My journey through pain - 9. Chapter 9 - Breaking down or sweeping the floor

I guess sometimes it is easy to underestimate the emotional impact certain things will have on the mind. For me, at least, that’s what happened. Now that the holidays are here, family reunions take place. We catch up with others, find out how they’ve been doing… And we have to tell them how we are doing. In my case, my family is not very big but we are very close. Most of the bad stuff that’s happened to me in the last few months I have only discussed with my mom, but now that the family has come together, it was time to tell someone else about the bad stuff. Not because I felt I had to – but because it’s what’s fair, and besides, my sister could already tell that something was wrong even though she lives hundreds of miles away. I elected to share only now because we could talk face-to-face.

It was hard. Harder than I expected. Throughout the weeks, I had come to a place where I had sort of reached an odd sort of equilibrium with much of what has happened. It had become a sort of background to my days, along with the horrible anxiety attacks, the panic that sometimes sets in, the bad nights, the worse mornings, and so on and so forth. But having to explain to someone else just what I was going through – what I still am going through – forced me to look at the situation from the outside once again. It made everything seem fresh and painful again, and even though I was calm as I spoke, and even though I received all the support I could have hoped for, I still feel awful. It’s like I’m back to day one of all of these debilitating psychological symptoms. It’s like I awoke the trauma from its slumber and now it stirs in the dark recesses of my mind just like it did at the beginning. The bad feelings have not been quite as severe, but they are there, painful as ever. And now especially, when my daily routine has been forced to change a little bit because of family reunions, and with the overbearing weight of the pressure to be joyful and jolly now that the holidays are here, it’s rough. It feels like I am unbalanced and I’m struggling to regain my proper footing but getting tripped all the time by Christmas carols and early nightfall and the cold and my own thoughts.

Nevertheless.

I’m fighting to be well again emotionally, every second of every day it seems. And something I have managed to do even despite this situation of the past couple days has been to not give in to hopelessness. I have always gotten kind of down during Christmas, because, and I’m sure many others can relate, it seems like everyone is supposed to be super happy but I do have some bad memories of years which were not so good for one reason or another. This year is especially tough, but I have come to the conclusion that when I feel bad I essentially have two choices. Number one: do nothing, curl into a ball in my bed and suffer. Number two: do something. Something productive, or something fun, something positive. Anything. So today, and just as I have chosen each day since my anxiety took off like it did, I chose option number two.

I dragged myself to the gym even though when I woke up it felt like I wouldn’t have the strength to go. I did my full workout even though I kept thinking that I should just give up and go back home. I felt weak, but not physically weak – it’s a weakness of the heart, of dealing with too many negative things for too long a time I think. And yet being physically active, and proving my doctor right, the negativity receded a little bit. Maybe it’s endorphins at work, maybe it’s just the satisfaction of being active, but all the same the day always feels less dark after I’m done. Then I came home and the anxiety bubbled back up, feeling as though I was drowning in it. It’s hard to be logical and think when you feel like that, because all you can see and hear are your own dark thoughts, but despite all of that I decided to do something about it. I was home alone since the rest of the family had gone out shopping, and I started sweeping the floor.

It’s something so simple, yet it helped me. I swept and vacuumed. After a few minutes I felt like some music, which is itself a small miracle since I tend to avoid music when I feel down because just makes me feel worse. But since I was busy, it was a good way to distract myself. After sweeping I did the dishes, tidied up here and there. Completely mundane activities which many of us do without a second thought, or even avoid doing just because house work might seem annoying. But for me, it was a way to occupy myself and avoid the anxiety for a little while. I have often heard that being busy helps, and today I saw that it’s true. That’s not to say that it will always work, but for me at least it did and I do feel a small measure of satisfaction at challenging my sort of automatic avoidance response to a hard episode of anxiety like this one. Instead of suffering in silence and doing nothing, I cleaned up the house to the rhythm of music. It was a small victory, but I will remember it because my days now are made of those tiny victories that help me see the light in the middle of the darkness. I may feel like I have gone back to day one in terms of how anxious I feel, how sad, etc. but in reality I’m learning a lot and, even though right now it feels like the episode will never and I will always feel as awful as I feel right now, deep down I know that this will pass. I just have to hold on, and not give in to hopelessness.