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...
After an interesting talk with my therapist he pointed out that most of my depressive moods seem to start off from anxiety. I am hard on myself he says and I do not like myself. Which is true a lot of the times. I am an odd person, but there are a lot of odd people. When they own it, it becomes more normal. According to him, he said he was also an odd person to help with the sting. So I guess my big question is , does anyone else have anxiety that spirals into depression because of the fear that people will see you as abnormal and than signal you out?
My swing between anxiety and depression happens like this: I feel anxious about leaving the house so I stay in. At first, I stay busy with cool things like art projects, classes, learning a new skill. Then I feel it's too much effort for nothing more than to keep myself occupied so I wind up reading. But it seems to be too much of an effort so I flip on the TV. Then I wind up sleeping later and later and more and more and voila! Depression.
So I dig myself out of it and get my buns out of the house. But because I've been in for so long, I get more anxious than I normally would. I press on and work through it, find myself doing fun things with friends although it's always a pretty big effort and there's always anxiety. I keep pushing myself though and eventually, my anxiety gets to be too much and my body reacts with chronic migraines, terrible IBS or some bodily symptom that forces me to stay in.
But I don't want to get depressed so I look for things to do - volunteering from home, reading, taking classes, sewing, etc. until it doesn't seem worth the effort and I sink into the couch with a bag of chips and tv...until that seems like too much effort and then I find myself sleeping later and later and more and more until I'm depressed again.
It's pretty much lather, rinse, repeat at that point.
I think a lot of us deal with this cycle.
What they don't get is that people with anxiety are completely fearless in the traditional sense. We're rarely afraid of anything beyond the anxiety and things that give us anxiety.
And as I got older, I began to be able to explain it a bit better.
TRIGGER WARNING...
I explained to friends and family that the reason water boarding is considered one of the worst things you can do to another human being is because it causes a panic attack. That's all it does. The person is never in any real danger. There aren't any physical marks from it. And yet the most hardened soldier can endure it for no longer than 10 seconds and they wind up having night terrors and protracted PTSD from it.
So please, when I tell you I have anxiety, instead of picturing a little child afraid to try broccoli, see it for what it is - you're asking me to volunteer for torture and my answer is "no thank you."
TRIGGER WARNING OVER.
Some family will get offended - "how could I possible make you nervous?" To them I say it has absolutely no rhyme or reason - it is simply that what I'm accustomed to and comfortable with is okay. Beyond that, it's a challenge and some days I can and some I can't. Sorry you caught me on a bad day.
What has helped me with the anxiety is to work into doing things that are on the edge of my comfort zone but not outside of it. If I go beyond my comfort zone, I'm gonna need some recovery time.
Once you get to know yourself and accept the limitations of anxiety/depression - and speak up for yourself - it becomes easier.
I really think that addressing my negative thinking has helped both my anxiety and depression. The roots of both are the same. I have worked hard on tackling every passing negative thought and really putting it to the test, asking myself if there is evidence to support it and if there is an alternative way to look at a situation. I almost always feel better when I do this and I've found the negative thoughts don't come nearly as frequently as they used to.
I know it can be really tough living with family members who don't quite get your condition. My family did the same thing to me. My father, especially, would just fight me about everything I thought or felt. My parents would always be so dismissive. On the one hand they didn't respect the reality of my disorder and on the other hand they would always patronize me about it. Sadly, this didn't improve until I moved out and lived on my own.
Since then, however, I learned that my father has always struggled with anxiety and depression, too. I think it would have helped me to know I wasn't the only "sick" one. Ask yourself if some of your family members don't also have the same problems, possibly undiagnosed... depression and anxiety often run in the family.
And don't worry about being "odd." Odd people are interesting and live rich lives. Be glad you aren't the average bear. :)
Reed I am working on speaking up more. I am not as bad as I was, but I am getting better. Talking about how I feel is still difficult for me.it's sad that I prefer the depression for this, because crying seems yo be more socially acceptable than bugging out and getting angry at myself and feeling like I am some sort of social pariah.
Interestingly, I find that when I CAN get angry and channel it productively, it helps me to power through difficult challenges.
It helped in several ways.
First, it helped me to recognize all of the progress I've made.
Second, it helped me recognize how INCREDIBLY strong I am. As a child, I attended school, lessons, etc. and constantly had to deal with anxiety. I didn't have any control over my schedule - just had to do what was expected - as I'm sure we all did.
Finally, it pissed me off to be honest. To think that I've dealt with anxiety for SO long - and it helped me vocalize some of that anger and work through it.
Don't know if this exercise would be helpful for you.
Sending hugs.
My anxiety can definitely spiral into depression, and they are definitely 2 separate things for me, not intertwined. Generally speaking, my anxieties are health-related where a headache makes me think I have a brain tumor, a swollen lymph node makes me think I have lymphoma, and GI pain makes me think I have parasites or cancer. Obviously, this causes me a lot of PANIC. My meds have been really effective in reducing the panic :) But for me, the months and months of worrying and panicking led to depression because I was so TIRED from being panicked all the time, and all of my test results came back within normal ranges. That was really hard for me because I'm generally very in tune with my body - how could I be so wrong? and would my provider ever believe me again? I've found that once you tell a provider that you have anxiety, most of them are willing to attribute anything you tell them you're feeling to the anxiety. Luckily, my NP is amazing and doesn't brush me off; but other practitioners have before. I'm sorry that this was a really long way to answer your question! But yeah, my anxiety can totally spiral into depression, and I do struggle with loving myself, and also with the fear of being singled out.
Second, I read about your family trying to guilt you into not being anxious by calling you lazy, etc. It seems like they really don't understand anxiety... I'm really sorry that they say those things to you, because clearly, they don't see how you are suffering. Has there ever been a chance for you to explain anxiety to them? Are they willing to listen?? Maybe this is something your therapist could help with..? Because having a supportive family could be beneficial.
Good luck to you.
Sadiegirl13,my mother has anxiety. It gets bad with her and it makes anything she's dealing with health wise ten times worse. She doesn't want to understand, and talking to them just makes me so frustrated because no matter what I say they don't hear me.