Would any one like to join in an anxiety support thread?

[Heatherandmoss]

I’ve seen lots of posts recently about people having a bad time with their anxiety and I thought an on going thread might be good do people can bob on and offer and receive support, share tips and just generally empathise with some one going through the same thing.

I’ve had anxiety since I was about ten ( I realised after my psychiatrist was able to help me pin point my earliest memory of it)

I think there is a bit of misconception of anxiety as some people think it’s just general worry - but it’s not.

When my anxiety rears her head it’s so physical. I sweat, my face can go numb, pains in my chest. I have a feeling like some one is kicking my front door in and I’m scared for my life and I could just be hoovering. Anxiety jolts me awake when I’m asleep and it rolls down my body like thunder. It makes me catastrophize at 3am and my feet start rubbing against each other ( weird) My anxiety makes me walk in to the kitchen with my kids empty dinner plates and suddenly feel so so over whelmed I struggle for breath and tears leak out in a gasp of raw emotion - all done silently so my kids can’t hear me.

I’ve had to give up drinking alcohol because Jesus the anxiety the next day was shocking and lasted days until I suddenly stepped out the anxiety room.

My anxiety has been bad since November as I’ve got some things going and I’m worried my heart is going to pack in because of the extra ‘thud thud thud’ overtime it’s being doing!

Exercise does help me take the edge of sometimes. I nearly went to the GP the other day as it was rotten but at this moment of time I need to be switched on.

Today has not been to bad. I’m considering it a win.

So I’ve you’d like to join in or have some where to say ‘holy fuck it’s bad today’ hopefully more people will be here and you will know some one knows how bad your feeling.

Hi Flamingo, welcome to the thread. Sorry to hear that you and your family are struggling. It's been a tough year, hasn't it. Stress can have a massive impact on your memory. Maybe you need some time off work 💐

I'm here if you want to talk.

That's so kind of you. Thank you.
I'm hoping to speak to the doctor tomorrow. At the moment I feel I can't return to work. It's exhausted me and I need to be with my children instead of coming home late every night. I feel my relationship with them and my daughter in particular has suffered due to my hours.
I'm over thinking I know

You need to put your health and your children first. Hope you manage to make an appointment tomorrow 💐

My DD is 18, so I don't have to worry about doing long hours. Although she does find being home alone boring at times. I used to struggle when she was younger and I was doing 12 hour shifts in retail.

What work do you do?

flamingo40 sorry you are struggling. It’s s**t to feel like this. Do you have support IRL? I am a closet anxiety sufferer, so don’t verbalise it to others, have never sought help from it and hide in the darkness sobbing when it all gets too much. I have finally realised this week I need help as the fog won’t lift this time. I hope you can get help too

Hi flamingo 💐 I’m sorry you’ve got so much going on. Trying to keep our kids’ MH afloat while dealing with our own is just so exhausting. You never need to have anything specific to say etc on this thread btw - just say what you need to, this has really been a great support lately just being able to get my thoughts out in a place where I know everyone can understand - even if not the precise situation, we all get what it’s like to be stressed and anxious to such an extent 💐

I’ve had a nothing sort of day. I wasn’t especially hoping to be very productive but I hoped maybe better than this! However I’ve spent all day on the sofa playing a phone game. It feels like a shutdown after all the forms etc I’ve been doing, so I’m trying to just accept it and as DH pointed out, it is Sunday! So screw it, laziness rules.

In fact I started reading Resilient by Rick Hanson yesterday and the first chapter is about compassion, mainly to ourselves, so I’m trying to just be kind to myself, recognising that actually I’ve managed a lot of tasks this week and if I need a lot of downtime today that’s really ok.

iamsodone I am emerging from that closet! Dd has terrible anxiety and people always used to say but why? Where does she get it from? And I'd keep quiet. I'm now admitting that I also suffer horribly from anxiety, so many of my big life decisions have been made because of it - to my detriment.
I'm trying to be brave and tell people how I feel, as a role model to dd but also to force myself to confront it.
Having just been through a really bad patch, but still feeling anxious a lot, I'm considering longer term meds. The side effects have also put me off, I can't beat the thought of feeling worse before I feel better (sertraline nearly did for me) but I'm wondering if perhaps I start really slow perhaps I can avoid the worst?

Gp is due to call me for a review in 2 weeks so will chat with him then.

That book sounds good Sing. I like reading self help books. I'm in the middle of reading Lost Connections by Johann Hari. Yesterday I read The Things You See Only When You Slow Down by Haemin Sunim.

Feeling blue this evening. Just feel like there's too much to do this weekend. The weather's awful. Very windy and heavy rain.

loki I really enjoyed lost connections but it did make me sad - I think he's so right but as a society we are so far away from it and I can't see how I could make those connections whilst working full time, having kids and worrying about pensions/being able to provide for myself without having to work until I drop.

I know what you mean WLmum. For me it's not just time but also the inability to connect with people. Going as far back as school, I'm the kind of person that's on the outside, looking in. Saying that, I'm not painfully shy anymore, just awkward in social situations.

I’m sorry to hear your situation at the moment @flamingo40. can you grant yourself a bit more time off work to be around your family?

@Iamsodonewith2020 @WLmum Ive noticed in retrospect that when I started to open up about my struggles and my mental health that was probably one of the biggest turning points for me on the road to better management with myself, and greater self loved. I made a bit of a career about speaking out at one point, it’s certainly made me stronger. Talking openly about it makes it more ‘normal’ in a way.

@SingToTheSky after how productive you have been you certainly earned the lazy day. I hope it helped reset your mind some!

@Lokikitty I hope you feel brighter this week. I know the weather hasn’t helped much lately. We are due some lovely sunshine this week so I’m very much looking forward to that, I hope it helps lift your mood some!

My weekend has been good one the whole and even though anxiety has been boggling at me (another nightmare on Friday night I think??) me and my DP managed to get out on an 11 mile walk which was a good effort and I really enjoyed bein out of the house as I haven’t really been out much all year. Yesterday was just spent pottering about but we are good this weekend and I laughed loads. I’m looking forward to the next few weeks which are three shorter weeks at work with the bank holidays and the Easter holidays keeping busy so I won’t be sat in the house as much by myself with my own thoughts.

Morning!
I am super tired today - just couldn’t sleep for hours. I even got up for a bit. I’d stay in bed but I’m hungry 😳

I have therapy at 10, I’m really looking forward to it as I’ve not had an appointment since December and I have so much positive stuff to catch her up on like the volunteering. For ages therapy was obviously dealing with mostly negative past stuff but we always talked about values within that and it now feels like we’ve moved on to focusing on the future, which I’ve never really felt able to do in life before.

Ironically though I’m a little anxious that I don’t have enough of a reason for an appointment because other than the anxiety around moving forward (the usual “what if I fail” stuff) I sort of don’t feel like I “need” it in the same way I used to?! FFS I can’t win sometimes 😂

Well I have done it. Have booked GP appointment. My online booking message obviously worried her as she messaged back at 7.35 saying she could speak to me anytime at all this morning. GP doesn’t open till 8.30 normally

Well done iam 💐 the fact she messaged so quickly bodes well about her caring nature, I hope the call goes well 💖

Thank you for your kind words.
I'm currently waiting my phone call from the doctor. Having read my medical notes online it says I have malaise. Of course I've googled as we do and it's chronic fatigue syndrome? There's lots of symptoms which I have.
Now I'm frightened about what this means for work... I'm a nanny. There's no chance I can work if I'm confused and my memory keeps going. It's not safe.
I suppose I'll wait to see what the GP says.
Sending strength to everyone

It sounds like they’ve put that as a description of symptoms but would need to officially discuss the possibility of an ME/CFS diagnosis. They need to rule out a lot of other stuff first with bloods etc. Before I saw the CFS specialist I had “post viral fatigue” on my notes for a while I think as it was a fluey thing that kicked it off. Hope you get a decent explanation and chat with the GP 💖

Right I’ve set everything up for therapy. I actually feel a bit more nervous today than I did before our first ever session back in 2019!? 😂 Ah well I think it’s mostly due to the Zoom thing TBH. I usually feel at ease pretty quickly, she’s so great at making me feel safe to chat even via a screen!

Feeling really good after the session. Must write some notes before it all falls out of my head! We talked a lot about the anxiety in the short term (which I am getting better at breaking down into manageable steps eg just reading a form rather than trying to fill it in) vs the longer term worries like about whether I’ll fit in at an office etc

Glad it went well @SingToTheSky. It’s been a long time since I was in therapy but I remember getting the jitters before each session - I couldn’t imagine doing one over zoom of all things!

It is quite unnerving really. We tend to interrupt each other more as the sound can go funny and we’ve both struggled with the lack of body language cues etc. So I’ve not had sessions as often as it doesn’t quite feel so “worth it” IYSWIM. I don’t particularly like feeling vulnerable over zoom, in my own house, needing to be back to “mum mode” straight after. Much better when it’s a positive session like today (but still talking about important stuff). I really can’t wait to be back in her office again.

So I've had a call from a student doctor to take me details. He's going to talk to the doctor and call me back. He mentioned chronic fatigue syndrome but also concerns over my mental health which could be the reason I'm feeling The way I am.
Having been on sertraline for a few years maybe this isn't helping me anymore?

Had a phonecall from my doctor who had referred for blood tests. He asked me what I thought the problem was?
So I know have a sick note that says the reason is I'm tired all the time!! I mean what will my employer think of that?
They're checking thyroid, vitamin d and more. He won't diagnose until he gets the results but tired all the time? When did that ever be a reason to be off work? I feel more anxious now having to send that in

Oh yikes. Tired all the time is an incredibly unhelpful phrase for a sick note ffs!!! Is there any way you could ask another doctor to reword it?

Themadcatparade - glad you had a good weekend. I'm impressed by the 11 mile walk. The most I can do is 5 miles.

Sing- glad your therapy session went well.

Iam - well done, glad you got a doctors appointment sorted out.

Flamingo - try not to worry about your sick note. They probably couldn't put anything else on because they are still doing tests.

I was worried about handing mine in. My sick note said feels a phased return would help. My doctor couldn't get hold of me because I was at work. She did leave me a message saying that I should let her know if I needed anything adding to the sick note, which was good of her.

Thank you all for your support.
I'll read the thread properly when my heads more with it.
For now I'll await my tests. I've sent work a message but they've read and not replied so I'm guessing they're being careful now what to say

sing that therapy sounds good - I think where you're feeling better you can use therapy to build new roads whereas when you're feeling awful it's literally clawing out of the pit of despair. Really well done, hard work to get to where you are so celebrate yourself.
flamingo tired all the time is an actual medical diagnosis, although I know it sounds strange. I'd see it as sort of a holding statement - they've labelled the result while they look for the cause. Sounds like they are doing a thorough check which is good news.

WLmum

Thank you for that. I honestly thought it sounded like a silly excuse. That's made me feel much better