Tag: anxiety

It’s Not Easy Socializing with a Brain Like Mine

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Lately, I’ve been flirting with the idea of being more social. It’s a challenge for my introverted self. It takes energy that I don’t always have or want to expend. I’ve neglected that part of my life for too long and I don’t want to do that anymore. I want to leave my house more. It doesn’t have to be anything much. Once a month, go out with a friend, maybe for lunch or dinner or something. Socialize with someone outside of my house and the library. I need to make more of an effort to connect with the friends I have in my meatspace and this would be an easy, low pressure way to do that.

Right?

Well, my brain hasn’t met a good idea that it couldn’t turn bad. Or at least make seem impossible. Anxiety is fun like that.

The friends that currently occupy my immediate physical reality took a different path in life than I did. They got married, had kids, have full-time jobs in which they’ve been employed for years. You know. They all became functioning adults. Meanwhile, I’m over here avoiding adulthood like I’m dodging bullets in the Matrix. My point is that their lives are already very full. They’ve got a lot going on. Better things to do, as it were. My brain gleefully informs me that I do not need to be bothering these friends. They put effort into their lives. They’ve got their social circles. There’s no room for you anymore.

I do have some friends that didn’t entirely go the full-tilt adult route, didn’t get married and/or have kids. They would theoretically have more available time in their life to spend an hour eating food, drinking drinks, and talking about things and stuff with me. However, I still can’t find a way to justify that I’m not bothering them by asking them to hang out with me for a short while. I can’t imagine it being anything other than an inconvenience to them for me to ask, especially if they have to make an excuse because they don’t want to go.

My brain enjoys telling me that everybody hates me and I should go eat worms.

My brain also enjoys projection. My first reaction to someone asking me to socialize is usually a reflexive “no”. It’s too much work to get in the right brain space, I’ll be too anxious. Even if my immediate reaction is a “yes” or a “maybe”, I more than likely won’t feel the same way when the time comes to leave the house. Most often, if I commit to an outing, I will follow through because I know I’ll be fine (or close enough to fine) when I get there. It takes an incredible amount of mental gymnastics sometimes just to convince myself to go out. Why wouldn’t other people go through the same thing when I ask them?

Well, maybe because they have normal, more reasonable brains.

I’m not giving up on this idea that I can have a small social life. After all, I used to have one. It’s just a matter of ignoring the worst of my brain and sending that first text message.

It’ll be fine when I get there.

I Never Go Out Alone…Anxiety Is My Forever Date

~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments

I’m not the most social creature. I’m like a cryptid. Sightings of me in the wild are rare and to be treasured, sometimes worthy of being caught on film.

When I do make these rare excursions into the social sphere, I prefer to go with others. Also like a cryptid, I’m weird and awkward around humans. Having a friend or a group of friends makes that awkwardness and weirdness less noticeable. It also makes it easier for me to be in a social situation. Having someone else or a group of someone elses with me acts as sort of a buffer from the anxiety of being in a social situation. They are the lubricant that greases the wheels of my social interactions, as it were.

Sometimes, though, I have to fly solo. Or maybe just arrive solo with the intent of meeting up with my lubricants and buffers. But either/or, I’m never really solo. My anxiety is always with me.

Here’s the thing: Alone or with friends, if I’m out and about in a social situation, I never feel like I belong. I always feel awkward and I feel like that awkwardness is apparent. I feel like the people I’m interacting with -even friends I’ve known for decades- can plainly see that I’m poorly cosplaying as a functioning human being. Now, with the friends I’ve known for ages, I eventually relax and even though my anxiety never goes away and I will absolutely rake myself over the coals later about everything I’ve said and done, my anxiety at least relaxes with me for that moment. But, if I’m with people I’m less comfortable with because maybe I haven’t known them as long or I don’t hang out with them as much, or I’m flying solo and forced to be in the midst of people I barely know or don’t know at all, I never relax and neither does my anxiety. I spend the entire time in performance mode, and that my friends, is exhausting.

In theory, the more that I socialize, the more comfortable my anxiety could become with the whole act of socializing. The more my anxiety and I feel comfortable with socializing, the more we’ll feel like we belong in those situations and with those people.

In practice, however…well, I don’t know how it works out in practice because I struggle with getting past my basic cryptid nature and ingrained social anxiety to actually put this into practice. The idea of making myself more available to hang out with people seems like guaranteed rejection because who would want to voluntarily hangout with an anxiety-ridden cryptid? Sure, I would, but that’s because cryptids of a feather. Or another more fitting cryptid feature. I guess it depends on the cryptid. My point is that it’s a pretty big ask to associate with me in a public, social situation and not everyone is up for that and I don’t blame them.

Yes, I know that could just be my anxiety talking, but it could also be true.

In conclusion, this is one of those things that I’m going to spend my existence working on. Maybe one day the practice will finally prove the theory. In the meantime, enjoy the cryptid sightings.

I Wear Body Armor

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

I know I just wrote about using fashion to boost my serotonin, but did you know that I also dress for protection?

Allow me to explain.

A couple of weeks ago at the library I work at, I presented a program on 22 murders that occurred in my county. I’ve not done any public speaking of this kind since my third go round of community college in speech class, which was close to fifteen years ago now. I did well in the class, of course, because I’m one of those people who insists on excelling academically, but this program wasn’t for a grade. Speaking in front of twenty people, even about something I’m interested in and excited about (like murder) is daunting. Throw some anxiety in there and the entire week leading up to the program I was regretting my decision to do this. I felt like there was no way I was going to remember everything, that people were going to be bored, that it was going to be a dud of a program, and I was going to let down our program director, whom I adore.

Knowing that anxiety and doubt were going to plague me, I decided my best course of action would be to put on my body armor.

I meticulously picked out my outfit down to the socks, panties, jewelry, mask, and eye shadow colors to make me feel as fierce and badass as possible, while still meeting dress code. And it worked. I still had to deal with my anxiety and I still had some doubts until I started talking, but damn I felt good about my look.

I felt bulletproof.

(For the record, I wore a pink button down shirt, white criss-cross tanktop, boyfriend cut jeans, pink socks, my custom chaos Vans, pink mask, and black and pink jewelry.)

Like playing with my fashion to help boost my mood, sometimes I use it as armor, too. Armor against the world and armor against myself.

Facing a crappy day? Sometimes all I need is the sexiest pair of panties I own. It’s like wearing kevlar. My secret defense against the world.

Not in the mood to be fucked with at work? I have found that people do not argue with me if I wear excessive amounts of pink. No, I don’t know why, but it has yet to fail.

Needing a little extra insulation from my anxiety? That’s why I have an ungodly amount of novelty socks.

It’s something that I can do even on the days when I’m not going full fashion. Maybe I’m just having a meh day that calls for soft clothes, but I’ve got glittery slippers to cap off that legging and sweatshirt combo.

Like any armor, it has its weaknesses. It’s not foolproof. Some days, no amount of armor can protect me. Some days the world is too harsh. Or I’m too harsh. Sometimes, the anxiety finds the gaps in my kevlar. Sometimes, the world does.

And like any armor, I don’t always need it. I’m not constantly walking around in my stylish chain mail anticipating a lance. Sometimes it’s all in the name of serotonin, all just to have fun.

And sometimes, they’re just clothes, something I put on because I live in a society that has decency laws and/or I’m feeling a bit chilly.

That’s what’s so great about fashion.

It’s so versatile.

The Slow Down

~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments

I live by my To Do Lists. I’ve got a project board hanging on my closet door. I’ve got multiple pages in my OneNote with all of my projects, writing, audio, library, and other. I cannot organize everything in my brain, so I organize it on the outside. It works very well for me because I’m able to see everything. Seeing it all laid out helps me keep everything straight.

However, sometimes seeing it all laid out like that with the deadlines and everything triggers my anxiety. It’s a very specific reaction, too.

Do All The Things Right Now.

The fun part about this anxiety and resulting response is that I don’t even need to have a lot of things on the To Do List to trigger it. The deadline doesn’t even have to be that dire. Sometimes, my anxiety decides to make it dire. It’s not ideal. Sure, in the past it’s forced a high-level of productivity because I would indeed try to do all the things right now, but the panic-flail nature of it would take a serious toll on my sanity.

In the past few years, I’ve made major strides with this particular anxiety issue with a simple bit of advice.

What do you need to do when you’re in a hurry? Slow down.

I’ve taken that approach when my anxiety tells me that I need to Do All The Things Right Now. I slow down. I lay out the schedule of what needs to get done and then I only do those things. Yes, I could probably do more, but I don’t let myself. If I do, then I’ll fall into the trap of doing all the things at the expense of myself. This doesn’t always make the itchy, dire feeling go away, but it will eventually. It might take a night’s sleep to feel better. But the point is that I’m able to get to that sleep because I’m not making myself do all of the things to try to make the itchy, dire feeling go away.

For example, Grinchmas almost always triggers the Do All The Things Right Now response. The combination of whatever projects I’m working on and the need to make and mail gifts and cards and to do all of my baking makes it nearly unavoidable. The only way I’ve found to cope and not feel like I’m failing is to schedule everything. Yes, I write down in my planner what day I’m baking sugar cookies and what day I’m mailing cards along with what project I’m working on that day and what I need to do during my library shift that day. To fight the urge to do all of the things right now, I have to show myself that all of the things will get done in time.

To get everything done, I have to slow down. One thing at a time until it’s all done. The slow progress guarantees I’ll get everything done without sacrificing my mental well-being to do it.

I”ll be honest. It’s been a game-changer for me.

Slow and steady really can win the race.

That Old Familiar Feeling (of Failure)

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

My anxiety is a funny thing. Not ha ha funny, obviously, but curious funny. The way it flares up and dissipates. What sets it off.

And the frustrations of how it can affect me.

Sometimes I’ll go days, maybe a whole week, with my anxiety pinging. I can feel it, hanging on my shoulders and clinging to my neck. It’s just there, making me uncomfortable, waiting to give me a squeeze. And squeeze it will. It’ll set my brain to overdrive at the slightest trigger.

My overwhelming thought when this happens is “I’m failing”. It is the mantra of my anxiety.

I’m failing. I’m failing. I’m failing.

As someone who’s fear of failure has severely negatively impacted her life, I think this is a pretty insidious thing for my brain chemicals to do. How’s your day going? Your week? Feeling a bit anxious? Well, that’s because you’re not doing enough and what you are doing isn’t good enough. Enjoy!

When this happened recently, it was during a very busy period. I had several projects going and I was struggling to keep all of my plates spinning. In fact, I dropped a few. And even though I managed to be incredibly productive, more productive than I anticipated, I would still have moments during that week when my anxiety would give me a squeeze and whisper in my ear, “I’m failing. I’m failing. I’m failing.” Of course, that voice got louder when I dropped my plates. Sure, I got all of this done, but you forgot to do something that you’ve done every other week for months. And you nearly forgot to do this thing that you’ve done every day for the last two months. You’re not doing as well as you thought, huh?

I’m failing. I’m failing. I’m failing.

It’s a scratchy voice and an itchy feeling. My shoulders are tightening and my skin is contracting just typing about it.

It’s a helpless feeling, too. Not just because my brain does this sort of clever shit to me against my will. It’s a helpless feeling because it validates the rotten thoughts I have about myself. It gives them more weight. I’m floundering because I’m failing and I’m failing because I’m not good enough to do any better.

If my depression is acting the ass, the result can be debilitating, a spiral straight to mental health hell.

If not, then my anxiety gets a rude awakening from my stubbornness, which is so embedded in my family’s DNA that it’s actually on the family crest. Because my stubbornness doesn’t care about my anxiety or failing. I have shit to do and I’m going to do it. The end.

This is part of the reason why I can fake being okay when my anxiety is actually doing a number on me. I might be a little extra awkward and maybe a little more forgetful, but otherwise, there’s nothing different about me. I’m taking care of business like I always do.

I’m failing. I’m failing. I’m failing.

And I’m too stubborn to let that stop me.

I’m Cheering You On…From Over Here

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

As an introvert with unmedicated anxiety, my desire to be supportive of friends and family can be somewhat less than what I’d like depending on the day.

On my best days, I can show up. Physically. In person. When my batteries are fully charged and my anxiety is either low-tide or manageable, I can actually be there for my people. Yes, I am capable of pushing myself for really important events when I’m not feeling my best, but I honestly try to make myself social interaction ready prior to those events. This means as much alone time as I can beforehand along with having my anxiety coping methods at the ready.

However, I can’t always do that. I work in a customer service job. Even part time, I can’t always successfully recharge my batteries. My anxiety can prevent it. Or my depression if it’s acting up.

So, sometimes -most times, too many times- I don’t show up. Not in the physical form.

Most of the time my support comes in a less full-bodied form. Text messages, emails, likes, favorites, retweets, memes, cards. It’s not ideal, I know. But sometimes it’s all I have the energy to do. I want you know that I’m thinking of you, that I support you, that I’m proud of you. Those little gestures are the best I can do and they’re the ones I end up doing the most.

And even with the easiest of these gestures I can still struggle because of my anxiety.

As I’ve mentioned before, my anxiety’s favorite thing to tell me is that people do not like me and do not want to hear from me. This applies to my closest friends and even my family. I have to psych myself up sometimes to text my own sister. Crazy, right? Yes, I am.

There are times, when I do not respond to social media posts even though I want to because I feel like that’s for the best. That my support would best be expressed with a like or a favorite or a share or a retweet rather than an actual verbally communicated interaction because I don’t want to be too familiar and/or bug anybody. And yes, this applies to people I’ve known for years and that I’m related to. I quite frequently backspace.

You’re welcome.

I’m lackluster in a lot of ways. My best is rarely good enough. But I do try. And I do care about the people in my world.

Believe me when I say that I’m cheering you all on.

But from over here.

Let’s Talk About Stress, Baby

~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments

In my little world, I categorize my stress into two categories: To Do List Stress and Life Stress. Sometimes they overlap, but they tend to affect me differently.

I prefer no stress, but if I had to pick one of these, I’ll pick the To Do List Stress.

To Do List Stress is the consequence of me overestimating my ability to be productive and scheduling myself to do a whole lot of things in a certain period of time. To Do List Stress is most prevalent in December, but I can honestly do this to myself at any time. I tend to cope with this stress better. Not because I can choose to reschedule the things on my To Do List to be more accommodating (because even if I say I’m going to do that, I never do), but for whatever reason, it’s just something I can handle. Maybe it’s because I’m a Capricorn. Who knows.

One contributing factor to my ability to deal with To Do List Stress is that it triggers my “DO IT ALL NOW” anxiety and out of all of my anxiety manifestations, I can actually deal with that one pretty easily. It mostly involves me reminding myself that I don’t have to do it all now and I have it all scheduled out. Do I have to remind myself of this multiple times a day, if not an hour, and does it sometimes disrupt my sleep? Yes. But it’s mild compared to what Life Stress does to me.

Life Stress is everything else in my world.

It’s working short-handed most days of the week. It’s working a customer service job during a pandemic. It’s the constant barrage of bad news. It’s going grocery shopping at any point in time. It’s the ever present strain that never seems to abate.

I’m not great at dealing with that kind of stress, at least not anymore. I think I was better at dealing with it when I was younger and more resilient. Or I was too dumb to stop and realize what I was dealing with. Whatever the reason, after the Massively Stressful Summer of ’18, my ability to cope with Life Stress is basically non-existent. It totally drains me.

Which is not good.

It’s not ideal to go through life feeling like you’re unable to catch your breath.

I think -and this is just speculation- that I might be able to cope with Life Stress better if it didn’t absolutely wreck me anxiety-wise. While To Do List Stress triggers one particular anxiety manifestation, Life Stress triggers several and they’re all the worst.

The general dread that comes with social situations, like going to work for example, goes from barely registering/normal to now dialed up to 11 because every shift guarantees an unpleasant interaction with someone.

And every unpleasant interaction leads to rumination that I can’t stop, whether I acknowledge it or not. Because most days, I just chalk it up to the normal of now and don’t consciously think about it. But that doesn’t mean it’s not pinballing through my brain, off in the background, coming to the fore when I finally sleep and the guard goes down.

Stress dreams are not fun. And I’m having them a lot more often than I ever did.

This sort of thing has made my baseline anxiety worse. I question every single human interaction I have outside of the people in my house, and still question those interactions on occasion. I cannot wish someone happy birthday without questioning my word choice. You think I’m joking, but I’m not. I can have a chat with someone I’ve known most of my life, who knows me and my quirks and my dumbassery, and still walk away from that conversation ruminating over every single thing I said and did during that interaction.

This is the toll that Life Stress takes on me. Is taking on me. Because in addition to just sucking in general, it’s also feeding a beast I’m quickly losing control of.

Now I know that I’m not unique in this. A lot of people have Life Stress issues along with mental illness. Some might argue that I’m lucky because I don’t have the added stresses of a spouse and kids and a real job. But think about it. If I can’t handle what I’ve already got, it’s probably for the best that I’m not dealing with more. I’m hardly coping (not really) as it is.

Do I feel like a complete failure and a total baby? Absolutely.

Will I find a way to cope and/or live with it?

I hope so.

What I Mean When I Say I Don’t Have the Energy

~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments

The library has a holiday outing every year. We go out to dinner at one of the local places and then we go to the CH Moore Homestead for the candlelight tour of the mansion. It’s really pretty. We did it the first year that I worked for the library. Last year’s was cancelled due to Covid. This year we’re going again.

I’m not going. I don’t have the energy.

When I say this, people assume that means I’m tired and how can I possibly be tired weeks in advance? That’s ridiculous! Come on! You should go! It’ll be so much fun!

First of all, never pester me about something. It will activate my spite and that’s a great way to make sure I never do it.

Second of all, I’ve been tired since 1994. It’s a permanent condition at this point.

And lastly, what I mean when I say that I don’t have the energy is that I don’t have the energy necessary to do sufficient battle with my anxiety and/or depression in order to allow myself to have a good time.

I’m using this specific example of the library’s holiday outing because as I’ve written many times, this is my least favorite time of the year. It tends to be hectic. Even not having to split my time between multiple family holiday gatherings anymore, I still find myself stressed out over presents and baking and cards and mailing. This is the time of year that my mental illnesses can be more affected due to that whole lack of daylight thing combined with the need to go out more.

Even during with ideal conditions, my energy reserves in December are low.

But I’ve spent the last year plus in a pandemic, keeping up with the changing library policies regarding Covid safety and arguing with people who walk past THREE signs that say masks are required because they don’t want to wear a mask.

I barely have enough energy to get through the requirements of my day. I do not have the energy to do anything extra.

Some people refer to this as not having enough spoons. If that is the metaphor you require to understand me, then that is the one I’ll use. I have no extra spoons. I rarely have any at this time of year. I’d say they get lost in the dishwasher, but we don’t have one.

I know some people feel like this is bullshit. I’m not married. I don’t have kids. I don’t have a full-time job (and if my job at the library was full-time, it’s minimum wage, so it wouldn’t count as a real job anyway). In their opinion, there’s nothing depleting my energy. I should have a plethora of spoons. I’m just lazy.

And to them, I say…I am, as a rule, fucking exhausting to deal with. Even in small doses. Imagine putting up with me all the damn time.

In conclusion, I have no extra energy to accommodate any more requests at this time. Thank you.

Have a Bad Day

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

I woke up from a dead sleep at 4am with an anxiety attack. It had something to do with the day job, an insignificant thing that my broke-ass brain decided was a much bigger issue and decided to flail about it despite my repeated attempts at logic and reason. It took almost two hours for me to get back to sleep and even then, I ended up having fitful anxiety dreams.

This set the tone for my day. It colored everything I did. How I interacted with other people and dealt with them, how I went about my writing and my day job shift. When I finished my exercises in the morning (because I made myself do them), I sat on the floor with my head in my hands for twenty minutes, inert. I knew that it was going to be a day. I was going to be out of sorts.

And you know what?

I let myself have a bad day.

There’s this idea that bad days should be avoided at all costs. Do whatever you can to not have one. Don’t let that one moment ruin your twenty-fours hours. Change your attitude, change your perspective, other people have it worse, don’t let it get you down.

Granted, no one wants to have a bad day, but I think so much of that is because people don’t like dealing with other people having a bad day. It makes them uncomfortable. It’s awkward. They don’t know what to say or what to do. So, they tell you not to have one so they don’t have to deal with it. Which perpetuates this idea that bad days are some kind of failing. To have one means you’re not fighting hard enough to be happy and therefore not burden the other people in your life with your unpleasant, unkempt shit.

In the past, I would have struggled to turn my frown upside down and that struggle would have made my bad day worse. I would have pushed and everything I touched would have gone to instant shit. Like the Midas touch, only crappy. Instead, I knew from the minute I woke up with that anxiety attack that I was going to have a bad day and I accepted it. I didn’t wallow in it. I didn’t take it out on anyone else. I just acknowledged that this was the day that I was having and it was okay. I was allowed.

The result?

My day wasn’t great, but it didn’t get worse. It was bearable. I was more productive than I thought I’d be because I didn’t push myself. I gave myself an out for everything on my schedule. I forced nothing. I took nothing personally and I ate comfort food for dinner. I let myself be, I had my bad day, and I didn’t make anyone else uncomfortable in the process. My day ended up being grey instead of black.

And it ended better than it started.

Two bowls of cereal have that power.

Change the Chant

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Anyone who has anxiety will tell you that it’s very real and very dumb. Your brain decides everything is terrible and despite your logical assertions that everything is in fact fine, your brain disagrees. Endlessly.

I have several ways to cope with my anxiety because some days it’s worse than others. With the new day job in retail, learning the specifics of this job (a lot of retail is the same, but every store has their own style), and the drastically increased face-to-face interactions with humans, my anxiety has definitely been worse.

One of the consequences of my anxiety going on a rage is that I don’t sleep and/or don’t sleep well. Sleep is sort of important to my well-being, as it is for most people. Due to my recent health issues, it’s been very important.

One of the ways that I cope with my anxiety is through chanting mantras. It’s a quick and easy way to calm my mind and the anxiety in the moment. It’s also very helpful at slowing down the mental chatter before sleep. The rhythm of the words soothes me and the words themselves plant pleasantness in my brain.

The mantras have been getting a workout due to the new day job and the chaos therein. The Wal-Mart in town is closing, our business has dramatically increased, and it’s been slow going getting more help and more hours to compensate for it. My anxiety has been zinging.

So, it’s no wonder that the mantras I’ve always used have been recently overused and have stopped working.

It’s not ideal, for sure. There is no rest when I come home from a long, hectic shift, go to sleep, and my dreams put me right back at work. I don’t enjoy working the same shift twice.

After a few rough nights, I realized that maybe the solution wasn’t too far from my old tricks.

The old mantras didn’t seem to work anymore. Maybe a new one would? A mantra specifically geared towards releasing the anxiety associated with work. I tried it for a few nights and it…helped? I still dreamed about work, but instead of reliving my shift or fighting not to dream about work, I just let it roll. The dreams weren’t as intense and didn’t last very long before I moved on to my usual dream weirdness (I was involved in a heist that used plastic wrap and wasn’t nearly as clever as everyone thought it was; we all should have been caught). In short, the new mantra has helped me reclaim at least a somewhat more restful night.

Once things with the day job smooth out, it’ll go into the coping toolbox with the rest of the mantras.

But until then, I’ll chant away.