I have programmed the song “Breathe” by Michelle Branch as my cell phone alarm clock in the hopes that a positive song will help me think positively, but even so, morning comes too quickly. Still groggy from the cocktail of drugs I took so I could sleep, and still trying to decide whether or not I actually slept, I’m sure about only three things: positive thinking doesn’t work, self-medication does, and my supply of sleeping pills, distributed by my parents, is waning. Growing up medicated and surrounded by doctors, I learned to use drugs to assuage unwanted feelings. Today is no exception. Obsessing over my breakup with Ashley—the reason I can’t sleep—I look up shrinks covered by my insurance and find an Upper West Side psychiatrist named Dr. Sylvia Goldstein.
She schedules me for the next evening at 8:00 p.m. I wonder what sort of doctor has office hours that late at night.
