Medication and performance – or where did my work mojo go?

I take a medication called Clozapine. As medications go it is a case of ‘this is serious mum – REALLY serious!’. Three of the potential side effects are life threatening and so I have to have regular blood tests, ECGs and Echocardiograms to be able to keep taking the meds. When I started on the medication in 2020 it needed to be done in hospital as an impatient and took over three months to titrate up to an effective dose. Clozapine is the medication of choice for treatment resistant schizophrenia. It is a wonderful medication, and I have not been unwell since I went on it.

However, clozapine is a pharmaceutical friend which comes with some major strings attached. One of these is it effect on my brain, and particularly the ability for my brain to remember things and manage lots of things at the same time.

In 2007 I joined the public service. I am intelligent and the work was engaging. I never had any worries around performance. Quite the opposite in fact. One of my managers told me I would be able to do any job in the department if I put my mind to it. Flash forward to 2023 and I was unable to do even a mid-level role in the public service. I struggled to do what was expected of me. Unfortunately, at the time I didn’t have very understanding managers so life at work was very unpleasant and I quit.

Up until recently I thought the issue in my public service role was solely my managers but looking back I realise that my performance actually was pretty patchy. I didn’t understand this at the time as I had no real insight into my work. I has never been an underperformer in the past so why I should I be now?

The realisation about the impact of my meds on my work only really sank in this week after I had to quit a job that I absolutely loved, mostly because I couldn’t keep up with the conflicting priorities and need to know who lots of people are and what they do. When I first realised this, I went into a bit of a panic as I thought maybe I won’t be able to work anywhere again.

Actually, I don’t think that is true. The three jobs I have left because of this issue have all been roles where there were loads of small elements which needed tracking and prioritising. When I have work which I can do one thing at a time, I seem to be OK. So my academic work is not too challenging, and my support worker work is also OK. It is a bit of a rude shock though, the idea that maybe the issue will worsen, and I won’t be able to work at all. I am defined by my work. My work is what makes me who I am. I love to work, so much so that I have to force myself take weekends!

I guess it is a sobering kind of thing. I am someone with schizophrenia with a large profile and a CV that would rival most senior managers. I am considered brilliant and competent. Authors frequently get their publishers to ask me to provide an endorsement for their books. I am a brand. I am sought after all over the world and strangers regularly come up to me and say how wonderful my work is. I have always had a sort of dystopian Yennski career nightmare. It involves me being old, chronically unwell and in psychiatric hospital and saying to the nurses that I used to write books and them not believing me at all and saying, ‘that’s nice sweetie.’ Being unable to work is probably the closest fear I have to my fear of death – which is significant! I mean imagine a world without Yennski Horrible!!

My various disability conditions haven’t posed much of  a threat to my employability for many years and having them do so now does not fill me with joy I must say! But I guess it helps to view myself as vulnerable and for there to be the possibility of limitations on what I do now and into the future. It also helps me to appreciate how well I have done thus far. A lot of other people with schizophrenia can’t work at all or spend lots of their lives unable to be part to the workforce. I used to be one of them, then I wasn’t and maybe possibly I will again in the future, I don’t know – and uncertainty is not my friend.

I am not quite sure how I should approach this. I tend to be pretty competitive in my attitudes around being me so maybe I should turn this into a competition – see how long I can continue working for, how many suitable roles I can find, whether I can actually improve matters, maybe how philosophical and accepting I can be about the whole situation!

I don’t have any solution to this at all. No nifty little Yennski pearl of wisdom, no free, unsolicited advice! I guess just embrace the uncertainty and aim to be the best Yenn I can be regardless of what I can or can’t do jobs-wise. And cuddle Sunflower too of course. There isn’t much that the world can throw at me that can’t be solved with some cuddles with a purring Sunflower the kitty.

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