Tag: pain

Bored and Happy To Be

June 16, 2020

I have reached a new phase of my mental health journey.

A year ago, I was just beginning to experience new levels of anxiety, and what I can now see as Relationship OCD and Scrupulosity.

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Me, this time last year- when I started to descend quickly into an abyss of self-destruction- always tired and ignoring my needs

I was always getting triggered and my mind descending into chaos. Not being able to relax and be alone anymore. Eventually, from the moment I woke up I was attacked mercilessly with intrusive thoughts, and sometimes I was up in the night panicking at fake threats or possibilities.

Now, I am… well, bored. And I have never been more happy to be so.

I say bored because my mind spent an entire year – 2019 was a dark year – with obsessive thoughts that eventually gave way to compulsions, which fueled high anxiety from dawn until dusk.

Now,  my mind is unfamiliar and clear.

Through lots of work with my therapist (I found someone who specializes in what I needed; I recommend this if you can find one); joined an online course and community focusing on Relationship OCD (Check out Awaken Into Love here); worked for reconciliation in relationship that needed repairing; resolving some of my anger and disappointment towards God; tending to my dilapidated physical health; seeking out various literature and resources; and leaning hard on my loved ones… As a result, I have experienced levels of mental boredom and healthy emotional regulation that I don’t think I have before.

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Healthy in Spring 2020. Reveling in the glow emanating from a more healed, whole, and renewed mind and body. Thank you, Lord!

When I say I’m happy, it doesn’t mean I’ve found some crazy enlightenment in anything I’ve done, per se. I just am more WHOLE. I have grace towards myself when I fail, get anxious, give into a compulsion, or regress. Therefore, I am able to be more understanding towards others as well.

I am doing the work. I am able to decide which thoughts to entertain, let be, or reject as ridiculous.

I am able to feel awful, sad, or even depressed without it having to mean something huge. And, for me, I haven’t been this happy in a long time- happy because I am taking charge of my life by controlling what I can and letting go of what I can’t. My trust in God is growing as I see how he takes care of me when I let Him.

I have been able to set boundaries with people- I can decide how I am to be treated and what I won’t tolerate. This doesn’t mean I reject the other person, it can actually safeguard and improve a relationship/friendship.

I still deal with anxiety, but am managing it significantly better than even 2 months ago.

I will probably turn my focus for Anxious Anne outwards more, since I have more mental capacity to do so. I want to do more features, interviews, and articles relating to mental health, art, and faith.

Let’s see where this goes!

-Anxious Anne

Music featured:

I created a strings cover of a favorite song called “Take Heart” by Hillsong-

 

Decapitate Me, Please

April 21, 2020
If you haven’t yet read it, please read my interview and art showcase with my friend and artist Hannah Carson- Interview: “When Her Eyes Grew In” Art Series by Hannah Carson

I have lived in ignorance of the effects of the quarantine on my life…

We are reaching week number six of the mandated social distancing disorder. I am truly starting to feel it. Even though I am more fortunate than some, with more of a structure to my life, still. I feel like I am floating through life these days. I have this image of a grand, celestial calendar and I am just floating through the weeks and days, inertia carrying me forward.

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“Time-space Distancing 2020” by Bethany Porter

At first, as an introvert, I enjoyed the lack of social pressure to go do certain things. My social energy didn’t have to be spread as thin and I could just focus on a very small group of people.

However, about three weeks in, I started to ruminate on different thoughts- usually relating to people in my life whose life has been affected by the social distancing. Next, someone who had been a fixture in my near daily life for the last couple of years died suddenly.

The sudden death mixed with the uncertainty of the quarantine and it’s compounding effect on my and other people’s progress in life started to wear away at my confidence and my ease.

Certain compulsions have come back- some trite ones being eating more dessert and watch TV to emotionally cope, but some more detrimental. I am pretty sure some of us can relate.

There have been some positive effects, too. I have had more opportunities to learn some valuable skills that are pluses as an artist/musician in this digital age. I have had time to attend to some to do list items and finally purchase a shag rug to cover my cheap, thin carpeted floors. I have developed wonderful evening stretching and physical therapy routines. I have also spent some quality time with my roommates and we have bonded in ways we never could have without the quarantine.

My mind is buzzing as the end of the social order (well, who knows if it will be the end) is fast approaching. This will not only mark the end of a very difficult yet enlightening period, but also the beginning of an EVEN MORE uncertain period where anything can happen. The virus could come back. We may see our life very slowly returning to normal, or NEVER returning to normal. Actions long planned could dissolve, adapt, or be completely replaced.

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Excuse the language… but it’s apt to my brain lately!! “All will go to crap” is the general feeling.

I will say I am grateful for the things I’ve learned. But my mind is starting to build up with all sorts of thoughts and feelings – feeding the anxieties – and is weighing me down and causing my neck to hurt. I am ready for gravity to come back and these thoughts, plans, and intents to be able to move forward.

In the meantime, someone, decapitate me, please.

-Anxious Anne