Lately, it seems as if I can't shake my anxiety even for a minute. I've been having stomachache's and trouble getting a deep breath for weeks on end, not to mention trouble sleeping coupled with a few days of sleeping for 12-16 hours. I remind myself I'm in the thick of it: midterm pressure along with my mother's diagnosis have combined for an extremely stressful couple of weeks. I've been prescribed a non-narcotic anxiety pill that technically helps, in the sense that it knocks me out for about 8 hours.
I'm beginning to realize that the anxiety itself is not the true source of my discomfort; rather, it is my inability to accept and cope with it that's causing the real problem. In other words: I am making myself anxious about being anxious. Instead of finding real, constructive things to do to help with my uneasy state, I am freaking out about freaking out. I am very familiar with this mindset, and have found myself caught up in it many times. It's combined with a depression that is mainly fueled by emotional exhaustion. The old 'pull the covers over my head' avoidance syndrome that I feel whenever I'm overwhelmed.
So, now that I know how I feel (which can be half the battle), I've decided what I'm going to do about it. Actually, it came to me like a lightening bolt. After skimming all my old self-help fallbacks (which made me more anxious, because they seemed so out of reach.) My advice to myself is:
LIGHTEN UP.
Take some pressure off. Chill out. Don't be so un-dude, dude. However you put it, I've realized that for someone who relies on her sense of humor to get her through, I've been awfully bogged down in the seriousness of life. Circumstances undoubtedly started this spiral, but I am determined to renew the vow I made to myself years ago in my worst bout of depression. I am determined to be happy. Even if it kills me.
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