Anxiety Is…

Anxiety is…going from zero to sixty in 1.1 seconds as the rational part of your brain just SLAMS shut and emotional brain snatches the keys and peels out of the driveway, taking out mailboxes garbage cans along the way.

Anxiety is…finding out your son ate the last of the cookies and cream ice cream that you really wanted and then taking the next 15 minutes to throw things and scream and slam any door or cabinet you can find. Over ice cream.

Anxiety is…your daughter telling you she accidentally left her new package of bobby pins at her friends house and you yelling about how horribly irresponsible she was, despite her apologizing over and over. It’s irritatingly saying how she’s going to have to pay for them. They are freaking bobby pins. Not gold coins.

Anxiety is…not being able to get my daughter’s new found curly hair looking right despite many tries and lots of research and hair products and obsessing about it the rest of the day and hating how it’s turning out (without telling her that) and wanting to cry over it. All day.

Anxiety is…is he in there judging me? Thinking I’m not doing enough. Thinking, she’s just laying on the couch, AGAIN? And rolling this thought over and over and over and over and over and over again in my mentally ill brain.

Anxiety is…we got our driveway seal coated and there’s a streak that’s very quickly driving me insane. And I can’t stop thinking about. And I can’t stop the irrational angry feelings that accompany the spinning thoughts. There are also 2 sets of dirty foot prints on it. Because apparently people can’t figure out the sign means don’t walk on it. So more spinning. More anger.

Anxiety is…getting overly stressed out and overthinking and obsessing and wanting to cry because you’ve been searching and searching and searching for a new doctor for both of your kids, whom they really really need, and there just isn’t anything out there. And then feeling helpless that we’re stuck where we are, who aren’t giving us the care we need and then am I going to have to just keep having to work so hard to get what they need when it would be easier somewhere else???

Anxiety is…we’re celebrating my husband’s birthday tomorrow and feeling crushingly overwhelmed by having to get ready for that.

Anxiety is…vacation in a couple weeks and feeling like I just don’t even want to go. I should be excited but there’s so many what ifs and so many chances to be uncomfortable.

Anxiety is…nothing. It can just be a feeling. You don’t know where it’s coming from. You just feel off. And bad. You feel it in your head. You feel it in your body. Your skin is crawling. Your mind is racing. Your thoughts and words are repeating. You scream. You lash out. You snap.

Anxiety is….a million other things that will have to wait to be share in a second installment.

Lonely

I didn’t think I’d be so lonely.

But here I am, day after day,

Alone.

I can’t work anymore. I’ve tried and I can’t. I’ve had medical professionals deem me disabled and unable to work.

So here I am, day after day,

Alone.

The days of getting kids together for playdates during the day have passed. All the kids are at school. And their moms, my friends, all back to work, taking our mid day lunches and hangouts along with them.

So here I am, day after day,

Alone.

I used to volunteer at the animal shelter but it started to become too much for me.

So here I am, day after day,

Alone.

Driving hurts so much that it’s hard to visit anyone or go anywhere and do anything.

So here I am, day after day.

Alone.

I talk to my therapist once a week. It helps a little but it doesn’t take the place of the rest of the people in my life.

So here I am, day after day,

Alone.

My pain is my own and no one can understand how it feels or what it does to me except me.

So here I am, day after day,

Alone.

I have my family. My kids. My husband. I love them, and they love me. But they are all busy during the day. And they don’t/can’t understand the cause for this loneliness.

So here I am, day after day,

Alone.

She’s sick again.

My daughter is sick again. She’s sick a lot. So this isn’t new for us. But I’m so sad for her because she’s missing her first field trip ever in elementary school. Yes, ever. She’s in 3rd grade and this was finally supposed to be her first. We were so excited that they were finally bringing them back after covid. Many other schools did last year, but for some reason, hers didn’t. So after waiting through kindergarten, first, and second grade, it was finally time. When the information came home weeks ago, I lit up inside and so did she!

She’s been having a hard time at school with both her teacher and some kids. So we had been focusing on the good things coming up. Field day. Live wax museum. ABC countdown.

Annnnd the field trip. Getting to leave school! Getting to ride the bus with all of her classroom friends. Seeing trucks on the highway and making the well known gesture for asking them to blow their horns. Singing bus songs that will undoubtedly annoy your teacher and chaperones. Eating lunch in a different place. Seeing something new.

And now she doesn’t get to go. 🙁

I haven’t actually told her yet. She doesn’t realize what day it is. And she’s too sick to upset her. But I know. And I know she’ll be disappointed and sad. And I’M disappointed and sad. COVID has taken so much of her elementary school experience away. And now this experience is finally back, and she’s missing it anyway.

She has the living wax museum on Friday, and I am just praying that she is well by then or she will be devastated. And so will I. So if you have any get well/healing prayers or good thoughts for my daughter, I’ll take them.

But for now, I’m just mourning the fact that she’s missing out on another elementary school rite of passage. And just hoping she’ll get another chance for one next year.

But there’s nothing wrong with it.

My tail bone/sacrum make me howl and wail in excruciating pain whenever I sit for more than a few minutes, especially trying to get out of the car. Standing up takes is agonizing painful and painstaking. But there’s nothing wrong with it.

My low back aches to a pain scale score of 11, all day long, every day. Invisible claws grab and squeeze at it. But there’s nothing wrong with it.

My mid back burns and screams when I walk or lean forward or sit for more than a few minutes. But there’s nothing wrong with it.

My brain is crushed by an invisible vise and my brain is filled with nauseating lava almost daily. But there’s nothing wrong with it.

My stomach churns with horrendous nausea most days of the week. But there’s nothing wrong with it.

My skin feels itchy, beaten, battered, and viciously bruised day after day. But there’s nothing wrong with it.

Xray after xray. Blood test after blood test. Mri after mri. I’m the picture of health. Isn’t it great?