{GUEST POST} Winning the Battle

Today's post is written by my dad, who also struggles with anxiety. It's another perspective on what anxiety is like, how it can affect you, and his experiences on the roller-coaster of learning how to cope with it all.

Anxiety. I have it, I hate it, but I am winning the battle.

"You look kind of depressed, Charlie Brown"
'I worry about school a lot...
I also worry about my worrying so much about school...
My anxieties have anxieties" - Charles M. Schulz

I have it. It starts with a flush feeling. I start to feel warm all over. Next comes the elevated heart rate.

The feeling that my heart is out of control and is going explode. Then the panic attack. The certainty that there is something extremely wrong with me, life threateningly wrong with me. I am certain that I am about to die and there is nothing I can do to stop it.

I hate it. I hate what it does to me. It makes me feel helpless to control my own thoughts; my own body. Even once I realized it was just a panic attack, I could not get myself to believe that I was going to be okay. I knew it, but I couldn’t overcome it. I hate what it does to my family. The strain it puts on
relationships with the people I love, the people that care for me. They all want to help, they want to
know what to do, but I can’t tell them because I don’t know what will help. I feel like I am letting them all down. I am the husband, the dad. I am supposed to be the one to protect them, to fix their problems. I am not supposed to need their help. I hate that it makes me moody, the highs and the lows. It makes me hard to get to know. I can’t or don’t want to try to explain what anxiety is so I keep people on the outside. It’s easier that way. I hate the feeling that I am the carrier, the one that gave it to my daughter.

I am winning the battle. I have been fortunate enough to find things that work for me. It’s not a magic
pill or a sure-fire cure, it’s a combination of things.

First, it’s the love of my family and friends. People willing to stand by me through thick and thin, to give me their undying love and not give up on me. Without that, I would have given in to it. I would have given up. I truly wonder if I would still be here today.

Then there is acupuncture, it changed my life. I remember driving into the city with my wife and
daughter to go for an acupuncture appointment for an unrelated issue. On the drive in I had an attack;
and I knew I was done, this would be the last time I would make this drive as I was going to be dead
soon. I happened to mention it to my acupuncturist while I was there and she said, “why didn’t you tell me you had anxiety?” She gave me a few needles and before she put the last one in to the fleshy part between my thumb and pointer finger she warned me that I would feel a shock. The needle went in and a spark of electricity shot up my arm, through my neck and to the top of my brain. I knew right there that I was changed. I left the office and met my wife and daughter an I told them something has
changed.

Then there are the meds. It took a while to find the right one. Some made me feel disconnected,
unattached to my own body. Some made me tired all the time, all I wanted to do was sleep. Some had
side effects and addictions that were worse then the anxiety. But I finally found one that I take in a very small dose everyday that doesn’t give me any of those feelings and I feel its working. I often think that I don’t need it anymore, but I haven’t had a full-fledged panic attack in 14 years so why would I risk stopping something that is working.

"Awards:
"really tried even though you're convinced that everyone thinks you didn't"
"dealt with miserable feelings and made it through another day which is awesome and amazing"
"being you, which is really great!"
-Beth Evans

If you have anxiety, you need to keep trying to find what works for you. Don’t give up. If you try
something and it isn’t right for you, try something else. Try a combination. Therapy, meds, acupuncture, exercise, homeopathic, there are may alternatives. This one I can’t stress enough, TALK about it. There is nothing to be ashamed of. It’s not all in your head. It’s an ILLNESS, a chemical imbalance. You can’t cure it by wishing it away or thinking happy thoughts. You need to get professional help and understanding. When people offer help, accept it. I know its hard, but you must keep trying. You are loved, you are strong and you are worthy. You can learn to control it, you can beat it. There is hope and light on the other side.

I am worthy.

(The following is a poem that I wrote after my counselling appointment last week. I haven't written poetry in years so please bear with me as I try to remember how words work and how to let them flow.)

"Bear with me"

I am worthy.

Even if I fail
Even if I let you down
Even if I let myself down
I am worthy.

Even if I question every move
Even if I question the face I see in the mirror
Or the way I look in my own head
Even if I can't stand it
I am worthy.

Even if I'm not where I want to be
Or where I thought I would be
Even if I'm not who I want to be
Or who I think I should be
Or who you think I should be
I am worthy.

Even if I can't even start to understand that this whole idea
of self compassion
and self care
and self acceptance
Is more than just an idea
I am worthy.

Even if the little voice in my head
tells me a million times a day
that
I.
am.
not.
good.
enough.
I am worthy.

Even if I don't believe it
I am worthy.

I am worthy of love
I am worthy of beauty
I am worthy of respect
I am worthy of strength
I am worthy of compassion
I am worthy of power
I am worthy of laughter
I am worthy of effort
I am worthy of time
I am worthy of energy

I am worthy
of finding all of this
Inside of myself.

I do not need the voices of others
to make me believe that
I am worthy.

Because
eventually
I will believe it myself.

I am worthy.

OK let's be real here, anxiety freaking sucks

Jeez guys, things are tough for me these days.

Anxie-Trees
Weeping Willow, Quaking Aspen,
Worried Sequoia ("is my trunk too big? why's everyone staring at me? is my bark too thick?),
Sweaty Palms, Queasy Sapling (ugh.),
this bonsai may appear outwardly calm, but inside it's screaming."
                                                                                                                        - Gemma Correll

Ever since my panic attack a few weeks ago (see last post for more details), I feel like I've been spiraling - grasping at thin little straws to stay afloat in this awful sea of paranoia and fear. I went camping again, and I was scared of everything the whole damn time. I was scared of sleeping. Scared of walking to the washroom by myself. Scared of just... being there and letting my guard down. In a place that used to be so calm and peaceful and free of anxiety. Every time I think about it now, I just want to cry.

And it's gone beyond just camping. Now that I've had a panic attack again, I'm constantly aware of when the next one might be - even more so than before. I'm back to being scared of the phone, of crowds, of going to the grocery store, of leaving the house alone outside of my normal routine. I've begun to physically shut down, too. I don't want to go for my walks every day, and I have to fight myself so damn hard to do my workouts. It feels like all of the work that I have been doing in the past few months, including writing this blog, has turned on me - all of the things that I've been enjoying have now become sources of anxiety for me and I have no idea how to handle this because I feel like I've been robbed and I feel like I can't have anything for myself anymore because anxiety will take it away.

And then I hear my counsellor's voice in my head.

"But what if that's not the case? What if that's not what it means?"

Yeah but.... what if it is? But, then again, what if she's right... what if it isn't?

I really struggle with thinking like this. I tend to be horribly fatalistic - for me, either everything went according to plan and it was a success, or something went wrong and everything was a complete failure. Middle ground is hard for me to see. It's a very defeatist mindset, and I know this. I live in a world of 'What Ifs,' and they always seem to take one perspective over the other. 

But what if that's exactly it? What if, after all this freaking out about this panic attack, I have to realize that... this is what progress looks & feels like?

I have had a few friends reach out to me after my last post to suggest exactly this. At first, I was quick to shrug the idea off - if this is what progress looked like, then maybe I don't want progress, maybe I want to stay numb and constantly slightly panicky. But I've had some time to think about it, and I think I can start to believe that they're right. Maybe I have to make myself believe that they're right, that my counsellor is right, that my anxiety is wrong - because otherwise I might give up.

"Surprise! It's a panic attack!
'Aw.'
'Hey.' (recent failures)"
 - Beth Evans

Really, whether this is progress or not, I have to keep moving forward. I have to try. It might be harder to get out of bed these days, but I'm still getting up. I'm winning my battles every day, even if the fight is harder. The reality is that, even if I find myself at a point where I haven't had a panic attack in years, I might have one again, and that maybe doesn't have to mean that I failed. All it means is that I had a panic attack. It doesn't have to be a reflection on me, if I don't let it. I'm not sure I know how to do that yet, but I'm going to try. I'm going to always keep trying.

Affirmation: I will find joy again in the things that I love. The things that I love will love me again.

"Note to self: I don't have
to take this day all at
once, but rather, one
step, one breath, one
moment at a time.
I am only one person.
Things will get done
when they get done."
                                                  - Unknown

                                           

Dealing (Or Not) With Setbacks

This post isn't going to have pictures. This post is really hard for me to write. It's going to be horribly honest, and it's not going to be fun.

I feel like I've failed.

Until last weekend, my most recent panic attack was on March 8th of this year. However, on Saturday, June 24th, I had another panic attack. That means that I went 108 days without one. All things considered, that sounds awesome and I should be proud of that, and I kind of am - not even two years ago I was dealing with multiple attacks a week, sometimes even multiple a day - but now I feel horribly stuck. Or worse, I feel like I've taken a huge leap backwards despite my many small steps forwards over the past few months.

I started going to counselling in February. Being able to talk to someone about my concerns and to get helpful tips and strategies for managing my anxiety levels has been a-freaking-mazing for me. Obviously, it has been working. I've been feeling more in control, I've been feeling like I can function and not worry about when I might break down in public, not worry about any second feeling like I am going to die, to rip my hair out, to make a freaking show of myself. It's been an absolute blessing and I advocate going to counselling for everyone because there's something freeing in just being able to be fully honest with someone about what's going on in your head. I feel like I have been making HUGE leaps and bounds forwards in my progress, and I've never been more okay with where I'm at. Along side that, I have not been having panic attacks.

Apparently, it makes it quite a bit easier to accept having anxiety when I'm not experiencing the worst symptom of it.

So there's a few layers to this.

First of all, I had this panic attack while my partner and I were camping. This is a big deal for me because camping is my happy place. Camping is where I literally am not stressed about anything at all because it's quiet and the air is fresh and there's a fire and a breeze and sunshine and board games and marshmallows. No one can be anxious when there's marshmallows around, right? Camping basically embodies everything I want for my life, for my well-being, for my future. I look forward to it with all my heart and soul. And now I'm scared of it. I've never had a panic attack camping before. It was my safe space, my way to walk away from my anxiety and leave it in the city. And now it's found me in the place that I never wanted to see it. Now I am anxious even thinking about it. Now I know it can get me out there, too. And that really sucks (understatement). Honestly, it breaks my heart. I felt like camping was the one thing I had left to myself without that bloody voice in my head trying to ruin everything. And now it's there. And I don't know how to shut it up.

Secondly, I had this panic attack in the middle of the night. I was literally sleeping. I woke up, and I was mid-attack. This is new, too. Never happened like that before. I woke up absolutely terrified, I had no clue what was going on or where I was - I was cold, scared, shaking, hyperventilating, pulling at my skin and hair, and I had no bearings to my surroundings. I came down from it because I literally panic-rocked myself back to sleep as my partner tried to comfort me. That is an experience I would really like to never go through again.

The third and final thing here is that I have NO IDEA what caused it. Usually, I can pick out what my trigger was, even if it's a new trigger that's never set me off before. Usually there's SOMETHING that HAPPENS before I have an attack. This time, there was nothing I can think of - it literally came out of nowhere. Yes, this can be a common thing for people with anxiety - attacks don't always need triggers. Some people don't have triggers at all, it's all random. However, most of the time I can tell what set me off. That lets me prepare if I'm ever in the same situation, it helps me to avoid certain things, to know what might set me off so I can be ready. If there's no trigger, then I have no way to be ready to bring myself down. It opens up a whole new can of worms for me - I can have an attack LITERALLY ANYWHERE for LITERALLY NO REASON. Which puts me on edge ALL THE TIME.

I have no happy ending to this today. I have no good advice. I have no fun/happy/thought-provoking quote to wrap this up.

All I have is anxiety.

And anxiety sucks.

Learning to Love and Hate - Anxiety Triggers

So I wanted to do another post that was more specific to my personal experience with anxiety and anxiety symptoms and triggers. So that's what I'm doing. This is that post.

"Anxiety Girl!
able to jump to the worst conclusion
in a single bound!"

When I was a kid, my dad traveled a lot for work. Especially in the winter, it seemed like he was gone more often than not. No big deal, and I don't hold resentment or anything towards him for that. It is what it is, and it was the way that things were. He was gone often, but it was for a good reason, and lots of the time we actually got to go with him - his work trips became our family vacations. However, when my dad was gone, I could tell that my mom was stressed, and rightfully so - she was doing double duty. I'm very empathetic, so other peoples' emotions and energies rub off on me quite easily; when she was stressed, I was stressed. If she was worried, I was worried. My brother and I both had a habit of getting sick when my dad was travelling - for me, at least, I know a lot of that had to do with worry.

Now that I'm older, I find that my partner travels a decent amount for work already. Same things tend to happen - I get sick with worry. In the day or two leading up to when he leaves, my anxiety starts running ideas through my head. All the ways his trip could go poorly. Car crashes, freak weather, tornadoes, bear attack, crash the quad, fallen tree, lost in the woods, you've seen 127 Hours, you know what could happen....The day he leaves is probably the worst. It's hard to focus on anything, I'm constantly asking him if he's definitely going, what his plans are, what time he's leaving, when he's coming home, his route, everything. I feel as though if I have all the details, I have more control over the outcome. Even if something does go wrong, I know what his plan was and I can have a better grasp on what to do.

"I had to LEARN to SILENCE
the VOICE IN MY HEAD
that was ALWAYS telling me
something was going to go
SERIOUSLY
WRONG..."

It's not just when other people are travelling, either. It's me, too. Travelling is one of my favourite things in the world - and I tend to hate a lot of it. How the hell does that make sense? Getting there is the worst. Planes, cars, boats, all of it just sends my anxiety reeling for reasons to ruin my time. Messed up schedules, delayed flights and trains, missed connections - easy triggers for a panic attack for me. I had a panic attack in front of the Hungarian Parliament Building once because we missed a tour time, even though there were definite workable alternatives. Take off and landing on planes spike my heart rate through the freaking roof. I have to check maps a million times before we leave for anywhere every day because god forbid we get lost in a city that we don't know or don't speak the language. I memorize train station names. I talk the route out with my travel partners again and again. I have tour reservations (tours that I have researched in excruciating detail before we reserved them) in my phone and printed copies in the pack. I've checked the meeting time and meeting point a gazillion times. Our 'free time' is even scheduled - where we're going to go, how we are going to get there. I think you get the point - planning is my way of controlling the situation, however, if something doesn't go according to my plan, it can completely ruin my day by sending me into a panic attack in public. There's nothing like having strangers stare at you while you hyperventilate and cry and rip at your hair and try and soothe yourself back down.

"Hey Brain, is there anything we can do to help with your anxiety" - Heart
"I don't know" - Brain
"What if I contort myself like THIS?" - Stomach
"UM" - Brain
"And I'll move things along REALLY fast or REALLY slow, depending on your preference" - Intestines
"Well I don't..." -Brain
"And I"ll pump as FAST AS MY LITTLE ME CAN PUMP" - Heart
"How does that even..." - Brain
"And just ONE of us with twitch from time to time" - Eyes
"You all look ridiculous"- Brain
"Does that mean it's working?" - Stomach
                                                                                                                      Comic by The Awkward Yeti

So the more time I spend thinking about this, I think it boils down to this - I have anxiety about the specifics and unpredictability of travelling, whether it's for myself or for others. While unpredictability is something that I tend not to handle well on a good day, I think it's amplified when it relates to travel because of the unfamiliar surroundings and unknown potential situations. There are a million ways that things can go wrong (trust me, I've thought through most of them), but I try to deal with it because I understand that it's completely worth it - travelling is something that I have been privileged enough to be able to do, and I try not to let this anxiety limit me, I guess. And I get that, when it comes to other people travelling (especially for work), I have no say in it and am going to have to learn to cope. Otherwise I'm being really selfish in making people cancel plans because I can't handle it.

"I've got 99 problems and 86 of them are completely made up scenarios
in my head that I'm stressing about for absolutely no logical reason."

The Daily Struggles of Your Average Anxiety-Girl

I want to open this up with some very informative, scientific, real factual data in the form of pie charts.

   

Bingo, I lied, they're not scientific. BUT they're super useful for what I'm about to talk about. We have this stigma about mental health in our society. We - as a society, as a culture, as a people - like to blanket things - by this, I mean that we like to assume that "anxiety" always means one thing, "depression" always means the same thing, and anyone who has either is experiencing the same thing as your second cousin's boyfriend's litter sister who also has anxiety. 

Here's the thing. Mental health issues are wonderfully non-selective. They don't care who you are. They don't care what you've been through. They don't care what your past is. They don't care what you look like. They don't care if you've dealt with it before or not. They don't care if you have easy access to resources. Yes, there are certain experiences that an individual goes through that may foster the development of mental health issues, and YES there are some patterns when it comes to mental health disorders and mental illness, but my point is this: NEVER ASSUME that one person's experience is universal, or that, because of differences, someone's experience is invalid.

What does someone with anxiety/mental health struggles look like?

Like you. Like me. Like your best friend, like your coworker, like your spouse, like the guy you just passed on the street, like your favourite celebrity, like your child. Like literally everyone you've ever met or seen or heard of ever.

How does someone with anxiety/mental health struggles act?

Outgoing, chatty, ecstatic, sad, reserved, giddy, neutral, whatever, literally any combination of moods and characteristics ever. 

"But wait! If EVERYONE EVER might be struggling with anxiety/depression/other mental health disorders, and there's no clear way to tell based on their attitudes or actions, how am I supposed to be able to know?"

So here's the thing.

You can't.

When it comes down to it, blanketing these ideas of mental health can be harmful. They contribute to the stigma surrounding mental health, and they also might serve to stop people from seeking help. If we continue to perpetuate one overarching, all-encompassing idea of what 'anxiety' looks like, or how a 'mentally ill' person acts, then it invalidates the experiences of those who don't fit that model. It leaves people wondering what the hell is wrong with them because they don't fit this 'mold'. It leaves them thinking that they maybe don't need help, because what they're going through doesn't match the 'signs and symptoms' list that our culture has carved out.

Watch your words and your actions, support your friends and family, do your research. Do your part in breaking down this horribly inflexible, harmful, and straight-up-wrong idea of mental health and mental illness. Contribute to making people feel valid. Work to feel valid in your own experiences. Encourage others to do so. Get help if you need it. Don't judge those who already have, or who are struggling to take that step.

"We cling to music, to poems, to quotes, to
writing, to art because we desperately do not
want to be alone, We want to know we aren't
going crazy and someone else out there knows
exactly how you're feeling. We want someone
to explain the things we can't." - Unknown

What Anxiety Gives Back

This week's blog post is a response to the guest post written by my mother last week about her experiences having a husband and daughter who both deal with anxiety. If you missed that one, you can link to it on the right-hand-side of this page. 

I've got to admit, I cried and cried and cried upon reading my mom's post. And then, when I read it again, I cried and cried and cried some more. It's really hard to hear how much my anxiety really affects the people close to me. Don't get me wrong, I am fully aware of the fact that it's not easy on them, but sometimes it's really easy to get caught up in myself and my own struggles that I become ignorant of the people that I love.

Anxiety Portrait 1 - Kathrin Honesta

My mom is my hero. I know that most people say that about their moms, and they're totally right to - mothers, in all the forms that they come, are amazing. I genuinely mean that when I speak about my mother. The amount of strength and determination that she has is phenomenal, and she damn near never falters; yet she's always an honest, compassionate, loving, take-no-crap-but-still-be-gentle friend to anyone that needs her (including me). I watched her work so hard to raise my brother and me through our childhoods while my dad was learning how to cope with his anxiety, and couldn't always help as much as he wanted to. I felt her heart ache when I started to struggle at university, but she still stayed encouraging, supportive, and determined for me - which was something that I couldn't be for myself at the time. And, when I started to open up more about the details of my anxiety, I saw her jump up to take action - helping me to find a counsellor, a doctor that I don't hate, encouraging me to go and be social and do the things that I can't always do - even though I knew it was hard on her, too. I fought back - and I fought hard. I still do, it's so hard for me to admit that I need help, so I argue, because I like to think that I'm the only one that knows what is best for me. I know she cried a lot. I know I cried a lot, too.

Being a family member of one person struggling with mental illness is hard. Being a wife and being a mother to people with anxiety must be exhausting. I can't even imagine the weight that anxiety has on those who have a choice - the choice to fight against it for the ones that you love, or to walk away because it's not your illness, it's not your brain that makes the monsters. To choose to have the daily battles and the life-long fight against mental illness forced upon you just by virtue of loving people is, in my mind, an incredible tell of someone's character; it takes a warrior to deal with it, to fight someone else's fight; to pick up the sword when your partner can't carry it anymore. To be able to even temporarily fight your child's battles when they have no strength left is not an easy feat. It takes a superhero. My mom is Wonder Woman.

Artist Unknown

The point of what I'm trying to get at is this: life doesn't stop when anxiety steps in. For me, for my dad, my mom, my partner, life keeps moving forward even though anxiety tries to force it to stand still, or even move backwards. There's not always the opportunity to just take the time you need to figure out how to cope, how to deal, what methods work, what meds work - life doesn't always (or ever) let you have unlimited time to heal. It keeps going, and that can be damn near impossible sometimes. For me, I can usually tell when the people I love are struggling, but it's not always within my ability to help - I'm so caught up trying to keep myself together that I genuinely feel like I have nothing to give to anyone else - so my struggles add to the struggles of others. My mom has never stopped trying. She fights for my dad, she fights for me - and she fights for herself. She struggles, yeah, but she never quits. She never stops being exactly what I need her to be (even if that means that we fight each other sometimes).

My mom is my hero. I hope that we can continue to grow and learn together so that we can learn how to better help each other. Anxiety isn't an easy thing to deal with, but it sure as hell helps when you know you have Wonder Woman at your back.

"For the highs and the lows,
and the moments between,
mountains and valleys,
and rivers and streams,
for where you are now
and where you will go,
for "I've always known"
and "I told you so,"
for "nothing is happening,"
and "all has gone wrong,"
it is here in this journey
you will learn to be strong
you will get where you're going,
landing where you belong."
                                                                         - Morgan Harper Nichols