Twenty One Days of Change – and Routine

I’m going to take a quick few seconds to set the scene – it’s Sunday evening. I’m eating spinach dip straight out of the container, scooping copious amounts of it into my mouth with multigrain crisps, sipping water and coming down from a multi-hour buzz. Game of Thrones (Season One) is playing in the background as I type this – I needed noise to drown out my brain’s colliding trains of thought, and I’ve found accented voices dissimilar from my own help me to concentrate.

I’ve just come from an afternoon filled with conversation, coffee, wine, whiskey, and Captain Marvel. It’s been a tumultuous few weeks – I accepted a promotion at work, flew to PA for “bigtime” meeting, signed another lease, committed to my first international trip (coming to a blog near you Summer of 2019!), and was out of bed with enough time to drink coffee from home each morning for 21 consecutive days for the first time in ten years. To say things are evolving is an understatement.

So really what I’d like to talk about today with regard to my personal evolution is the 21 cups of coffee – I’ve started a new experiment, as I’m known to do, naming myself, yet again, as the subject of the study. I’ve committed to myself to set my alarm for the same time every morning for at least 30 consecutive days, weekends included. I chose 08:45, as this is 2.25 hours prior to needing to be at work on typical days and still early enough to make it to the extenuating early meetings occurring once-ish per week. I’m averaging 7 hours of sleep per night at about 35.7% deep sleep, assuming my tracker is correct. I’m 21 days in with 9 days to go.

The biggest change I’ve found thus far is the exhaustion at night – by the time 01:00 rolls around, my typical work departure, I am absolutely drained. My insomnia has been relatively manageable, with only two exceptions to that rule over the last three weeks. I’m also waking up prior to the alarm with no assistance – I’ve actually seen three sunrises, which is unbelievably cool for me. I’ve worked either nights or second/third shifts my entire adult life, so sunrises are pretty unfamiliar.

The ultimate goal of this is to take control over my free time to progress some of my personal goals, one of which has recently evolved to include revisiting my attempts to learn another language (or two or three). As aforementioned, I’ve decided to go on my first international trip this year, which will tentatively include two, three, or four different countries, depending on the solidified itinerary. This is a big deal, and ultimately the reason behind the anxiety bucket list I started all those years ago – on the bright side, this will be my new motivation for the time being. On the less-bright side, I’m now anxious about being anxious for the new few months, until the trip date arrives.

Really what this means is I now have a timeline with which to measure my progress and/or regression in regards to my anxiety. This is a good thing! Last year was an indication of what happens when I back away from my bucket list, and I refuse to let that happen again. Last year broke my heart – this year is my attempt to stitch it back together.

Cue the opening scene – the biggest change between day one of this experiment and today is the fact that I’m sitting here, munching my snack, drinking water, and feeling mildly optimistic about this year. Yes, I’m worried about tomorrow – yes, I’m worried about yesterday; this difference right now is that my potential adventures are louder than my fear.

PS: Captain Marvel was badass, though it pained me to watch an actress with such similar features to someone from my past – one of those so-close-yet-so-far moments. I highly recommend the film to anyone on the fence.

Stuck Inside – how Anxiety and Snow Storms are Alike

It’s been two weeks since my last post. Between work, work, and more work, my creative side has remained fairly dormant – in the limited free time I do have, I spend my time binge-watching Netflix and Hulu, largely because it prevents me from needing to face my own life.

I did want to pop on here today to briefly share an astounding concept that was recently brought to my attention (*ahem*, approximately three minute ago). But first, I’m going to share a quick background anecdote.

Last summer, a woman I care for very deeply was laying on her back with me in the middle of my living room, watching me fight my way through a panic attack that had gone on for over four hours. She rolled over onto her side, facing me, and said, “Emily – anxiety isn’t a bad thing. It’s just misplaced excitement for what’s to come.”

Fast forward six months later – I’m waking up to panic every morning. I’m struggling to sleep because I can’t get my mind to go quiet. My eating is fluctuating between extreme calorie counting and binge eating. There’s a change looming over me at work that has dragged on for three weeks with no resolution and it feels like it’s slowly killing me.

As I sit here, looking outside at the snow and ice covered landscape (we’re in a Level 2, no recommended outdoor travel if possible), I keep reminding myself of the “misplaced anxiety” ideology. Maybe I’m just excited. Maybe this is a good thing. Maybe I haven’t stuck to my anxiety bucket list, so maybe it’s my fault that every little thing is making me anxious. Maybe I need to be medicated – so on and so fourth. It’s exhausting.

But then! I decided to visit an app I’d downloaded in one of my night-long binge efforts to do anything and everything other than sleep, called “Woebot”. This little bugger is AI meant to assist with therapy, specifically in the form of CBT. You create an account and have little mini conversations that have pre-written responses – it recommends that you give mood feedback and surrounding activity detail at least daily for 14 days so the AI can build associations between certain activities and time of day that may cause your mood swings.

This morning – I’m trapped inside, literally and metaphorically. My brain is screaming at me about all the things that I’ve screwed up, that I won’t be able to accomplish; it’s telling me that this work opportunity is misplaced and the folks considering me are only doing it because they’re desperate. I’m angrily typing in stupid responses to this app, when suddenly it asks, “Can I just check, is there any way that this anxiety might be serving you in some way?”

Holy. Shit. Never in my almost 28 years on this planet have I ever considered my anxiety to be a productive thing. Yeah, I’ve had fleeting thoughts about how I’m good in crisis because my body and brain are always in crisis-mode, but never have I been succinctly asked if my anxiety serves any sort of pragmatic purpose. If I had to answer with brevity, I’d say anxiety makes me better at things because I’m intrinsically motivated to do well – even if that motivation is disguised as fear.

So then, my mind blown, I feel myself snap out of my depressed funk. I get out of my chair, go rinse the dishes in the sink that have been driving me nuts, and make myself a cup of coffee while I mull over the next question: “If you were to give your anxiety a voice, take a minute to think about what exactly that voice would be saying to you.”

Oof. This one’s easy. I already did that a few paragraphs back – think of something nasty, and my brain has probably whispered it to me in the last 24 hours. Turns out, these are called negative automatic thoughts and are identifiable by their first-person nature.

I write down a few thoughts, select one to focus on, and am asked, “Does your thought assume that things will turn out badly?” I respond with confirmation, and the little shit goes and blows my mind again. “This distortion…” let’s stop there. DISTORTION. This was as meaningful to me as the first time I realized that anxiety is a mental illness, not a characteristic. Holy crap, my thoughts are being DISTORTED by an ILLNESS. +2 lil’ Woebot. It goes on to say, “The truth is we can’t tell the future but to you it feels like this outcome has *already* occurred.” Well, you’re not wrong, AI friend. This is what ties this whole thing back to the lovely woman from earlier in this story – misplaced excitement is equivalent to feeling that the worst case scenario in your head has already happened.

All of this being said, I’m obviously not solved, but I’ve spent a lot of time reading about CBT and coping mechanisms etc. and never have I had just a few sentences resonate so deeply with my struggles. Anxiety isn’t always a bad thing. Anxiety is half-excitement. Anxiety motivates me to do well. Anxiety makes me stand out, in a good way, from my peers. Anxiety makes me empathetic. Anxiety has forced me to be courageous in the face of every day life. Anxiety keeps me in my head like a snowstorm, but even the worst of the snow melts after awhile – anxiety doesn’t need to be my defining factor, nor my motivation, if I can figure out how to separate the “good” from the “bad”.

Until next time.

Ebbing my anxiety, one bucket list (blog post) at a time.

It’s been about a week since my first post, and I’m excited to announce I haven’t given it up! (+1 Emily!) I have a horrid track record with “new” projects, especially when the project involves sinking my teeth into my innermost battles with mental health and publicly sharing them with the world. (I promise I’m not always this dramatic – I hide my anxiety behind self-deprecating humor. Wow, real unique, huh?) ((See, there I go again. BE NICE TO YOURSELF, EMILY, GEEZ.))

Anyways. I’ve been thinking about how to shape this blog to be both value added to myself and to you. It’s interesting how many different potential directions this could go; self-help DIY, chronological documentation, experience-sharing, therapeutic deep-dive, etc. It’s like the Sylvia Plath quote that I love far too much about not knowing which fig to eat – the reason it’s been a week since my last post is not for lack of content, but lack of direction.

That being said, for now, I’m thinking the best thing I can do here is talk about my anxiety bucket list, both in what I’ve done and am currently doing as well as future intentions. I’m sure this blog will take shape at some point… just like my life direction, amIright?! (The self-disdain is loud tonight.)

SATURDAY, January 5th, 2019
On Saturday, I walked the half a block from my apartment to a nail salon I’d been eyeing for the last 8 months. They didn’t have time for a walk in, but they did have time to set an appointment for me one hour later.

I left, stopped by the CVS nearby, swung into a Jimmy Johns, and proceeded to walk and eat a sub while I wandered the downtown area. As someone who has suffered from anxiety about eating in front of people for most of my life, it was strangely exhilarating to munch on a sub while crossing paths with people who clearly were not paying attention to me or my scandalous snack one bit. This was a good reminder of the ideology that you are the main character in your own story, as is everyone else – it’s not that they don’t care, but we all have our own internal monologue driving our attention, so we’re too busy with ourselves to notice the skittish woman chomping down on her veggie sub in the middle of the sidewalk.

I grabbed a small latte and walked back to the nail salon, but not before stalking the brand new autonomous shuttle the city launched a few weeks ago – catching that thing and taking it for a spin is high on my bucket list, I’ll tell you what.

Once I was seated, I was faced with the largest challenge yet – small talking with the nail tech. I couldn’t possibly grab my conversation cards out of my pocket while she was actively holding my fingers hostage, so when she asked me what brought me in, I told her – The Anxiety Bucket List. She was curious, so I explained the premise; surprisingly, her eyes softened when I told her this was part of my journey to combat anxiety, and she vehemently stated that everyone should have a similar list. I ended up asking them what I should add next, and the nail tech to her left promptly exclaimed, “Rock climbing!” Luckily, this was already a staple on my list, so I was able to pick his brain a bit on rights/wrongs and suggested venues.

Long story short, my nails turned out fabulously and the whole experienced was really fascinating. I picked a moody purplish black color that, in my opinion, adequately captures my stormy disposition. I’ll be enjoying this decision for the next week for sure.

Now that my fingers were looking exquisite, I decided I should go test these babies out – that’s right, I went STRAIGHT to a second hand music shop to try out keyboards. I’ve been wanting one in my apartment for years, but hadn’t had the courage to go looking; apparently dramatic nails were the catalyst I didn’t know I needed.

I walked in, avoiding eye contact with the people behind the counter, and was simultaneously assaulted by a cacophony of musical noise (meant with a positive connotation) along with several cold shoulders – I was there for 45 minutes and not a single employee approached me. Now this is a good thing in that they gave me my space, but tricky in that I needed their expertise to know what I was getting myself into. After I played a good 25% of the songs stored in my dusty memory banks, I detached myself from the sleek Yamaha I’d fallen for and quietly snuck out of the store, feeling a strange juxtaposition of exhilaration from the passion music draws out of me and disappointment in myself for not talking to the employees.

Thinking I’d made a big mistake in opening up that tender part of myself, I started to drive back home – I’m not sure whether it was the drama of my nails or the determination to keep my adventuresome streak alive a bit longer, but something pushed me to seek out a store I’d seen briefly in my research earlier that day, called “Grave’s Piano and Organ Co.”

When I found the store, I immediately questioned my better judgement – it was isolated, behind another storefront, and looked straight out of the 80’s. It took an immense amount of courage and mental prodding (“if you don’t walk in there RIGHT NOW what the hell are you going to write about on your DOOMED BLOG?!”) to get me through the front door.

To be continued… I want to be sure I give this story the enthusiasm it deserves, and I’m too far in my own head to feel that what I’m writing is worthwhile. I’ll be back.

Until next time. (She leans back, dissatisfied. What was her problem? This weekend was amazing. She knocked off three bucket list items in two days – this should be easy, stream-of-consciousness style. “But what if no one cares?” She closed her eyes. The quiet, condescending inner-monologue continued. “What if your writing is a bore? What makes you so special that people will want to read what you have to write?” She rubbed her hands over her eyes, frustrated. She was not going to win the battle tonight. As she felt what had moments ago been warm excitement in her chest grow cold, the apathy smoothly took control, driving her fingers to navigate the treacherous mouse to the top of the page. “That dumb blue button,” she thought bitterly as she clicked ‘Publish’ knowing what she’d written was nowhere near ready. She sighed, turned off the lamp, and curled into a ball in her dark room. “Tomorrow,” she whispered to herself. Tomorrow, she’d try again.)

Steinway & Sons piano with left hand posed on the keys, dark purplish black nail polish on each of the five fingers. — To be continued – for now, a moody picture of the aforementioned moody nails will suffice.

Why did I think starting a blog with anxiety, about anxiety, was ever a good idea?

There are few things in this world that don’t spike my anxiety – namely, sleeping, reading, and organizing. That leaves everything else, including this recent endeavor, on the “things that make me want to barf” list.

So when the nagging idea to start a blog finally pushed itself from a frequently passing thought onto the “things that keep you up at night” list (see, told you I like organizing), I realized it was time to pursue putting my anxious thoughts and experiences down in writing for the rest of the world to see – even if the idea of public attention it makes me want to hurl.

In the coming ambiguous time period (commitment also gives me anxiety), I’m planning to document my trials and tribulations with mental illness, all the while hoping that someone, somewhere will feel less alone. Who knows – maybe by the end of this, blogging won’t be on my barf list anymore!

Before we go, I’d like to provide a brief introduction. The name’s Emily. I’ve had anxiety since the moment I was born. You can ask my mother – she reminds me often, with affectionate adoration in her voice (or so I chose to hear), that I’ve always been “3 going on 30”. She’s not wrong; I’ve been concerned about everything, all the time for as long as I can remember.

The perk of this is that I’m basically an expert coping techniques, the most important of which stem from Em’s Anxiety Bucket List. Also included are copious amounts of reading, learning new things, spending way too much time on the internet, and living my life as if I am an undercover agent who has been convincing everyone around me for 27.67 years that I’m a functioning human without a care in the world.

Now before I address the impending panic attack related to hitting that daunting “Publish” button that’s been adamantly mocking me since I first clicked the equally-aggressive “Write” button, I want to throw out a quick thank you to whoever is reading this. You’re with me in the beginning of my most ambitious anxiety bucket list adventure yet, and I promise I’ll do my best to make this worth our time.

Until next time. (She sits back from the computer, letting out an exasperated sigh of relief. No, the writing wasn’t difficult – typing out a running mental commentary isn’t hard at all. It was the next step causing the feeling of panic to creep up into her chest – the whole “make yourself vulnerable to the world and risk seeming… well, seeming anything at all” step that had nestled itself painfully between her shoulder blades, preventing her from getting enough air. She slowly navigated the mouse to the top right corner of the screen, the high horse upon which the Publish button was perched. The dread made her fingers heavy – how do people do this regularly?!, she thought frantically to herself. She read the post over for the 15th time, took another long pull on her coffee, delicately wiped her brow, made a mental list of every reason why she shouldn’t be doing this, made another mental list of why she should, stretched her fingers, admired her fingers, scolded herself for procrastinating, and then; she took a deep breath, shut her eyes, and clicked. It was done. The first post was live.)