Anxiety Support Group
Anxiety is a physical condition marked by intense and persistent feelings of distress, fear, angst or dread. General anxiety caused by routine day-to-day stresses usually passes quickly and is experienced by almost everyone at one time or another. However, such feelings that linger over time and are very difficult to cope with, and which lack a clear cause, may indicate...
3 more days until take-off on our 5 person, 2 week road trip. It will be the first time any of us have ventured very far off-farm since the protective custody shuffle in August, 2019. It will be the first road trip ever for the orphans, ages almost 8, 5 and 2. I am a lifelong road warrior and Hubs has travelled with me often enough to have some clues, but the children change the logistics dramatically. So do the remaining marshal laws, etc., of Coronaville.
Of course I've had to unleash my "What If" monster for the job of packing and planning. Covering the unknowns of a road trip are what packing and planning are all about. What if I need to brush my teeth? What if the baby needs a diaper change? It would be lovely if my What If monster could stick to such predictable details, but ? ? ? Is it fair to call myself, "A What If addict?" One if is too many and a million what ifs are not enough. What if one of the more dysfunctional family members choose this very week to add their chaos to the equation? What if there is another, meaner maskite invasion while we are on the road? What if Jurrasic Park is real and the dinosaurs take over the world?
Sigh. . .
I think I'm holding steady? Maybe? Reality checks requested.
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It's going to get hotter here with Thursday being the hottest. It's noon and 75f feels more like 80 or more.I've been cleaning up the deck in this morning and cleaning the windows outside. Then I cut up a pallet in half, I've decided to call it quits now because I went a bit light headed. Joanne, some drugs we take have an effect on us in the heat, I know a couple of mine do, maybe yours...
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Decades ago in my mid 20s my friend and I took a road trip from eastern Wisconsin to southern Arizona, to a town a few miles from the Mexican border, and then on the way home we headed north and took a different route. No cell phones, no hotel reservations, no credit cards. We pooled our money and kept it in an envelope that I was in charge of. We planned our trip based on info in AAA booklets and a paper map. What I’d give to feel that utterly unconcerned and fearless again, haha!
Man I love a road trip. Instilling a sense of wanderlust in the kids is awesome!
Evidence from my first parenting career indicate that my free-styling is a bit intense for children, What if I find the balance here in my second parenting career? For sure, I miss my rivers and the kiddos tell me they want to see what it is I'm always pining for here in The Dust Bowl. There are a few lovely watersheds near the farm which the locals call, "Rivers." As lovely and vital as those watersheds are, it takes a plainsman to call them, "Rivers."
What if you do find the balance… in that sentence “what if”sounds less like a monster and more like a hopeful possibility. It’s got a nice sound.
Putting a positive spin on the "What Ifs" is one of my tools for managing the compulsion. My own compulsive what ifs are typically doom-sayer prophecies. Reminding myself that a good outcome is as likely as a bad one provides balance.
It's an "opportunity" to work on being in the moment and going with the flow. If the goal of the trip is to take a trip and spend time with your new family then it will be a success no matter what happens. At times like that I occasionally remember something I was told on my wedding day. No matter what happens, if, at the end of the day you are married, then it was a success.
Good luck and have fun!
Among my many travel mantras is, "Let the dream motivate. Let reality dictate." Not much in life seems to happen according to my fantasies, but it be the fantasies which motivate me to do the research, etc. Letting go of the fantasies as the details come together is a critical step in my own travel planning. Let the adventure have a Life all its own.
I also believe Life is far more creative than the most creative of humans. The complications I worried about are seldom the complications which actually happen.
And here we begin the last day of waiting. Life willing and the maskites don't rise, tomorrow we trade in the question of, "Is it time to go yet?" for the equally irritationg question, "Are we there yet?"