Right now I’m sitting in a hotel room in Syracuse.  I just finished up with my sales meeting, and have an hour to kill before I head off to a mandatory team dinner (mandatory fun, don’t you love that?).  There is nothing to do in my room except go on the internet, so I opened my email and noticed that I had received 3 messages from anxiety sufferers regarding my site.

I have been busy lately, so I haven’t had time to respond to the messages I’ve been receiving.  Since I had a free moment just now, I decided to quickly respond to the 3 I received today.  It took me less than 10 minutes.  I wrote 3 thoughtful multi-paragraph emails to people I didn’t know in basically less time than it takes me to get a shower.

The weird thing is that I have many more unanswered emails waiting in my inbox from weeks past that I’ve procrastinated on, due to the daunting monster of time I thought they demanded.  I grossly overestimated the actual time it would take me to respond.  Why did I put it off?  I could have responded in no time at all and had my mind clear of mental clutter and worry about past due responses.

The fact is, people prone to anxiety and worry often over-exaggerate the time it takes to complete certain tasks, leading to feelings of being overwhelmed and helpless.  We procrastinate and the problem continues to grow bigger and bigger in our minds, freezing us into inaction.

I have had so many examples of this in the past 2 days.  For instance, I’m in the process of moving, so my apartment has been a complete WRECK.  Basically, piles and piles of unfolded laundry.  You could not walk in the bedroom.  My fiance complained about it (which he never usually does), so I knew I had to do something.  I set a timer, so that I was forced to fold clothes for 20 minutes.  No more, no less.  When that buzzer rang, believe it or not, I was 75% of the way done folding the clothes.  I decided to just stick it out and in another 15 minutes the previously covered floor was completely visible and spic and span.  I amazed myself and was shocked at how horribly I over-estimated the time it would take me to finish the task.  It was a weight off my shoulders when I finally finished it, and it only took 35 minutes.  What was I scared about?

Another example.  My expense report deadline was coming up.  For some reason I had this awful misconception that it would be so boring and take over 2 hours.  I finished it in less than 45 minutes.  Again, what was I thinking?

When a task is weighing on your mind, challenge yourself, and see how long it really takes compared to how long you think it takes.  I guarantee you will see a marked difference.  The better we can accurately estimate the time for a task, the less anxious and overwhelmed we will feel.

So many mental thinking errors play into anxiety and panic, and this is just one of them.  Work on eliminating this one and one more piece of the recovery puzzle will be put into place.

Hey Everyone.. Sorry I have been gone for so long!!! I have just been too busy.  Between fixing up my new house, planning for the wedding, and being really busy with work, I haven’t had a free minute.  It’s really starting to drive me NUTS.

I have also been thinking about taking a new job.  It would involve an intense period of learning up front, then for the first 6 months it would be non-stop working.  Even after the settling in period, the hours are probably still going to be long and the stress high.  On one hand, I love challenges and this experience would be completely new and exciting for me.  On the other hand, I know myself, and high stress doesn’t sit well with me.

Going through a bout with anxiety really does teach you a lot about yourself.  For instance, I know that being on the go 24/7 is appealing to me, but my physical body and mind unfortunately can’t handle it.  That is one reason I am hesitant to take this new job.  Even recently, being so busy with everything, I’ve been nauseous almost everyday, and utterly exhausted.  It sort of just doesn’t work for me.  I wish it did, but it doesn’t.  I need time everyday to do NOTHING, to clear my mind, and to relax.  Running around like crazy only makes room for one other thing, and that is relapse.

Anyways, it’s nice to take a minute and write my thoughts here.  It really does help putting it in writing.

Hopefully I’ll be back a lot more often than I have been.

For the past few days, it seems like my brain won’t communicate with my mouth!  I just can’t seem to get my point across clearly in conversations, I’ve been stuttering, and I keep saying the opposite of the words I’m looking for!  I hate when this happens.

I of course used to think I was suffering from MS, Parkinson’s, or some other horrible disease when I would get like this.  But now I realize that it’s just stress, usually on top of lack of sleep.

Recently, I’ve been preparing for an important training session at work, getting my wedding “save the date” cards prepared, and I just put on offer on a house yesterday with my fiance!  Ahh!!

I almost wanted to cry last night when I couldn’t get my words out straight.  I started complaining about it when I realized I had gotten only 6 hours of sleep the previous night, and I was tossing and turning the whole time literally *dreaming* about remodeling the house we made an offer on!  I’m not talking about dreams of choosing new countertops and beautiful stainless steel appliances from Home Depot, but dreams about actually tearing out old cabinetry and pulling off aluminum siding, over and over and over.  I was doing hard mental labor all night, not sleeping and relaxing!

Luckily I was able to recognize that it was stress causing me the “symptom” of not being able to talk eloquently.  When you are still in anxiety disorder mode, it’s easy to take a stress symptom and blow it up into an incurable disease or brain tumor, which will cause you additional anxiety and is likely to take you to panic attack status.  One key component of being recovered from anxiety disorder is having the skill to know whether or not a symptom is really something to see a doctor about or whether it’s a temporary effect of life’s stress.  Even if you’re not recovered, learning the difference will help you return to normalcy a lot quicker, as it will reduce needless anxiety.

Have you ever had a few good anxiety free days, only to realize it and suddenly become overwhelmed with the fear that your anxiety could come back?

It used to happen to me all the time.

I would have a few great days, and then slowly in the back of my mind would loom the awful possibility of anxiety rearing its ugly little head again.  Well, that fear pretty guaranteed that I would start feeling short of breath, unreal, and anxious again.

I thought I was recovered even when I had this fear, but I later realized that I wasn’t.  Fearing anxiety is basically THE problem in anxiety disorder.  It’s the rejection of the emotion itself that causes the disorder.  Imagine if you were feeling anxious, but instead of hating it, you liked it.  It wouldn’t be much of a problem anymore!

I’m not asking you to like your anxitey, but just accept that it’s real, it’s here, and there’s not much you can do about it at the moment.  It wasn’t until my response to the thought of getting anxiety again was “oh well, it’s no big deal” that I was really recovered.

The fear of anything, even relapsing into anxiety, will cause anxiety.  Recognizing this fact can go a long way towards feeling better.  Trying to avoid the fear will not work, because that still means that it’s something that is not acceptable to you, and this will continue to induce anxiety.  Seeing the fear and deciding that its something you can live with temporarily will often cause it to diminish more quickly when it does happen.

Now when I have the thought of relapsing, I tell myself that I could deal with it, it would be no big deal, and it would eventually go away.  Instead of feeling short of breath, unreal, and anxious, I feel calm, open, and ready.

Here’s a method I have used successfully from the Panic Attacks Workbook. It’s called the AWARE method. AWARE is an acronym you can use while you’re experiencing high anxiety or a panic attack.

AWARE stands for:

A- Acknowledge
W- Watch
A- Action
R- Repeat
E- End

1. ACKNOWLEDGE and ACCEPT that you have anxiety. Say to yourself “Oh, I’m experiencing anxiety right now, that’s fine”.

2. WATCH the anxiety. Be an objective observer. Watch and notice your body, how you’re reacting, how you feel.

3. ACTION- Take a deep breath OUT rather than in, and follow the rule of opposites- if your mind tells you to get upset, don’t. If your mind tells you to take deep breaths in, take a deep breath out. Do everything the opposite of your instincts. This is really odd, but it totally works!

4. REPEAT the first three if needed.

5. END. Anxiety will always go away on it’s own. It will end. We can’t force it to end, but if we wait patiently, it always does. This step is just a reminder of that. We can’t really control it, so don’t try to.

I like this method because the acronym, AWARE, is easy to remember when you are in the midst of an attack.

This past labor day weekend was one of the best labor day weekends I can remember in a long time.  My fiance and I went home to visit my parents.  The weather was perfect and I was in a great mood.  No anxiety related to visiting the family.  Just happiness and fun.  We swam and sat by t he pool, went water skiing, and went to some city festivals.  It was a great time.  I haven’t spent so much solid quality time with my parents in a while.  It was really satisfying.

But now I’m home and I’m sort of sad.  By sort of, I mean that I feel down-right depressed.

The weather is still great.  I have a good job and a great fiance.  But for some reason I just feel so damn depressed!

Maybe it’s the fact that after the holiday weekend, it’s back to the same old grind.  Cooking, cleaning, working, and doing it all again the next day, Monday through Friday.  Yuck.  Plus, while I do have some friends where I live now, my family isn’t here, so it’s sort of lonely.

Sometimes I wonder what the meaning of it all is.  I’m really thankful that my anxiety is gone and I have the capacity to enjoy life, but what should I really do with it?  Go shopping tonight?  Go for a walk?  Do some more cleaning?  Blech.  Seems pointless.

Guess it’s just one of those days.  Not to mention, I just finished a big project last night (wedding invitations), so I’m probably just looking for the next thing to do.  Well, tomorrow is Thursday so the weekend will be here soon.

Hope everyone else is having a better day than me!

I’m sure that in the midst of your anxiety and panic, you’ve probably found at least one or two coping mechanisms that have worked to help you feel better. Maybe focusing on another activity, or taking a few deep breaths help. Maybe it’s telling yourself that the anxiety is no big deal rather than getting upset over it, and it slowly melts away. Sometimes these things can be very simple and very obvious.

The problem is, these coping mechanisms are not always “simple” or “obvious” in the midst of an attack. When you are experiencing anxiety, your brain seems to go haywire and stops any logical thought. You can’t seem to remember what helped you the last time you had an attack or what you could possibly do to feel better. It’s like you blank out, can’t think straight, and feel hopeless.

I was reminded of this while emailing an anxiety sufferer I met through my site. She mentioned that focusing her attention on a certain activity rather than the anxiety itself had pretty much taken away the unreality she was feeling that day. She also said that doing that had worked before, but it wasn’t always apparent while she was having an attack. That immediately brought to my mind the many times I would have a “relapse” only to freak out, not being able to remember how I made myself feel better the last time.

To solve the problem, I have since created a sheet of notebook paper with my “best coping mechanisms” written out. Now, if I ever need to, I can go straight to the sheet, read it word for word, and remember what to do. I don’t let that mind blanking thing get the best of me anymore! I have used this several times in the past and it has worked.

The next time you find yourself feeling great and anxiety free, stop and ask yourself how you did it. Write it down, and save it for later. It’s a lifesaver!

I must admit that one thing I still am in the habit of is doing too much. I have an obsession with “getting things done”. The problem is, that I can usually create a neverending list of things to do. Once one thing is checked off, I can think of three more to add. Just one more load of laundry. Better unload the dishwasher. I should probably clean out the pantry.

Today after I got home from work, I decided to dust the living room (long long overdue!). I vacuumed the rug, then decided I should clean up the giant mess in the kitchen. Did that, then finished some administrative stuff for work. Realized that there were two plastic bags of cherry tomatoes that were about to rot, so I decided to cut them up to make tomato sauce. Also made some tofu. Then went out clean my car (I’m pretty messy). Read a few chapters of a book for work.

I was about to throw in a load of laundry, when I realized my head was spinning! I sat down on the couch and just did nothing. I laid down and just looked around the room for a few minutes. It felt like every cell in my body was buzzing. I just needed to relax.

Had I not done that, I guarantee I would have kept going until ten o’clock at night. It happens all the time. I rarely give myself permission to just “be”.

I know the work I described is not hard labor, or high stress corporate stuff, but work is work! Whether it’s housework, physical work, fun work, boring work, it is work! You get tired, and you need to take a break. You need to have fun. You need to relax.

So give yourself a break, and allow yourself to take one! Going and going like the energizer bunny will only lead to burnout and that nasty feeling of unreality and anxiety. Taking time to relax and have fun is absolutely necessary.

Ugh.. I don’t know what’s going on in the northeast, but it SUCKS. I have had a itchy, watery eyes, a scratchy throat, a runny nose, and constant sneezing for the last 3 freaking weeks! I do have allergies, but I’ve never had it this bad before from anything besides cats and dust! Apparently the unusual dryness in the northeast has caused a lot of stuff to go airborne- at least that’s what I’ve been hearing.

The worst part about all this is the OTHER allergy symptom that I get that nobody ever talks about. It’s that horrible spaced out, head floating above you, dizzy kind of feeling, along with fatigue. Easily mistaken for anxiety. It makes you feel rotten and tired and yucky and crabby! I hate it!

I always mistake it for anxiety too. And it’s not. I thought I was having a relapse last May when I finally put two and two together to realize it’s those pesky allergens that make you feel disconnected! Once the cottonwood stopped in June, I felt fine.

Just a reminder not to mistake allergies or actually being sick with anxiety!

Today I had a work related lunch with clients (doctors) that I just did not want to deal with. I woke up in a bad mood, I felt anxious, and I felt cranky. It’s no surprise. Something you dread dealing with arises and you feel anxiety. It was not anxiety disorder anxiety, but anxiety nonetheless.

I started thinking that if I were to endure situations like today’s lunch day in and day out, chances are I would probably get close to anxiety disorder status (or for me, have a relapse). We often forget how our outside circumstances, such as jobs, can affect us so dramatically. It’s so common for people with anxiety disorders to think that the problem is with themselves, rather than a changeable circumstance.

Case in point. I started a new job a year almost exactly a year ago. I was previously an engineer at a large corporation. I got no respect, the company was constantly having layoffs, and I wasn’t particularly thrilled with my work. I stayed with this job for two years, and quite frankly, I wasn’t happy. I would think it was because of my own shortcomings- maybe the work I was doing wasn’t good enough to qualify for respect, maybe I should like engineering and there was just something wrong with me because I didn’t. I gave myself self-deprecating reasons for why I was unhappy until I realized it was just the damn job and I left!

And you know, I was right! I went into a completetly different field (sales), and I am much happier. I work with nicer people, and oddly enough, even though I work a sales job and am much younger than most of my clients, I still feel I get more respect than at my old job. Of course what I did was risky. I could have hated my new career or have failed miserably at it, but the point is, a job is a modifiable circumstance that doesn’t have to be permanent.

Another good example is of a close friend from my new job. We were both placed under the same manager in the same location. She hated our manager and felt she could not do anything right to please him. After a few months on the job, she began complaining of not feeling herself, not having fun, feeling “out of it” and “like she was in a movie”, and that she was unable to concentrate or think clearly. She was convinced she was sick or dying and began to freak out. I knew immediately that her problem was stress and anxiety. I could relate to every single thing she was complaining about. I felt so bad for her. I tried to help her as much as I could and even convinced her to go to a couple therapy sessions so this didn’t blow up into a full blown disorder (which would completely suck). The funny thing is that ended up getting relocated. We were talking one day and I realized that she hadn’t complained about any weird “symptoms” for over two months, so I asked her if she was still feeling funny. She replied that after she moved and started work in her new location with a new manager, she never had a single episode again and completely forgot about it.

That old saying “God give me the serenity to accept things which cannot be changed; Give me courage to change things which must be changed; And the wisdom to distinguish one from the other.” is so true. Often it’s the knowing part that’s hard! Once we realize what needs to be changed, taking action can make quite a difference.