Progress

It's almost 11:00pm on a wonderful Sunday evening. Just wrapped up watching StarGate, the movie with the fam and now getting ready to snuggle down and fall asleep to (you guessed it!) StarGate SG-1. Hah!

As I sat there watching the movie, I wondered to myself if I would have the gutz to walk through the StarGate. Honestly, I'm not so sure if I would. Today we went to Armstrong Woods with the intent on hiking one of the trails. I haven't done this is over a year and honestly the thought about being out in nature, a good amount of distance from my home, was making me feel more than uncomfortable. When I mentioned to Jess that I'm not feeling much for going on a big hike, he let out a sigh of relief and said he wasn't up to it, either. Good, I thought, 'cause I wasn't sure how well I was going to handle it. So, to answer my question, if I were given the chance to walk through the StarGate today, I would not do it. Right now, my sense of adventure and discovery is clouded with the fog of my anxiety disorder. Best to wait for the fog to lift.

And it's not that these foggy days are taking over my life, infact I've experienced more sunny days than not. However, sometimes it's hard to "roll with the fog", so to speak. I'm still looking deep to try and figure out how I got this way. I've summed it up like this: according to all the pros on Generalized Anxiety Disorder, the onset of the anxiety began after a traumatic event that shook my emotional foundation; however, the stage was set, with a super high-stress lifestyle, including overloading myself with school work, extra activities and volunteer work, leaving little to no time for myself, and even my family. So my brain did what it had to, by shutting me down. Now, I still believe I made it worse when I started investing a "cure" in medications and started on those. I know, now, what I need to do to get better.

So how do I do that? Well, for the longest time, I had no hope because even though I was consistently exposing myself to anxious situations, I lacked a sensation of relief when I accomplished my goal. Lately, however, I've had tremendous progress, especially when I face my fear and go forward. Today was an exception, because I felt like I hadn't pushed myself because we did not go on the hike, so internally, I wouldn't allow myself the satisfaction of feeling accomplished. Yeah, I know. I'm working on it. But I do remember feeling better after we went to the DMV last week, and that was a HUGE amount of stress; it felt so good getting it done and over with, walking out of there intact, and moving on with my life. I've given myself permission to ask for help, ie. have Jesse come with me. I think, in a way, this is designed to bring us closer together, or some bullshit like that.

The point is now I've made so much progress that even my perfectionist-self cannot deny it. I still have my moments/days when I feel like it's the end of the world/I'm overloaded/overstimulated/never going to get better. But I have this great arsenal of tools at my disclosure. My recovery includes going to Al Anon meetings, seeing my counselor, expressing my feelings openly with those around me, eating right, exercising daily, enjoying something (ie going to the river, sewing, reading, etc.), spending quality time with my children, deep breathing, meditating, journaling, blogging, and when I can-exposing myself to anxiety-inducing situations. I'm on my way, and even in this moment of anxiety, I'm feeling awfully optimistic and empowered.

First Post: Expanding the Department

I've been wanting to try out this "Blog" thing for quite some time, but haven't because who the fuck would want to read about some whiney blonde in California who's having "issues." Truth is, I think there's something to offer by listening (or in this case, reading) other's experiences with the troubles you may share. For me, I have many experiences and I have many issues. We won't go into them all at once (where's the fun in that?!) but a biggie for me is (if you haven't guessed it already) anxiety.

Anxiety can be defined in numerous ways, from having a tense emotional feeling about something to not being able to leave your house for fear that you might "panic" in public. Anxiety is also defined by the phobias the person experiences, such as the example in the previous sentence, Agoraphobia. Really, any phobia causes us to have anxiety, but the FUCKED up part is anxiety can help us manifest our phobias. Oh JOY!

So now that we've got a little bit of background on how treacherous this bitch really is, let me give you the scoop on me. At the young age of 6 months, my mother once told me, my early onslaught with anxiety manifested itself as midnight screams of terror and an inability to control my "big emotions." As a young child, my parent's divorce and fractured parenting skills helped make Anxiety my best friend and for years was unable to sleep by myself. As a teenager, the "fuck-it-all" syndrome hit me steadfast and I became pregnant at 17 and kissed my freedom years goodbye. I hadn't thought about those horrid nighttime attacks until I had my first major one in Junction City, Oregon on I-5. My husband, my 4-month-old son and I set our sights on the Emerald City to start our new lives together, later to find that we were traveling far away from any sort of real "home." Being 18 years old and not knowing any better, I drove 10 hours straight with no breaks. Let's just say, my body was mad at me, and Anxiety took the wheel. That night began my continuous onslaught of battling what I defined as "traveling anxiety."

Most recently, however, I've come to learn, through books and my Mental Health professional, that I have suffered (and sometimes not just me) from Agoraphobia. Only mine was quite mild, since I was still able to leave my house and interact with people in public quite effortlessly. As you might have guessed, this has changed.

The Blow Out. The only memory that doesn't hold gut-wrenching pain of that day is my husband and I holding hands on the skating rink, holding each other up (as we so often do) and smiling. The rest of that day....well, I wish I had a time machine. The details are not important, but what happened that day was the day the I hope couples NEVER have to go through: crossing the line. There are many lines in a relationship: lines that get you upset, lines that hurt you, lines that betray you, lines that break you up. That day, these lines weren't just crossed, they were butchered, beaten, and slain (metaphorically speaking, of course). The end result is a shattered foundation that was once sound, strong and seemingly-unbreakable. When you lose all matters of reality in your life, you start to kinda lose it.

So lose it I did. It got harder and harder to leave home and venture out in the world like I used to, and when I would, Anxiety took hold of the wheel and drove me on crazy, twisting up and down roads. I tried battling her with pills: that just tranquilized the beast; she eventually woke back up and started her rampage again. I spoke with some friends who, unbeknownst to me, had similar issues and discovered that I'm not alone and that there ARE ways of getting back home out of this dark forest. I also learned of a book: The Anxiety & Phobia Workbook by Edmund J. Bourne, Ph.D. So far, this is the only book I've read on the subject, because I think it's the only one I'll ever need to read.

This week marks week #10 of active recovery from Agoraphobia. This is also the best I've felt since the Blow Out. I felt the urge to begin this blog because my normal journaling is moreso a conversation with the Universe, rather than an expressive log, such as this. And I can't write as fast as I can think, so I tend to lose a lot of thoughts that way. By no means am I doing this as a commercial effect on my life: this is purely part of my recovery towards being a healthy, happy, mentally-sound person.

Being stubborn by nature, I refuse to let this overcome my life. So journey with me, if you will, as I take you into my world.