the blessing disguised as an anxiety attack!

I will be starting an anxiety disorders group therapy at my methadone clinic in a couple weeks. I am revising my group therapy outline this morning and will bring it into the clinic to be reviewed; what was a total impossibility 8 weeks ago is almost a reality! I am living proof that there is life after anxiety hits you in a public setting. A torture that should be kept behind the walls of Guantanamo Bay, was played out under harsh florescent lights in a very public crowded setting. There is nothing worse than having a panic attack to rival ALL panic attacks in a public place. I don't know what is worse, the loss of self control, or the loss of self respect, but I was blessed by both that day! It has been 8 weeks since that day and now I am a few weeks away from turning that crisis into an opportunity to help those afflicted as I was and am and probably always shall be. By virtue of my mental illness I have an understanding that undergraduates simply reading books on anxiety don't have. The depths of despair my anxiety has brought me to dictate the heights of successfully treating other sufferers I am now envisioning. I hit a rock bottom so low that I knew it would take an act of God to drill any deeper. But it was because this bottom was so devastatingly low that I could look up and get a view of the sky many are not privy to. The sky that said unequivocally, you have nowhere to go now but UP! And so I began my ascent to the land of the free and the home of the brave, that is the life I once took for granted. I do not take my life for granted anymore. I am grateful every time I put my hands out in front of me and see little to no trembling there. I am grateful when I drink my methadone at the clinic without throwing three quarters of it on the ground because I am shaking so violently. I am grateful when I open my mouth to share in a 12 step meeting and I don't start hyperventilating. I am grateful when I don't spend an hour everyday trying to distinguish between a legitimate heart attack or just a typical panic attack. A month ago my confidence in my ability to stay calm or else calm myself down was non-existent. Now I am able to depend on myself to do this. For a while I needed certain people who I lovingly deemed "my xanax," or "my clonopin," to be physically present when I had to go to the methadone clinic or some other anxiety provoking environment. I still benefit from their presence but deep down I know that if they were not able to physically be there and I had to go, I would go and I would get through. Every week that goes by I see new signs of progress. There are so many priceless gifts this panic meltdown nuclear attack 8 weeks ago has brought me. A lot in my life has gone back to "normal." That is, I am quite a bit more relaxed, not as guarded and vigilant at every waking moment, with one eye always on the sky for that proverbial other shoe about to drop. Though I feel like I can trust myself to be "okay" in whatever environment I am in, or whatever challenge I am working through, I also know not to get too confident. I don't take this "return to business as usual" for granted. Though I am not constantly afraid a panic attack will strike again, I also don't take for granted the comfortability I feel in my own skin and my place in the world. I feel I have claimed most of my power back from my panic disorder. I am Empowered. 2 months ago I was powerless, the anxiety was in charge and I felt it virtually every moment of every day. I thought I was free while I slept but it would be there in the morning close as my cat by my face when I awoke. I would be foolish to take for granted my empowerment, and my feeling of being strong enough to go where I want to go when I want to go there, knowing that if I feel anxious I have the tools and the power to talk myself down. I don't live in the past of 2 months ago today, but I don't forget it either. Anyway, I am brave and I am free and 2 months ago today I was neither of those things nor did I think I would ever again feel brave or free. And today I am actually GRATEFUL that  8 weeks ago the blue sky opened up and a grey cloud of anxiety rained and hailed and thundered down on my poor afflicted head. I am grateful because now I don't take any aspect of my Empowerment over my mental health issues for granted. I am grateful because I am a stronger and wiser woman today. I am grateful for the new friendships I have forged with the people who reached out to me and accepted me when I was at my weakest. I am grateful for the deeper bonds I have developed with professionals caring for me. I am grateful to have seen that sky from rock bottom where there was truly nowhere left to go but crystal clear blue infinity. And today I am grateful because my anxiety disorder group at the methadone clinic will commence in a couple weeks. I will finally be given a platform by which I can help other sufferers. And that is vindicating. To discover that my darkest most painful past is my greatest asset of all, is simply vindicating. Anxiety disorders are such isolating and sometimes shameful disorders. I urge you to come out of the closet by seeking help from professionals or others you trust. With help and ONLY with help will you be able to get through the worst of it. And when you are in control of your disease and not vice versa you will discover a newfound appreciation of your everyday life. You will be free to go where you want when you want to go. You will be brave enough to try things your anxiety once dictated you to never try. You will know that in every crisis, if recognized and properly dealt with is an opportunity. You will know the joy there is in using your pain to bring healing to someone else in need. I can't wait to start my anxiety group and I will most definitely keep all my readers out there informed every step of the way. My worst ever anxiety attack has been one of my best blessings; I never thought I would say this! I wish such blessings in disguise to find you along your journey today as well!

looking back with gratitude!

Hi People! I have finally come far enough along to pause and look back. About two months ago I was hit with the major anxiety attack that prompted me to take action and also start this blog. To refresh your memory and/or my own, I was at the methadone clinic standing in line. The line was long and inching up ever so slowly to first place I felt my anxiety inching up to attack me. I felt acutely aware of all the people around me and the unbearably fluorescent lights. These two elements seemed to feed off of each other. The lights became more unforgivably harsh and the noise of the crowd felt like black helicopters of paranoia hovering around me watching me, staring at me, surveilling me. One of the aspects of my anxiety is that I feel like everyone can tell I am anxious. Therefore in this crowded setting, it meant that it wasn't just a couple people watching me, but a line about 30 deep, sixty eyes ALL on me. And the lighting only made my anxiety feel, to me, even more obvious. By the time I was two people away from first place in line I had to squat to the floor and concentrate on breathing. I feared i would never stand up again. This is when it hit me, or rather, I hit it: the rockbottom of anxiety. I who once surged from third place to second to cross the line in first place, setting the 1000 meter record in track during my high school years, was now finding it impossible to withstand being first place in line at the methadone clinic. I was finding it impossible to stand up, let alone walk across the finish line to the medicating window to drink my methadone. All of this because of my anxiety that grows in the dark places and then reveals its brutal face under harsh fluorescents before a crowd in which many people could judge me negatively out of ignorance of mental disorders. Finally facing the moment I feared, I failed. I failed to drink my entire cup of methadone without spilling three quarters of it. I who had so much promise in my youth, a record setting athlete, and enrolled in a top tier woman's college, had finally succumbed to the anxiety that I once turned to heroin to control. I was clean and sober so really felt every painful second of this failure. Later after processing this incident I realized the victory; I am clean and sober and feeling every second of this painful failure. If I were still getting high, I would have the luxury of not feeling an ounce of this regret, or a bead of anxiety provoked sweat on the brow. But I AM feeling it, every brutal bead of sweat, every hand wringing ounce of regret. And this is what prompted me to start this blog. This realization that there is satisfaction in feeling my anxiety because it is in feeling it that my self confidence is redeemed. Every second of a well felt anxiety attack is another moment of glory for the soldier that you are, albeit a soldier on the lonesome battlefield where it is just you and your anxiety. Whoever you are, I urge you to acknowledge your anxiety. Say, Hello anxiety! I know you are there. No need to run. I am crippled. I am a spineless puddle of anxiety on the floor. But I recognize you. And in recognizing you, I call you out of your shadows. And in calling you out, I make it clear that you are separate from me. And now that you are separate from me, I can do battle. And by doing battle I mean living my life on my own terms, not being controlled by the liar that you are. The liar that tells me I cannot withstand fluorescent lights. That I will die if I am in a line of thirty people. That everyone in the world right now is in the eyes of this crowd, under these harshest lights, judging me, rejecting me, done with me, till I am ruined and waiting to die. Today I realized how far I have come. My path has been tough, but simple. I have simply dealt with my Tuesday methadone bottle pick up day by accepting my anxiety. When I start feeling it creep in, I acknowledge it, and just go back to my breathing exercises, or refocusing by conversing with my counselor or friend, or repeating a Bible verse in my head. I do this because otherwise I will give my power over to my anxiety and this will result in the epic meltdown of two months ago. Today was proof, that there is life after a major anxiety attack like I suffered. With help, a lot of help and time, there is success. Today I spoke to my counselor and to my friend, but I didn't really need these interactions to keep myself calm. I breathed, but I didn't have to focus on my breathing to stave off hyperventilation. I didn't have to chant scripture in my head either. I just felt okay with myself being in this setting which two months ago I was jumping out of my very own skin. My shaking when I held my cup of methadone was probably like a 4 on a scale of 1 to 10. Two months ago, my shaking was at a 12. For the first time in two months, I felt safe in this setting which I have felt safe in for years. I am reclaiming this setting for myself where anxiety sought to claim it for itself. I stake my own Amercian flag in this ground, victory. I see anxiety so I don't have to become it. Just keep reminding yourself of this. Just because you feel anxious, doesn't mean you have to be anxious. You just have to be yourself. Don't let feeling anxious become you, you are worthy of being yourself. Grateful for my counselor, friends, 12 step meetings, and professionals in my life. Today was validation that with time and work anything is possible! If your anxiety feels impossible to overcome today, just be in the moment. Because believe me, in this moment you are okay. Don't look beyond this moment. In this moment, life isn't all that great, but it's life and that's something. That's really something! Life is not something to have an anxiety attack over, life's just too short for a lifelong anxiety attack. Acknowledge your anxiety BUT embrace LIFE! Good luck and I shall soldier ON, jp