Tag Archive | anxiety

An Enormous Weight

Dec31

I feel it…the weight…the weight of being a mom…the weight of being a wife…the weight of working full time…the weight of working full time at home while my kids are learning from home…the weight of being a contributing member of society…the weight of the state of the world…the weight of the Global Pandemic…the weight of the Covid-19. I have it. I caught it. We took so many precautions, tried to be so careful. This SUCKS! There is really no better word for this situation. Sucks…it feels like the wind has been literally sucked out of my lungs. I have asthma and I feel like I cannot take a a full deep breath. It feels like there is a small weight sitting at the top of my lungs that is only opening a part of the way to let the air in. Sucks…it feels like the desire to play with my kids has been sucked out of my life. I am sad, depressed, angry, anxious and so many other emotions that I cannot even name at this point. Sucks…It feels like all the thoughts have been sucked out of my brain. I cannot focus. I cannot think straight. I feel like I cannot even process what is happening.

My husband has also tested positive…My children both tested negative, thankfully but it is like a double edged sword. I am over the moon that they tested negative and there was no chance that Elliot infected anyone at school. But at the same time, I am slightly disappointed. If they did have it, they would be asymptomatic and getting through it without issue. Now I will terrified that they will catch it from us…AND…they have to quarantine for 24 DAYS!! That is a very long time to be isolated from the outside world. I am an extroverted extrovert. I need people around me. I need to interact with the outside world. Even if it is just to run to Wawa to get a coffee or a gallon of milk. I need to see people and community around me. That is the whole reason that I chose a career in HR, to be with and work with people.

I love my children, with everything that I am but 3.5 weeks without visitors, without being with people at all, for that long will drive anyone crazy! All day, everyday I think about worry about this virus and everything that is happening. Am I doing enough to protect my family, my children, myself? Am I making the right decisions to balance their safety and their sanity?

Right now we are waiting for test results to come back for many of my family members and I feel responsible for this. Though, I had no way of knowing that I had been exposed…as I said earlier we were taking precautions…when my aunt tested negative we thought we were in the clear, I had no idea that you still needed to quarantine for 10-14 days. Had I known that I would not have seen her…I would have known that there was still a chance to catch it.

They don’t tell you everything…the media…the people in charge…the powers that be…they only tell you what scares you…they only tell you enough to keep you under their thumb…they only tell what they want you to know…so you think think how they want you to think…so you will feel how they want you to feel. I am struggling so hard with what I am feeling and I cannot really make sense of any of this. I don’t know how to reconcile what I am feeling with everything around me.

I should be enjoying this time with my kids, I have 1.5 weeks off from work and we are all quarantined together, I should be excited to have this time with them. I should be planning all these different things to do with them, but I just don’t have it in me. I just really going through the motions of what I should be doing as their mom.

I hope and pray that 2021 brings change, serenity, hope, and peace. Each of these are desperately needed…by all of humanity.

Living with Anxiety

Dec11

And so it begins…The sun sets and the knots in my stomach begin to grow larger than they were during the day. Let’s be honest, when you suffer from anxiety the knots are always there. In some way or another, they are there. Always nervous or concerned or anticipating or overwhelmed about what is going to happen that day, the night, that hour or that moment. This is how I live, in a constant state of worry. I worry about how my daughter is doing in school. She is a very active child, I would almost go so far as to say she may have ADHD, though I am no medical professional to diagnose that, but she seems to exhibit the signs and symptoms. It wouldn’t surprise me if she did have it, my whole family seems to have it. I worry about her ability to focus on anything, her ability to listen and I worry about her behavior. I worry about how she will handle the world when she grows up. I worry that I am not doing right by her as her mother. I worry that I am making the wrong decisions, that I am too strict or not strict enough. 

I worry about my marriage. Am I doing enough as a wife? I am doing too much or not enough? Is my husband happy? I worry that I will say or do something that will cause us to fight. I worry that we will fight and he will leave. I worry that I am not enough. I worry that we are not enough. I worry that our family is not enough. That our home is not enough.

I worry about my newborn son. He is only a week old but I worry about him already. Before he was born I would wake up in a cold sweat that something was wrong with him in my belly or that something would go wrong when I went into labor. Now I worry that he is not getting enough sleep. I worry that he is eating too much or not enough. I worry that he will wake up in the middle of the night and wake up everyone else in the house. I worry that when that happens my daughter will wake up and not go back to sleep and that my husband will get angry with us. 

I worry about my career. Am I in a career that I want to be in? Is it providing enough for me and my family? Am I doing my job well? Am I doing the very best that I can be doing everyday? What more can I be doing to excel at my job? What does my team need from me to succeed? 

I even worry about when I will die. It is my greatest fear. I worry about the day that I will no longer be on this earth to be with my family. I worry that it will happen way too early and that my husband and children will be left all alone. I worry that my time will come and my children will not be prepared for the world. I worry that my husband will not be OK without me. I worry that he WILL be OK without me. I worry that the world will forget me. I worry that my children will not have someone to look after them. 

I worry about my extended family. I worry about people that I have never met but have seen in passing or on TV or on a viral video online. I worry about so many things ALL OF THE TIME. And it is truly exhausting.

I use the term worry because it is the easiest way to make you understand the feelings and thoughts that are constantly running through my brain and my heart. All of these thoughts and feelings are not necessarily irrational. Most of them, to some degree, are pretty legitimate. I know that so many have had some of the same thoughts, fears, and worries. What makes it different for me is that fact that I cannot turn these feelings off. They constantly run through me. Run through my brain all day and at times all night. I have stopped sleeping well because my brain doesn’t fully shut off. In fact, the silence of night is when these thoughts are often the loudest. I know deep down that one fight will not cause my husband to leave, or the baby crying in the middle of the night will not make him angry. I know that I am doing the best that I can for my children and they will be grow to be strong, happy and healthy adults. But knowing that does not stop the fear and dread from creeping in just a little. That is just how anxiety works. I cannot control it. It just is. 

Living with anxiety is like living with giant knot in the pit of your stomach in constant fear that it will unravel and strangle you.