empty promises.
Amber cannot live without an anti depressant because she does not have the drive to want to get better without them. It is an all consuming battle that requires all of your attention, day in and day out. You are constantly suppressing and redirecting this fire inside of you that threatens to burn you from the inside out. You're constantly evaluating your own behavior and asking yourself the hard questions. The really hard questions. Have I hurt people? Do I want to continue to hurt them? Do I want live more than I want death? The list goes on.
Amberlynn has never longed for anything more than what she has. She talks about these dreams of Los Angeles, authorship, and 200 pounds, but lacks any kind of introspection, drive, discipline, etc to make it happen. Her life is so built around instant gratification, that she can't put in, say, a year of work of writing for an hour every day, attending workshops, taking online classes, submitting to agencies, etc. She can't do that. She is incapable of it.
So why is it dangerous for AL to be off her lexapro? Why is it dangerous for someone that cries over tubed turkey (and obviously, the turkey represents control, so when control is wrestled away from Amberlynn through her own forgetfulness, she obviously has a mental breakdown) to not be on an antidepressant? Because her illness and addiction is so all consuming and over powering, that I think she can absolutely cause damage to herself (apart from the 540 pounds) and to the people around her. (more damage than she has already caused) Chuck in that you have a house, populated with two other people that are equally as despondent in the face of their illnesses, it's a recipe for disaster. We've all seen those times when people's pressure cookers explode, so to speak. It sucks, it's not pretty, not for anyone. Not for the person who basically snaps, it's shameful. Not for the people around them that are going what in the fuck just happened? But I think it's probably worst on the people who love them, who now will worry twice as much, and even that worry isn't enough to drag them out of their self indulgence long enough to say, man, I need consistent, professional help.
I've said this before on here and I'll say it again. I don't doubt that AL has experienced some kind of trauma in her life. You don't end up in her posistion if you haven't. We can speculate all day about what exactly it is and we'll probably never really know for sure because Amber is one of the biggest (lol) liars around due to her crippling insecurity and self esteem issues. But I think people that really wants what she claims to want, to live life unmedicated, and do it on her own, those people work tirelessly, day in and day out, to get there. And Amber won't. She never will.
Edit : Something I forgot. There's a struggle involved with getting yourself together that's different for everyone and it can take a really long time. I think the most insulting thing about Amber is she has so many means that aren't available to other people and yet she still does fuck all to better herself. She could afford to do twice weekly therapy or attend some kind of inpatient center, I'm sure, but she just wraps herself in this misery and this self serving attitude that's just so, SO hard to overlook and not get A loggy about.