panther's lair

chapter three of my huge tome on fixing my broken pea-brain discusses how to diagnose your moods. of course- to really be diagnosed, you should see a doctor or therapist of course- but the thing is, i have already been diagnosed. anywho, from what i can tell, i am giving my all in terms of collecting anxiety disorders. apparently, it is a goal of mine to eventually suffer from all of them.

all kidding aside, i do have too many anxiety problems.

the first section is indeed on anxiety and panic disorders- and they start with the granddaddy of all anxiety disorders- generalized anxiety disorder.

people with generalized anxiety disorder tend to feel anxious and tense all day, regardless of what is going on. things can be going well, they can be going poorly- but either way, someone like me will worry. hell, i'll be tense come rain or shine. some people think it is good to worry all the time- that it motivates you. it is true that a little anxiety can help spur you into action- but excessive anxiety can actually have the opposite effect. it can completely paralyze you. the way it seems to usually work with me is that i wake up feeling anxious, so then i start frantically thinking, trying to figure out what i would be worried about...and i can always come up with so many reasons to be nervous...which makes me more nervous...yet another viscious cycle that i seem to currently be trapped in. well- i am working on breaking free from this too. but in short- boy howdy do i have the symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder.

the next one the book talks about is social phobia. i do not have full blown problem with this, but i definitely have lots of social anxiety. it is weird how i can teach in front of a class, but i can barely tolerate being around people i do not know well in a social setting. in fact, sometimes i completely avoid others at all costs. one problem with this is that once you start avoiding people, your brain starts to convince you that they must really be scary or you wouldn't be ignoring the ringing telephone or hiding in your house. so- with more avoidance comes more anxiety, which brings more avoidance...and so forth. you can probably see where this is going. oh, and one major problem with social anxiety, is that when you feel nervous, you start acting odd- and people misinterpret your behavior all the time. i have been called stuck up before when it was just that i was terribly afraid. so yeah, i have some social anxiety.

there are also simple phobias- and i have a few of those (and i seem to be trying to create more or something...not on purpose, at least, not consciously). i am terrified of birds. absolutely terrified. but- i am not as bad as i used to be- i can now go outside, and i can go into pet stores that have birds- but i am always on the lookout for the nasty little feathered monsters. so i have worked on that phobia a long time ago to make me at least able to function like a fairly normal person in that regard...but when they fly at me, or when i see one in an unexpected place- if you are near me, chances are i will use you as a shield. i don't even think, just grab the nearest body and put them between me and the vicious sparrow. i am also afraid of blood (especially the idea of internal bleeding, or any time that someone can bleed so much that a small (or large) pool of blood forms). creeps me out. actually, i am pretty all around terrified of doctors (especially hospitals)- i am scared of the building, the equipment, the doctors themselves...needles. so when it comes to body stuff- blood and internal organs- i am squeamish as all get out. i almost pass out when i have to have a needle put in me (but then i get my nose pierced...i did that when i had a better grasp on my anxiety- right now...no way in hell would someone come at me with a needle like that). tattoos are also scary because of the needle part...but somehow i don't really equate getting a tattoo with getting blood drawn. i don't much care for heights- it isn't a terrible phobia necessarily, but i do get pretty frightened. albinos freak me out (luckily i don't see them...except for very very very rarely. i may have only really seen about 2 albinos in real life). dead things creep me out. clowns- good lord man, who isn't scared of clowns. so do i have trouble with phobias? indeed...indeed i do.

one i do not seem to show much evidence of is panic disorder. i have had panic attacks, but no full out ones (i have no idea how i have always managed to calm down enough before i am completely panicked...i guess i am getting a little better at dealing). but i don't seem to just have them randomly...so that is one disorder that i do not own in the anxiety spectrum.

agoraphobia- according to this book, it is the fear of being in open spaces or of traveling alone. other books (more recent ones) say it is actually the fear of having panic attacks in unsafe places. regardless of how you actually define it though, the symptoms are the same- you have a person who never leaves their home. i do not currently have this, but i definitely have tendencies towards this. anytime things get hard, i want to withdraw, i want to stay in my home with my cats. everything else is overstimulating. who knows also, if i might get all anxious- i'd rather do that at home. i don't want to burst into tears at a store- if i am going to do that, i want to be home. since my dad died, and my friend died, and everything else- i have had to really fight myself against becoming agoraphobic. for awhile, when i was really in danger of slinking into my home and never coming out again- i would force myself to leave the house for about half an hour a day at least. i would try to make myself do at least one thing that required interacting with someone other than the sweet one or the boy (and really, other than my close friends who are not threatening to me at all). so i would go to a store, or on the days that i had to teach that would count as my out of the house adventure for the day. sadly, it isn't all that much easier to leave my house still- some days it is a little better, but i often just still want to hole up here- watching movies all day every day. so- i don't have this, but i could probably easily have trouble with this if i don't watch myself.

obsessive compulsive disorder- here is another one that i used to not really have, but the older i get the more ocd i seem to become. it is almost like i am swapping the anxiety disorders, just putting them through the rotation. i check the door a few times before i am convinced it is locked. i definitely have some obsessions- the thing i am mostly lacking is the compulsions...however, i do have some small compulsions. i count stairs. actually, i count a lot of things, always have i think. but not so much in an ocd way- i think i started doing stuff like that long ago so that i could have something to focus on and not have to make eye contact or talk to other people.

hypochondriasis- this one i don't think i have at all. hypochondriacs tend to visit the doctor on a regular basis, always convinced they are dying or suffering from some serious disease. i usually assume most of my physical symptoms aren't due to a terrible disease, but to the anxiety and depression. i get so stressed out, i get so anxious, and i carry a lot of it inside. i let it build up and fester. this raises blood pressure, increases headaches, all sorts of stuff. it lowers your immune system's ability to fight off disease.

so yeah- i have a lot of trouble with anxiety. in various forms and ways...but a great deal of my trouble stems from that damn anxiety.

the next session is on mood disorders- and i do have major depressive disorder. you lose interest in things you once found enjoyable. you feel sad, your appetite goes wonky, sleep gets all messed up (these often happy with anxiety too- they really go nicely together). you feel worthless, guilty.

there is also dysthymic disorder, which is a milder form of depression. i don't know if i would be thought to have that when my depression is more under control. i do have the symptoms of it- but then again, they also go along with depression. this is a generally where you are just unhappy, pessimistic.

aren't people like me a hoot to be around- lovely.

luckily, i don't have the mood disorders that involve mania (such as bipolar or cyclothymia). my doctor once thought i might have cyclothymia (mild bipolar), but after awhile he decided it wasn't mania but anxiety.

and thus begins the next chapter- i am now on page 61, out of about 700...but still. progress is progress. chapter 4 is the last chapter in the first part of the book (the first part is on understanding your moods). there wasn't much to really say on that chapter- it is basically talking about whether or not you *should* change the way you feel. (isn't that a should statement...are they *ever* appropriate?).

the book talks about how in life there are frustrations and disappointments and it makes some sense that you would not always be optimistic or happy. however- it all boils down to a balance. sometimes negative feelings are good, or healthy- and sometimes they aren't. take this for example- do most people punch a wall after dropping nachos on the floor? probably not. what if you drop nachos on the floor after a bunch of other things go wrong that day? you are already on edge, already upset- and you drop the nachos- should that make you hit something? i kind of doubt it.

in the book, the author talks about how he had a patient who poured hot coffee on himself to distract himself from his feelings of worthlessness. i lose my job and fall into a year long funk. while feeling bad makes sense in many situations- i often feel way too bad, or feel bad about it for too long. to the point where i can't function in my life very well anymore.

people who don't have problems with depression or anxiety- they don't understand. just feel better, they say. those people, they have probably never stuck their head under water and inhaled in a rash attempt to try to drown. it is much more difficult to fix depression than "just feeling better." or when people say "don't worry about it." riiiight. not gonna happen. that is why i am torturing myself (and anybody who reads this) adn working so hard to learn to NOT feel like that. some people also underestimate the way depression really feels- they think it is like feeling a little down. no...depression is sitting for several hours in one spot, staring at the television that isn't even on- feeling slightly hungry but not getting up to do anything about it because it is too much trouble. where playing a game of solitaire on the computer becomes too much of an effort. when you can sleep for over 12 hours at a time. where you think things would be better if you didn't exist. where you look in the mirror and all you feel is hatred and disgust. try living there for a couple months- and then you can come and tell me to just get over it.

that is what the book is talking about - it isn't trying to fix healthy emotions- feeling sad because my dad died. that is very normal. however, having my dad die and then i wear the same exact pair of pants every time i leave the house for the entire summer- and spending the rest of my time in pjs- crying so hard that you vomit- being unable to find a job...i need to learn how to deal with stuff in a better way so that every time something bad happens to me, it doesn't take me several years to start functioning normally again.

so, the book lists some questions to help you decide whether or not you should accept, express, or change your feelings.

how long have i been feeling this way? all my life in some ways, but it comes in waves. around last october it started getting really bad again- and has only gotten worse (until i really started trying to get better- even though i am in the early stages of trying to fix myself, i still think i have made some progress). i feel guilty about things i said or did long ago- even several years ago. the book talks about a woman who had an affair 20 years earlier, and she still felt guilty about it. i feel guilty about things i did as a child, over 20 years ago. the book has a sentence that says "even a convicted felon is usually set free long before that much time has expired." when i think about it that way, it does help me to try and let go of some of that guilt.

am i doing something constructive about the problem, or am i simply brooding and avoiding it? until recently, i was brooding and avoiding it. now i am making efforts to fix what i let slide over the last year. i had become so hopeless, i guess i had pretty much given up for awhile. the book has another sentence that really struck me- "we can only feel healed and whole if we will allow ourselves to feel broken." i think was i was doing was feeling broken- but feeling so guilty about feeling bad- that i never resolved anything.

are my thoughts and feelings realistic? some are, some aren't. so i am trying to learn to tell the difference between them. i know i often blow things way out of proportion, overreact- make things worse by avoiding dealing with it...it is very handy for me to have that list of common distortions in my thinking- i can use that to sometimes figure out how realistic i am being.

will it be helpful or hurtful if i express my feelings? well, i almost always feel a little better after writing, so usually it is helpful- even if those feelings are unrealistic. by expressing them, either on here or to my wife or a friend- it helps me see if they are realistic or not. it helps me keep things in a little more perspective. of course, the way you express your feelings also makes a difference- screaming at a police officer for giving you a ticket, even when you are furious, is probably a very bad idea.

am i making myself unhappy about a situation that is beyond my control? oh yeah, i am doing that big time. one thing i am really bad at is getting really irritated by things other people do- things i have no control over. why do i waste so much energy getting mad because someone tries to cut in line at walmart?

am i avoiding a problem and denying that i'm really upset about it? again, i was avoiding it until recently- yet, i didn't deny that it bothered me. in fact, i think i even knew that it bothered me and that was precisely why i was avoiding it. of course, one way that i do often deny that i am upset is when i get very angry. it isn't a conscious refusal to admit i am upset, i often don't realize it. often when i get really anxious about something, i get really short tempered and angry. sometimes when it is pointed out that i am probably anxious about something- i think about it and realize i am. we have to move in the next few months- and i don't want to. i am terrified to. first i just got very very angry at the boy's dad because he got a job in a nearby town and the commute is too far to do it for long. my wife and i still work in this town though- so it looks like the compromise will be to move to a city that is between the two where we work. but i got so damn mad at him for all this- when in reality, a lot of my anger is probably anxiety.

are my expectations for the world realistic? apparently not- until i can somehow make everyone act more polite and stop acting so stupidly- so yeah, i guess i have unrealistic expectations about the world. i often think that things should go the way i want- but they often don't and there isn't a darn thing i can do about it. so why get so worked up over it? need to work on that.

are my expectations for myself realistic? i have no idea. i seem to have lost the ability to really tell what i am capable of, what i can't really do. right now, i don't really have any expectations for myself. unless you count wanting to feel better as an expectation. i don't know how realistic it is to think that i can feel better- i think it might be possible. i know i have climbed out of a horrible depression before, so there is some evidence that i can do it again. but i also don't have very much confidence right now and worry that i might think i will be able to do a better job than i can actually do.

am i feeling hopeless? yes. yes i am. however, now that i am aware of how hopeless i feel, i keep telling myself i am wrong. that it isn't hopeless. i don't believe it yet- but you have to keep telling yourself. eventually, i might start to believe.

am i experiencing a loss of self-esteem? indeed. very much indeed.

and as a parting thought- here is another sentence in the book that makes some sense to me- "if you try too hard to fight a problem within yourself or someone else, the very act of fighting will often create resistance. sometimes when you accept the problem and stop trying so hard, things will suddenly begin to change."

i think about my anger here. for years, i have tried to deny that i have a lot of anger. i have tried so hard to hold on to this idea that i am a peaceful person. now i realize that i am a mostly peaceful person, but that i *do* have a lot of anger. A LOT. now that i am accepting that more openly, i am finding that it may be just a little easier to keep it under control.

anywho, therapy hour has been long long long today, and i am just done now.