Fic: A Mile in My Shoes, a Lifetime in My Head (5/6)
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Back to Part 4
Later that morning, Jared and Jensen sat waiting patiently in the examination room at the doctor's office. Jared had been very quiet since Jensen's recounting of his history during breakfast, keeping his eyes on his plate as Jensen spoke. Jensen was anxiously wondering what Jared thought of it all, but he didn't press it; he knew he'd dumped a lot on his boyfriend all at once, and he was content to give Jared some time to process. He was just relieved that Jared had come around to accept the doctor's visit on his own.
A brief rap on the door announced Dr. Haine's arrival, who entered briskly with a big smile for the two men.
"Hey, guys, how are you doing? What's going on today?"
Her smile was warm even as her dark eyes alertly studied them. Her slim figure was clothed in a simple red knit shell and black pants, with the traditional white lab coat open over it, and her dark hair was clipped up away from her face. She looked professional and kind in equal measure.
Sitting in the waiting room earlier, they had quietly whispered an agreement to simply portray the persona of the face they wore. Their current situation was too fantastic to try and explain.
'Jared' now said, "Jensen has been feeling crappy for a while now, and I persuaded him to come in and let you check him out."
"Good advice! Okay, Jensen, what seems to be the trouble?"
She sat on the stool next to the counter that her laptop rested on, waiting for 'Jensen' to speak.
"Well, uh . . . I'm tired a lot, but I'm not sleeping well. Spending a lot of time just flaked out on the couch. I'm not very hungry, and even when I am, it's kinda hard to eat. I don't, uh . . . I'm not interested in sex." He cleared his throat nervously. "And I get angry really quickly, like a switch flicks inside me and - boom." He paused, trying to surreptitiously wipe a treacherous tear sliding down his cheek. "Everything is just really . . . gloomy. Like, I don't know how to be happy anymore."
Dr. Haine pressed a couple of tissues into his hand. "It's okay, Jensen," she said softly. "Just say what you can. We're here to figure out what's making you feel so bad, okay? Take your time."
'Jensen' took a deep breath. "I just feel shitty all the time. I'm either sad or mad, mostly sad. I don't want to do anything, go anywhere. And he," he gestured to 'Jared', "he's being so patient, and I feel so bad that he's gotta put up with this."
'Jensen' wiped his eyes and nose with a tissue in one hand, as he held onto 'Jared's' hand in the other.
"Dude, don't worry about that. I love you. I just wanna help you feel better."
'Jared' tried to reassure his partner, all the while feeling a yawning cavern of guilt inside himself. The real Jared was suffering because of the real Jensen's problem, and it was tearing Jensen up inside to watch. Now he could understand the concerns Jared had had before the swap, which he had deliberately ignored at the time. Well, he'd learned his lesson, and now they were going to fix this shit.
Dr. Haine typed some notes into her laptop, and now she got up to examine 'Jensen'. She looked into his eyes, his ears, his nose, and his throat. She checked his pulse and blood pressure. His reflexes flexed properly, his lungs sounded clear, and he didn't have a fever. She ran through a quick neurological test with him, and tapped all the results into her laptop again. Then she sat and faced them.
"Okay, here's my initial finding. Jensen, you seem to be in good health. I don't see any signs of illness or infection, and despite the poor eating and sleeping, your weight is good and you haven't really lost any muscle tone as of now. Your blood pressure is very slightly up, but I think that's the anxiety working, and not a real health issue." She looked back and forth to them. "Jensen, I'm asking at this point if you'd like Jared to stay or to wait for you in the waiting room."
'Jensen' grabbed 'Jared's' hand. "Stay, please. I don't care what it is, he can hear it."
Dr. Haine smiled. "That's what I expected you to say, but I had to ask. Okay, so I think what's going on here is that you're suffering from some pretty serious depression. I'm not talking about just feeling down or blue, like you lost a role or even that someone passed away. That's normal situational depression, and everyone experiences that in varying degrees and at different times. This is a different kind of animal altogether. We call this clinical depression, and it is - as you've found out - quite debilitating. Many areas of our life are affected by this, which then intensifies our feeling bad about ourselves."
Both men were still, focusing solely on Dr. Haine's words. 'Jared' slid an arm around 'Jensen's' shoulders, immediately feeling how his body was trembling.
"The best tool we have for handling this is medication."
'Jared' couldn't help shuddering. 'Jensen' looked at him, knowing from the confession earlier that day that he'd tried medication in the past and found it actively unhelpful.
'Jensen' turned to the doctor and said, "Uh, I was on a medication a long time ago, and it wasn't good. It didn't help, and even made me feel worse." He was so glad that 'Jared' had come clean; now they could be sure to address things with the proper information.
"Well, that's not uncommon. Early meds were not as reliably helpful or consistent as today's choices are. Anti-depressants are constantly evolving and becoming more sophisticated as we speak, and there's no comparison between early ADs and the current ones in terms of both effectiveness and side effects. I'd like you to consider starting on a low-level one as soon as possible. They do still take a few weeks to ramp up in the body."
She watched them for a minute, but seeing the reluctance in their faces, she sighed.
"Okay, I can see you two are not enthused about that option. I can suggest an alternate plan, if you like. While I'm able to prescribe the mainstream ADs and diagnose broad issues like clinical depression, there are specialists we can consult as well." 'Jared' moved as if to speak, and Dr. Haine raised her hand. "Bear with me one minute and let me explain."
"When we deal with the area of mental health, we have a two pronged approach. On one hand, we address the medication side by consulting a psychiatrist. These specialists deal exclusively with diagnosis and prescriptions, and have a much deeper and wider ranging knowledge of that field than I do. That is all they do. The other part is seeing a psychologist for therapy. This isn't "what happened in my childhood", Freudian-type therapy, but talk therapy that's geared to helping you deal with your condition. You'd learn to face and cope with the thoughts and behaviors that the depression wreaks upon you. You get to vent without feeling you are burdening your partner or family. If you'd prefer, we can cut right to the chase and set up those appointments as soon as possible." She looked at them, noting the stricken expressions on both faces. "Listen, why don't you take a few minutes and talk about it, okay? I have a couple of calls to make, and then I'll check back here with you." She squeezed 'Jensen's' shoulder as she passed him on the way to the door. "We're going to make this better. I'm not going to leave you hanging." And then she was gone and the door was closing.
As soon as they were alone, the two men turned to each other and hugged tightly. Jared, still in Jensen's body as it sat on the examining bench, whimpered quietly into Jensen's shirt.
Jensen held him and whispered in his ear, "We got this, baby. Hear her? We're going to fix this. And then I'm gonna spend the rest of my life making this up to you." Tears flooded his eyes. "I am so fucking sorry, Jay. Sorry I put you through this before. Sorry you have to deal with it now. But we're going to make everything better, I promise."
He kissed Jared's - his own - spiky light brown hair. God, how he missed Jared's real hair now, missed running his fingers through the dark, silky strands. He idly wondered how they were ever going to swap back. If they were ever going to swap back.
That night in bed, they snuggled together, Jared's need for comfort overriding his anxiety about being close. They didn't even think about sex, but simply held each other, exchanging some soft kisses now and then. Jensen appreciated being in Jared's body right now - he felt so big and protective, holding Jared with this tall frame and these long limbs. He wished hard, though, that they could be back inside themselves again. Wonky eyes, crabby knees, fucked-up brain - he'd take it all back if it would spare Jared this emotional maelstrom.
Three days later, they were ushered into the psychiatrist's office. Jensen was unsurprised at the overstuffed bookshelves, but the general untidy appearance of the office did surprise him a little. He guessed he'd thought that someone whose career was sorting people out would be better organized himself. The psychiatrist was almost as tall as Jared's body, but stoop-shouldered and balding, a ruff of curly, steel-gray hair festooning his head. Gold wire glasses sat on his nose, and he frequently batted at a tie that flopped around his shirt front. He seemed gruff but pleasant, so the two men sat in the chairs before the desk relaxed a tiny bit and waited.
"Good afternoon, my name is Dr. Goldblatt. I see Dr. Haine has sent you, Jensen Ackles, for a consultation about depression. Is this correct?" He looked piercingly at 'Jensen', who nodded. "And you are . . . ?" he said, turning to 'Jared'.
"I'm his boyfriend. His . . . his partner, Jared Padalecki," 'Jared' replied.
"And Jensen, is it all right with you if I speak freely in front of your partner, Jared?"
"Yes, it is," said 'Jensen' firmly. Dr. Goldblatt's eyes twinkled as he nodded.
"Excellent! Now I understand that Dr. Haine has made a preliminary diagnosis of clinical depression, but I will do my own exam here and see if I concur with her findings, or make my own diagnosis, all right? Therefore, let us begin."
The next hour was filled with Dr. Goldblatt asking a million questions, eliciting 'Jensen's' history, posting hypothetical situations and asking for responses to them, and so on. He asked 'Jared' over a dozen questions as well, delving into his observations of 'Jensen'. He scribbled many notes as they went, jotting them onto a legal pad on his desktop.
When he was done, Dr. Goldblatt sat for several minutes staring out the window. Jared and Jensen looked questioningly at each other, but remained sitting. They both felt firm that they were not leaving without an answer.
And finally the doctor turned back to them, fixing them with a steady, yet not unkind, gaze.
"Thank you for your patience, both with the exam itself and my deliberations. I prefer to sit and digest the information just gathered before I speak out of turn, you understand?" Jared and Jensen nodded.
"Jared, here is what I have determined from your exam. I do not believe you suffer from clinical depression, although your behavior indeed indicates depression. What I mean to say is, clinical depression is not the root cause of your malaise. Instead, I believe you have bipolar syndrome; specifically, what is referred to as bipolar type two."
Jensen felt like a bolt had gone through his heart. He saw similar shock on Jared's face. What? Bipolar? Wasn't that a - a kind of crazy?
"Gentlemen! Please do not panic. I see the alarm in your faces. Take a deep breath and listen to me. Now, when I say "bipolar", you think of the old term from lurid B movies - manic depression. That term is no longer used, and indeed greatly oversimplifies the syndrome. Bipolar does indicate that the two ends of the emotional spectrum are manifested - the mania, or hyperactivity, typified by sleep trouble or lack of sleep, extravagant and grandiloquent behavior, risky sexual behavior, and so on. The flip side is the depression - essentially everything you have been experiencing."
"But, Doctor, 'Jensen' hasn't been exhibiting any of the mania behaviors! How can he be . . . bipolar?"
The word felt so strange in Jensen's mouth, like he was acting some over-dramatic role on a cheesy movie of the week.
"Yes! Exactly. You are spot on, Jared. What Jensen is dealing with is a variation of bipolar called bipolar type two. In this part of the syndrome, there is no mania. It is primarily all depression. The depression, however, is deep and pervading, and it does not respond to traditional anti-depressant medications. In fact, anti-depressants can actually intensify the bipolar symptoms and make the patient more miserable."
Jensen's Days days flashed before his eyes; the ineffective Prozac, the worsening symptoms and side effects. His eyes fell on Jared, who was staring at him with the same comprehension in his face. No wonder the medication had been such a failure.
'Jensen' looked back at the doctor, swallowing hard to get his throat to work properly. "So, what happens? What do we do?"
His hand started hurting, and he looked down to realize how tightly it was clutching the chair arm. He lifted it up and put it with his other hand - with 'Jared'.
"Well, just because we don't use ADs doesn't mean we don't have effective medications available. In treating bipolar syndrome, one of the first lines of attack is the use of lithium. Lithium is an old drug, from the fifties; it's extremely stable, and a large number of bipolar patients enjoy great success with very minimal side effects. That's what I'd like to start you on, Jensen. Today. Happily, lithium works rather quickly, compared to ADs, and in a couple of weeks you will start feeling the benefits of it. The other aspect of treatment is cognitive behavioral therapy, which I believe Dr. Haine explained to you. Much as in clinical depression, bipolar patients find great relief and help with talk therapy. Have you found a therapist yet, or do you need a referral?"
'Jared' said, "We found one from a referral Dr. Haine gave us. We have an appointment with him tomorrow."
He felt so numb right now; he was relieved there was something to be done, but the actual diagnosis was still bouncing around inside his brain. Bipolar. Bipolar! Bipolar! The word kept echoing in his head.
Part of him wondered how much better might things have been, had he checked this out long ago. If he had pursued help instead of shoving the problem away or letting it bleed out all over the place? What might he have been spared? What might Jared have been spared during the swap?
Would Jared have even chosen to stay with him, had he known? That thought sent a chill down his spine. He'd hate to think something like this would have deterred Jared, but he didn't know for sure. And that thought was followed up by the realization that he'd have to give Jared a choice now. Now that they didBe fair, his mind whispered. You can't trap him like this. If he wants to go, you have to let him. You'll live. Somehow.
"Okay, Jay. Go ahead." Jensen's voice came out even, surprising him. "You can tell me anything."
He sat on the bed, facing Jared, trying to be as outwardly calm as possible, and mostly succeeding.
"Well, you were having a rough time, right? Even after you moved in, which I thought - you should be happy. But you weren't, at least not completely. And you wouldn't really talk to me about what you were thinking, or how you were feeling, or anything. Which, believe me, I totally understand now. Like, yeah, it would have been good if you had, but now I truly understand how you felt. It's so hard to try and just fucking communicate when you're feeling like this. So, I get that now."
Okay, thought Jensen. Here it comes.
"So I was really desperate, you know? I didn't know what to do, how to help you. How to understand what the problem was. And I was talking with Lynnie, you know, on the crew? I didn't tell her anything, I just said how I needed to know something, to understand what was going on, and she - she helped me. She told me all this stuff about her Old World granny, and kitchen magic, and she gave me - she gave me - "
His breathing hitched as he wiped at his eyes.
Jensen stared at Jared. What on Earth was Jared saying?
"She gave you what, dude? What did she give you?"
He could hear the panic in his voice now, and tried to breath deeply to calm down a little.
Jared looked up at Jensen with Jensen's green eyes filled with tears.
"She gave me this tea, and it was supposed to help us figure out what the problem was. And it did, right? We finally figured it out! But I," he gave a huge sob, "I drank the tea with you, and then we woke up in each other's bodies. So it worked, although I didn't know it then, but now we're like this, and I'm so sorry that I didn't tell you - I just gave it to you to drink, and I understand if you ha . . . hate me now."
He collapsed crying, falling forward so his head rested in Jensen's lap. Jensen heard him sobbing, the sobs punctuated with little exclamations of "sorry" over and over.
Jared's revelation stunned Jensen. Part of it was the whole idea of magic being involved. Magic tea!? But then he moved past that to think about the fact of Jared's silence about it all. He could be indignant. Angry, even. It was there a little, simmering underneath the shock. But - Jared drank that tea right along with him. He didn't slip Jensen a mickey, didn't stay out of it. He went right on in there with Jensen without knowing anymore about what would happen. The only reason he'd done it was wanting to help Jensen, find out what was going so dreadfully wrong inside him, so that they could fix it.
And that had happened, hadn't it? The swap had allowed Jared to experience what Jensen had, really know what it was like, how those twisted, knotted up emotions felt. It went both ways too - Jensen got to understand how concerned, how worried, Jared had been. How difficult it was to watch the one you love deal with something so deep-rooted and dark. How all that the watcher wanted was to help, support, mend. Love - how hard just loving could be. What was the saying? Walk a mile in my shoes? Fuck that, they hadn't walked in each other's shoes; they'd lived inside each other's head, breathed in each other's body. Jensen figured that didn't just raise the bar in understanding one another - it blew that fucker out of the water.
Jensen came out of his reverie to find Jared's head still lying on his lap.
"Hey there, hey hey hey, baby. It's all right. It's okay. I love you, and I know - I know - how much you love me. I'm not mad. Yeah, I'd say we shoulda talked more ahead of time, but I'm not mad. You did it, Jay; you found a way for us to finally figure the whole mess out. Look at today - look how much we learned. I know what's wrong now, what's not working right in my head. Okay? You did good."
He picked Jared up by the shoulders and scootched in to hug him, kissing his forehead and hair.
"I love you so much, darlin'. You given me the first real hope of managing the fucked up way my brain works. I could never be mad after that."
He put a hand under Jared's chin and tipped his face up for a kiss, to which Jared eagerly responded.
It still felt kinda weird to kiss his own face.
They got into bed and lay on their sides, each with an arm around the other. Their feet tangled together as they breathed the air shared between them. For all of the anxiety of the day - the last several days - Jensen felt strangely calm now. He ran his hand over the spiky hair housing Jared, smiled as Jared mirrored his action. They chuckled as a tiny shock zapped them both.
"Hey Jen, can you feel it? Like electricity building inside? Or a current coming on line - it's kind of tingling through me."
"Yeah, I can, Jay. Do you think - maybe tonight?"
"Maybe. Yeah. Yeah, I do. Maybe the magic's run out?"
He looked at Jensen from behind Jensen's vibrant green eyes, hope and love shining through them, studying his own eyes that were looking back at him.
"Damn, Jen - do my eyes always change colors like that?"
Jensen smiled and stroked his cheek. "Yeah, darlin', they do. I love to watch them. And I don't think the magic's running out. Maybe our time being swapped is, but we've got more magic than that."
He kissed Jared deeply now, not the tender soft kisses they'd been trading. He felt rather than heard Jared moan, and then there was skin pressed against his, a cock hardening against his thigh as Jared slid a hand down his back and gripped his ass.
"Yeah? Is it like that, Jay?"
"It is, Jen. It's exactly like that," Jared replied before kissing him hard.
And Jensen forgot everything else as he opened up to his man, his lover, and they lost themselves in each other and all the pleasure and love they could share.
And then they slept.
On to Part 6