Tag Archives: anxiety

Around, and around, and around

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Do you ever feel like you fluctuate between two opposite extremes? One day you want fuzzy slippers and leggings, the next some killer shoes and a sharp blazer that Stacy, Clinton, and Tim Gunn would swoon over. Or maybe one day you’re all about salads and lean protein, and then next it’s chips and guac, mac & cheese, and a bucket of ice cream.

Right now, I’m caught on this particular roller coaster, constantly swinging from side to side, with a few moments of contentment somewhere in the middle. One day I want a lovely back yard and garden (which are truly lovely, and I still love them) and the next I want to sell everything and spend my life wandering. Or I want a nice, stable, dependable job with state benefits and a reserved parking spot…but then I want to spend 3 years in a creative commune and, I don’t know, go hunting for berry pigments to turn into dye, or paint, or pie (I’m not entirely sure what happens at a creative artist commune, clearly.).

When I get knocked off kilter, it sometimes takes me a while of flailing around to find my center again. I feel like I can see where that center path is, but I keep missing it, criss-crossing it haphazardly, but slowing the pendulum swing…eventually I’ll find my feet confidently walking where I want them to be, and until then, I’m just trying to survive the ride.

It occurred to me in the last few days that I probably need to be on medication. Again. I have always dabbled around the edges of depression and for the last few years have also been fighting anxiety attacks and overwhelming moments of panic stemming from everyday situations. I’ve tried therapy and meds, and more meds and different therapy. And those things have all helped to some extent; but depending on how extreme and powerful the forces in my life…well…I think it’s time to up my meds.

 

 

I know that part of my issues of late have nothing to do with my brain chemistry, they would be shitty for anyone in my shoes. I also know that my particular brain chemistry sometimes needs a little boost to stay even. So, while I know my doc–who is well acquainted with my brain–wouldn’t hesitate to re-write me a prescription for something to help me manage my day-to-day; part of me wonders if that’s a cop out. Wonders if it’s my brain, or if it’s just the situation. I don’t want to be broken, but I also sometimes wonder if I’m gas-lighting myself. And then I remind myself for the umpteenth time that regardless of why, it’s okay to not be okay. And it’s okay to take meds, or go to therapy, or do whatever it is that works in order to get back to a place of feeling okay again. And when I, myself, try and convince myself otherwise…well, that’s not a very healthy behavior, now is it.

Oh, the hamsters in my brain, if you could only see and appreciate how they work, and how they work me over. It’s exhausting.

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When you can't see the trees from the fire in the forest

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Earlier this summer I took myself on a detour-road trip on my way to San Francisco for a wedding. As I drove through King’s Canyon National Park I was stunned and terribly saddened by the devastating damage from a recent forest fire. The photo above was taken at the end of May; there should be carpets of green covering everything, tender new shoots and leaves everywhere. Instead, everything was charred and dead, it seemed like the fire had consumed as far as I could see. However, when I got out and started exploring, there were thousands of wildflowers peeking up through the ashes and burned stumps. Maybe they stood out more to me because of their charcoal background, but in that setting they were absolutely vibrant in a way that could only exist with the fire scars surrounding them.

Sequoia National Park_feistyharriet_2016Later that day, in Sequoia National Park, I wandered for miles through the giant trees; there was a particular little spot where most of the trees had been gutted and scarred by a forest fire (or twenty); it seemed like every tree had gaping black gashes on it’s body. Yet, even with so much lost to the blaze, these trees continued to grow, putting out new branches and needles. I read at the Ranger Station that some Sequoia trees had survived dozens of forest fires in their hundreds of years in the forest. They have adapted to be able to absorb the flash-point heat of a quick-moving fire, and some even need that heat in order for their seeds to germinate. I spent a lot of time in one particular grove, trying to capture these giants with burned out canyons rising twenty or forty or sixty feet up their bodies, charred bark to their heart, deep enough to swallow my length of my arm.

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And yet, the forest continues to grow; the forest is healthier because of the fires. The necessary adaptions and evolutions of the trees in order to survive for hundreds of years is the reason places like Sequoia NP and Redwood NP exist. Sequoia trees are some of the oldest, largest, and strongest living creatures on earth, able to withstand heat and cold and fire and drought and earthquake and any other kind of natural disaster (or man-made disaster) that has been thrown at them for thousands–literally, thousands of years. Those trees are thriving, with the yawning black cracks likes badges of honor.

This last little while as I’ve been both reeling from my own personal fire, and also feeling sorry for myself (yes, I’ve been wallowing), I had forgotten about these trees; I’d forgotten how long I wandered among their burned trunks, putting my hands in the scars and trying to wrap my head around how they were still alive and growing and expanding. I had forgotten. I’m not sure what jogged my memory, but I’m glad it did. Everything may be on fire, but it won’t always be on fire. The flames will die out, the smoke will clear, and the coals will eventually stop smoldering. And yes, I’ll probably carry some scars from the experience, but I am a fucking Sequoia: a fire cannot destroy me.

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P.S. Thank you to all who have reached out in concern; I haven’t responded to many, I’ve literally been just trying to breathe. Last night’s epiphany about the Sequoia’s was an a ha! moment for me, a crisp, swift breeze that brought me hope I haven’t felt since this whole thing started. Yes, I’m being vague. I’m sorry. Actually, I’m not sorry. This is my little corner of the internet, and I use my writing as therapy. You’re the weirdly voyeuristic part-stranger who is reading my therapy sessions for recreation.

P.P.S. THANK YOU, all you voyeuristic weirdos! You are My Tribe.

P.P.P.S. ooxxooXoXXx

Everything is on fire

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I like to think that, most of the time, I can handle the immediate responsibilities of a crisis without a) losing my shit; b) having a meltdown; or c) running away. Car accident? I know what to do, I’m calm and collected, even while in pain. 13-year-old drops a moving chainsaw on his thigh? Yep, I’ve got that covered too (with obvious appropriate steps taken to get said kid to a doctor ASAP). A work colleague suddenly cannot meet a deadline? I can prioritize and put in extra hours to reduce the possible emergency to an inconvenience. And if, heaven forbid, there is some kind of natural disaster and people need water or shelter or whatever I can deal with the immediate steps to make that happen. I am able to absorb shock and stop it, instead of allow those shock waves to be amplified by my own freak outs and then reverberate along and freaking other people out too.

However, the thing that I have a really hard time with is feeling like things are okay, things are progressing and moving forward, only to discover that my legs have been chopped out from under me. To feel like you’ve been climbing up this staircase, careful and trusting, and then realize that the staircase is melting; someone has accidentally (or on purpose) set it on fire. At that point, you only have a few options: jump ship and hope the fall doesn’t kill you; or you take a breath, grit your teeth, and run down through the smoke and flames, knowing that once you’re on solid ground you’ll probably never be quite the same. I know the file won’t kill me, but the burns are going to leave a sizable mark.

I’m on fire. Everything is on fire. I can’t see through the smoke and my chest aches and I can’t breathe. I literally wake up at night coughing and gasping for air, covered in sweat, trying to stave off the eruption of a full blown panic attack. I’m trying to get clear of all the smoke and fear, but my legs don’t work they way they are supposed to and I feel like I’m running but not moving anywhere. I curl up, cradle my head in my arms, and wait.

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Contradictory

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When you start something new there is always a little bit of anxiety mixed in with the thrill of the new, the unexplored, the possibility. Maybe that’s just me. Coincidentally, when planning a new adventure, I also go through waves of melancholy and exhilaration; sad about what I’ll never have time to experience and simultaneously over the moon about what I will be able to see and do.

My brain is a living, spinning contradiction in almost every way. It’s exhausting.

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Living with a pet volcano named Anxiety

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Do you want to know what is the worst part of anxiety? It’s not the crippling sense of indecision, or cowering in the face of basic tasks, or cycling through all the horrible things everyone around you is thinking about you…nope, it’s feeling like any minute the other shoe will drop and what is currently leaving you a sobbing mess on the floor will suddenly become even worse. The fear of living: THAT is the worst part of anxiety.

Do I have anxiety? Yes. Do I have panic attacks? Also, yes. I take the meds and do the mental exercises and all the things I’m supposed to to minimize the effect of both anxiety and fear on my life. But I still have panic attacks, sudden bursts of heart-stopping fear that seem to come from nowhere, and also the long burning and deeply held suspicion that the worst to come is just around the corner. (Sometimes, fairly infrequently, I will have a panic attack and I know exactly what triggered the episode. Those kind of seem like blessings, really. Being able to name and identify the fear is a HUGE step in combatting it.)

I often feel trapped and claustrophobic in my own skin. I feel like this scary Thing is getting closer, circling around me like a monster hunting it’s prey. And sometimes I don’t know how to open a window, or turn on the light, and banish that fear to the back of my mind. I wish I knew how to do that. And I wish that when everything is The Worst I was able to remember the steps to bring back the light.

The last little while my panic and anxiety has been building, and some of it is coming from places I can identify, but in compounding itself the mountain of fear has become something so enormous I can hardly see it, I skirt around this Thing, careful not to poke it or irritate it, because I know if it wakes up it could destroy me. And I need it to NOT wake up right now. The damn giant needs to stay sleeping, gurgling and boiling just under it’s surface, but generally quiet, for just a little while longer. I am doing everything I know how to do to keep that scary mountain asleep, but I know that sometime soon it will explode like a volcano. I know it. I can’t control that part, I can MAYBE control when the explosion happens to a degree, but not if it explodes. The scary monster volcano mountain will always be there, it will always grow, and it will always–eventually–erupt into a fireball of ash and smoke and carnage. Anxiety volcanoes are never truly dead, just temporarily dormant.

Sigh. Living with anxiety is exhausting.

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