Tag Archives: anxiety

Seven things I learned this week

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This week kind of sucked hard, but I actually learned a lot.

  • I tend to bottle up things that I’m anxious, depressed, or upset about, until something small and seemingly insignificant happens and I have a major breakdown over it. I have to learn how to recognize what I’m feeling and allow myself to feel it, so that this doesn’t keep happening to me.

  • When the internet goes down and prevents me from working, that is a sign from the spaghetti monster in the sky to stop working and read a book — or do something else I love to do.
  • I need to learn to accept that my chronic pain and other symptoms are probably never going to go away, and that I am probably never going to be diagnosed. If I can accept these two things, I’ll probably have more peace of mind.
  • I’m not as shy as I used to be. I make new friends at the bar, I try new songs at karaoke, and I talk to total strangers at Barnes and Noble.
  • I have a man who loves me and will stick up for me and take my side no matter what, even if it’s his dad I’m arguing with.
  • I have an always friend. No matter how many times we hurt or betray each other, we can always work it out.
  • I have strong, steady faith that my Popi is going to pull through this. Cancer doesn’t have to be the end.

I still have no internet where I’m staying. The withdrawal symptoms were so bad that I drove all the way across the city to my Barnes and Noble so that I could post this and a review over at Freaking Bookworm. (Mmn, wifi and Starbucks…) I’ll add a link to the review as soon as it’s up! Read my review of Wizard At Large!

I have a bunch of pictures from karaoke last night that I’m going to post here. I have to get permission from my new friend Jonny Zee first, though. He’s one of the regulars at the bar we go to and we always have a blast with him.

I also have a bunch of pictures I took of my sister and her prom date last night before they left. I have permission to share those, so I’ll get them up on Flickr and here as soon as I can!

Even though this week sucked, and while I was wading through all of it I felt like it was never going to end and that the suckage was ruining everything, it turns out that I got a lot out of it. I also had a lot of fun last night (even though my knee and hip were aching badly for a little while), which made up for the suckage tenfold!

What did you learn this week?

Clearly I am crazy

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I cannot even tell you how it felt to be me yesterday. I haven’t felt that anxious and out of control since one of the last times I went to see a new doctor. (I can get so anxious that the smallest things make me cry, like parking or getting lost going to the new doctor’s office.) My aunt and business partner went on vacation almost two weeks ago, and left me in charge of most of our current projects. I figured, no problem, I can handle this. Until everything went wrong — on both her end and mine.

My anxiety was so high, that I didn’t even realize it when I lost it over my jeans not fitting. (Stupid menstrual bloating! I will hunt you down!) Because they are my only jeans that fit, this was a huge deal that spiraled into me being unhappy with everything I put on me, and then when I convinced myself to stop caring, I started picking on my hair, and then almost started picking on my shoes when I mentally shook myself and told myself to STOP. And I did. Later on, I realized that the reason I cried every time I looked in the mirror, looked at my curls, or looked down at my shoes was because I was terrified that I wouldn’t be able to hold up my end of the deal during my aunt’s vacation. (If you can call going to Florida and bringing your laptop and working anyway a vacation.)

By midnight last night, my hands were completely tied. I had no internet to upload one of my clients’ sites and was freaking out because I had no idea how I was going to continue to work on projects during the next couple of weeks. (I still have no idea, but lalalalala, I’m not listening.) I started to cry again. I paused, said out loud, “There’s nothing I can do. I can’t let this get to me,” and shut down my laptop. I used the Gmail app on my BlackBerry to email passwords and stuff to my aunt so that she could take care of the hosting end of this project from Florida, and told myself I’d upload the site this evening after work.

I took my favorite blanket and pillow downstairs and watched a Lifetime movie about a woman who helped her husband rape and kill her little sister and several other girls. Naturally, after the movie was over, I was convinced that every sound I heard was someone breaking into the house to come and rape me. Obviously all of these sounds were just the house settling, but then this morning, right before my alarm went off, I was awakened by loud knocking… which I quickly realized was someone hammering something next door.

I kept resetting my alarm over and over so that I could go back to sleep, and by the time I actually got up to get moving, I was running late for work. I don’t know what it is lately, but I have hardly any energy and just can’t get moving in the morning.

It’s a good thing the week is almost over. (I work at my part-time job Monday through Thursday.) Tonight I have to get that website up, and tomorrow night I have softball. Friday morning I have a business meeting with a friend and one of his coworkers who are interested in sending me some web projects; they’re an IT company and have a lot of front-end design projects they might use me for. Saturday and Sunday I am spending relaxing and recharging. I’m probably going to have to start coding another website before the weekend actually gets here, but at least that won’t be so problematic, since we already have hosting set up. I’m still not sure what to do about my internet situation, but I have a couple of other places I can go to with internet. It just sucks because I can’t exactly stay super late at those places.

Who knows, maybe the problem was because of the nasty weather, and since it’s not storming anymore, it might be fixed by now. Hopefully.

Anyway. How is your week going?

No time for a time-out

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I spent this weekend cleaning and organizing at my house because we’re doing some moving. My grandparents are staying downstairs, and my parents, sister, and I are moving some of our stuff out of storage and into here (and vice versa). I feel like I got absolutely nothing accomplished, especially since I got none of the work that is coming out of my ears done. I did get to see Ciana, my niece, for a little. I took the cutest picture of Mike holding her. I so wish I could post it here. It’s proof that he’s going to be an awesome dad (although, when she wouldn’t stop crying, he passed her to me with a “Here ya go!” and left the scene pretty quickly, hahaha).

Tomorrow is my prep for the colonoscopy I’m having Wednesday. It feels so weird to say that; usually it’s elderly or middle-aged people who get them done, not almost twenty-two-year-olds. I’m mostly nervous about tomorrow, at the moment, because I won’t be able to eat anything but clear, not red, liquids and Jell-O (again, no red). I’m hypoglycemic, so this is a scary thing for me. I really don’t want to spend one day nauseous all day and then the next day on the toilet all day, but here we are. I still don’t know what time my procedure is, either, so I have to call them and find out.

I’m going to miss two days of work, which is going to put me two days behind, and then Thursday is going to be really crazy: business meeting early in the morning, part-time job, writers’ group, and softball practice. Why can’t I seem to break this nasty habit of taking on too much? These are all things I want to do (except for the two jobs), but the worst part is that I don’t even have time to write anything to bring to my writers’ group.

I need a time-out.

Not normal

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This month is going by so fast. Softball starts soon, which I am really looking forward to; Mike and I bought our cleats this past weekend and mine are Adidas, which makes them the first pair of Adidas I’ve ever owned*. My biggest web design project is almost finished; I’ll soon be putting most of the money I make aside and some of it into starting my sleeve. The weather is getting warmer (especially if you just ignore all the cold rain we had this past weekend). Sundresses and flipflops are pushing aside coats and boots in the stores.

It truly feels like life is just cruising along. As rough as things have been, things are also really good. And yet, I’m really apprehensive about the colonscopy I have to have on the 31st.

It’s not really the procedure itself that scares me. I’m going to be out during it, so I’m not worried at all (especially if I ignore the horror story I heard about a lady who got one done and ended up getting her intestines punctured during it). The gastroenterologist who’s doing it did my aunt’s and diagnosed her, so I’m not worried about his capability. What I’m worried about is after.

Either he is going to have an answer for me, a diagnosis, or he is going to say the words I dread most: “Everything is normal.”

Everything is not normal. Sometimes I feel like I’m trapped in my own body while it attacks itself. Some symptoms make me feel so gross and icky, like maybe I should hide (although Mike reminds me that I’m loved and beautiful). And yet, with all of the things going on, each specialist I see is completely baffled. Some just give up. Some have been cruel, advising me to get a gym membership or see a psychiatrist. (I’m not kidding.)

I’m not sure I can take another non-diagnosis. I just want to know what’s wrong. I want to have a name to put to this disease. I want to say, “I have Blah Blah Blah Disease,” instead of, “I don’t know,” when someone asks me what’s wrong. I’m tired of being a medical mystery.

So, even though the days seem to slide by, it’s taking forever for the 31st to get here. I know I won’t get any answers directly after the procedure, but I have to hope that after analyzing the samples he’s going to take, Dr. Z will sit me down and say, “You have Blah Blah Blah Disease.” My aunt insists that I have Crohn’s Disease, that I’m so much like she was at my age, but after seeing specialist after specialist after specialist who said, “Nope, you don’t have Carpal Tunnel,” “Nope, you don’t have Rheumatoid Arthritis,” “Nope, you don’t have Thoracic Outlet Syndrome,” I’m afraid to hope.

*Growing up, my parents didn’t have a lot of money. We weren’t poor but there was no way in hell I was ever getting a pair of Adidas, even when I begged and begged for the “shell shoes” everyone wore when I was in middle school. I got the Walmart version instead. I’m actually glad that my parents didn’t buy me and my sister stuff like that; I know how to look past what’s “in” and go my own route.

My best

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I’m taking a moment, here, to unwind. To breathe. Man, do I need to breathe.

As much as I love my profession, sometimes the workload is daunting. I know that I shouldn’t complain, that I should be grateful and I should JUST DO IT. There is a little voice inside of me, though, that whispers.

You’re not cut out for this.

Then: You’re not a business person.

I am good at what I do. I know that. It isn’t an egotistical knowledge; I’m pretty hard on myself. To quote a show that I really miss now, “I try to be my best.” But I worry. I worry that my best is not good enough.

It would be one thing if I failed and only let myself down. But there are others depending on me. That knowledge leans heavily on me. The little voice gains volume.

You’re not cut out for this.

I tell it to shush, that I am doing my best.

But I wonder: Is my best enough?

I need to keep plowing through. It will all be worth it in the end, I tell myself. So cliche, but I hang on to it, because it HAS to be worth it in the end. Otherwise, what else is left?

All of the cigarettes, all of the chocolate, all of the coffee in the world can’t make the weight on me any easier to bear. Is it too much weight? I don’t know. I tell myself that I can handle it. I tell myself to just suck it up, to JUST DO IT. Just fucking do it.

I have to try to keep the what ifs at bay, keep the little/big voice smushed down.

I have to try.

To be my best.