u/ASmallArmyOfCrabs

I'm on cymbalta for chronic pain, and I've been taking it for ~2 months now.

Cymbalta has done more for my pain than anything else I've taken.

However these hallucinations are driving me mental. It's like every day I wake up to a drug trip. Everything is colourful and shiny, my walls are breathing, geometric patterns swirling around.

My first few days on the meds it was 24 hours a day, then after a month it was only a couple hours a day. Now I only get them a few times a week.

However I'm trying to increase my dose. Given my side effects, my doctor recommended just taking an extra one three times a week. Unfortunately whichever day I take that extra dose, I have the hallucinations again for the next like 12-15 hours before it lessens off again.

I'm luck that I'm not driving. But my job requires a lot of attention to visual details, and while I'm only doing online courses now, I can't imagine trying to read notes on the board in September.

Is there anything I can do to lessen these side effects? Do you think it could be worth it to just increase my dose every day? And then hopefully it would be manageable by the time classes start up again.

(nsfw is just because of the pissing, unsure if it's necessary)

Set up: My friend Alexis is friends with me, Bethany, and our other friend Craig. Craig and I both live in the same neighborhood whereas Alexis lives in a fancy downtown condo.

Yesterday, we all went out clubbing together. We've been out partying maybe 4-5 times before. We were definitely all drunk. All three of us were out socializing and talking to strangers all night.

Even after the club closed, we still ended up hanging out and talking with people until ~4am. Typically, I order the 3 of us an uber to Alexis' house and then Craig and I will chill there for a bit then go to the nearby McDonald's where we will get post clubbing food before heading home.

Alexis met someone that happened to live in my neighborhood, we can call them Daisy. Daisy saw that we were getting in the uber and asked to come along cause she didn't have a ride back. Alexis invited her to come along and neither Craig nor I protested. I told her we were only going to Alexis' place downtown and Daisy said that was fine and she could make her way from there.

Even though I didn't protest, I got mooch vibes from her (probably because of the fact that she was bumming a ride from people half her age) so I wasn't super interested in inviting her with us to the McDonald's pitstop. As an aside, Alexis' place was much closer and was in a much safer part of the city than the club, so we weren't putting Daisy in a worse spot by bringing her there.

So we got to Alexis' place, and Daisy was like "wtf this isn't the right neighbourhood." And I was like "yeah, well Craig is probably a bit car sick and we'll probably just wait around here for a bit", I explained, trying to get her to leave. Unfortunately Craig didn't pick up on the hint and was like "I'm fine to go" and Alexis was apologizing to Daisy and was like "Don't worry Bethany will give you a ride home"

So Alexis went inside to go to bed while the 3 of us waited for the uber outside. It's 5am now and the sun is rising. The uber is 10 minutes away and my phone dies. So we're kind of just waiting around together. Daisy suddenly announces "I'm gonna go pee" and walks around the corner, we presume to go into the front desk of the condo. Craig and I both say "Oh no you can't, it'll be locked". Then the Uber arrives, so we say "The Uber's here let's go" and Daisy says "I'm peeing!" and we both say "hey wtf?" From announcement to pissing took ~7 seconds.

We go around the corner and see her just pissing on the ground on Alexis' driveway. She doesn't have underwear on. The doorman comes out and starts yelling at her (fully validated). The uber is there so we get in. She also gets into the uber. We drive away, and both of us text Alexis explaining wtf just happened.

Alexis is pissed at us (understandably) for how we let this happen, how she's going to get into deep shit because of this, how there's probably going to be a huge fine for it. /End

The money part: Obviously the relationships that are involved are much more important than the money, but I'm also stressed about the money and I know people will ask.

All three of us agree that Daisy should pay. We have her phone number and vaguely know where she lives. But none of us think she actually will, especially if the number's high enough for the next paragraph to be relevant.

I have a minimum wage job and Craig is currently a student. Alexis expects the two of us to both pay half of the fine. Which is whatever if it's like $100, but if it's like $500, that's a much bigger problem for us. Obviously I wouldn't expect Alexis' parents (the condo owners) to pay the fine, but there is a number that Craig and I would be unable to afford. I don't know how to deal with that conversation without it immediately coming across as not wanting to take responsibility.

The social part: I struggle a lot with friendships ig, especially friendships ending. I'm already in a really fragile place because one of my great friends for the past year suddenly ghosted me out of nowhere. My other good friend just left for a 2 month vacation with her family. I also just had a break up, so I'm just not handling any of this stress well.

I've just kind of been crying on and off all day. Alexis has been my good friend for like 3 years now, and it just feels like this is going to ruin it forever. And I just keep cycling between being so sad and angry at her and trying to not care and just wait it out.

I know at some point the 3 of us have to meet up and talk about it. Craig and I talked about it for like an hour last night (~6-7am) and he has a much more level head than me about it. I trust him to explain things clearly. But I also feel like I'll just look terrible for sitting there quietly the whole time. But also I don't know what to say without just making it worse. There's no apologizing for this mess. I also know I won't take it well if Alexis is still very angry at us. I feel like I'll just explode into tears or anger back.

Tl;dr some random drunk lady pissed on my friend's driveway while we were waiting for the uber. My friend blames me for not stopping her. What can I say to my friend to preserve the friendship? What can I do while I wait for them to reach out to me?

I'm actually gonna go insane, my technology is rebeling against me.

two days ago

It started with my mouse giving up on life. My touchpad was fine, but my mouse was stuttering and lagging to the point where I had to give up on it. Whatever, I say, I'll deal with it after my exam.

yesterday

Then my computer monitor stopped working. I was able to get my hdmi cable and laptop to connect on my friend's monitor, but my monitor wouldn't detect the signal anymore.

Immediately after my monitor gave up, a book fell off my desk, that knocked off my plate of dinner >:( and my soda spilled all over my keyboard. My plate shattered into like a billion pieces, so I had to clean that up, then vacuum, and clean up all the sticky shit all over my desk, then take apart my keyboard and pray it doesn't break.

today

Now as the final straw, the shit that holds my air conditioner in the window fell out. It fell on top of some hvac thing so I can't get it back myself (praying that my residence lets me borrow a ladder?). The friggin air tube fell out of the window and knocked tonight's dinner off of my bedside table and all over the floor, and made my room really hot right before I wanted to go to bed. And the thinggg that makes the AC tube stay there is gone so I had to sadly tape it together. And now I'm just hoping it doesn't fall out while I sleep.

Trying to troubleshoot, fix and clean all of these random problems is driving me insane.

So yeah, if I die, you know what happened to me.

I will start with the caveat that I'm drunk rn, but I had some friends out in Edmonton who used to mix weed and tobacco in their bong. They had a specific slang name for it, but I just cannot remember what it is. (I can't remember it when I'm sober either, but I was reminded I've been meaning to ask this here)

I know a lot of people are going to say poppers, but it was something different

Thanks in advance if I don't look at this until tomorrow.

And sorry to the mods if this is too inappropriate to go here, I wasn't really sure. My opinion is that I am not seeking any advice on getting drugs, I just wanna increase and preserve knowledge of modern regional slang

I'm an undergrad taking a second year bio course that talks about electron microscopy. I just think it's so cool and would love to learn more about it/see it done in person. I can see that UBC has a few of these kinds of microscopes on campus. Would an undergrad be allowed anywhere near them? Any courses that allow you to play around with one?

My school offers a one year master's of management that you can do after you complete your bachelor's degree.

I still want to get an Oceanography degree, but I have some reaons for wanting to do this program first.

1. I want to go into fisheries management, and I feel like having a business education will help them take me more seriously
2. waiting an extra year will mean that my Oceanography masters will occur after Trump is out of office. I think the states have amazing programs, but I wouldn't want to go until I know how the administration is doing. I have citizenship there, but it's the kind where my parents were on a working visa.
3. I think it will make it easier to get into a good Oceanography program if I have more evidence that I can succeed in Masters program. I don't have the best grades (2.67), but I've been focusing on completing research papers so far to help bolster my chances. From what I've heard, this program is pretty easy to get into as a recent student.
4. I think it would be nice to have a change of pace. I grew up working in the family business, so I already have a lot of foundational experience with these courses. A lot of my arts credits were business courses because I found them fun, so I'm expecting the course load to not feel too heavy in comparison to what I'd expect from an Oceanography program.
5. I could keep my house and my lab positions for another year. I could keep building up my faculty connections, likely complete an extra paper and get better letters of reference. I'd appreciate not having to find a job or a house for another year. Especially if I'm predicting the program will be less busy than I am right now, it would be nicer to work on applications then, compared to doing them now during my bachelors.

But obviously I have no clue what I'm talking about. These are just assumptions I'm making, and I'd like to hear from other people what they think about this plan.