Anxiety is a cruel.. cruel condition. It seems, at times it is out to get you, its only purpose is to destroy you. To crank up bad feelings so that you spontaneously combust – or at least wish that you could.
I developed anxiety after a series of losses, and there are nights it paralyses me and quite frankly all I want to do is die. When I say die, I don’t really think I do want to die and leave my loved ones with the mess that follows but I do want the anxiety to stop because it is so damn painful. Anything would be better than feeling what I am feeling at that time, anything. I just need it to stop.
Last night I was in a hotel, I had been for a nice meal with my son and come back to our hotel to watch silly Saturday night mindless tv. It was a nice time, but I felt that little edge of anxiety creep in. It seemingly came from nowhere, but now in the cold light of day it was probably triggered by a sad memory, thoughts of watching this very program with one of the people that I lost last year.
So what happened? I became irritable not wanting my son to be near me (hard in a hotel room that you are sharing) but the care for him in that moment felt unbearable, like caring for him alone would kill me. The anxiety started to affect every part of my thought process, I started to doubt words of friends, analyzing various parts of the day, I thought about things at work going wrong. I start to believe that humanity itself was evil and that never again would I be happy. Anxiety for me is like a computer virus it affects every part of my brain, its buzzes with negativity with the ultimate messages of everything is bad and its all your fault.
So what can I do? If I am at home, I have some sleeping medication that I can take which will knock me out pretty quickly, not ideal but as they say tomorrow is another day. Recognising that nothing is going to change until the morning is a good first step, Giving up and sleeping helps, or at least that is what I have learnt.
Being away last night I didn’t have access to that medication, so I tied to sleep anyway. It was hard as my brain was firing away. My son was happy to watch you tube videos whilst I turned off the TV and tried to ignore the anxious thoughts that attacked me. My night was disturbed the anxiety continued to manifest in my dreams, but ultimately I did make it through until morning.
Morning is a completely different feeling. All that occurred the night before is gone and I am left with a calmness that felt so different at 8pm the night before. I can see in the morning light that my thinking was maladjusted, that really I am OK and I don’t want to die, that I am not going to die. All is well until the next attack.
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