health

When the Anxiety Takes Over

| Ben

My anxiousness has crept up on me again and it’s been a bit of a nuisance. For anybody who doesn’t experience ongoing anxiety, consider yourself lucky.

When I explain it to people, I explain it like this: You know that first day worry and anxiousness you have on the first day of working in a new place? That’s what I experience every day that I go to work. I am anxious about many things, more than half will probably not happen. It can get debilitating. It sometimes makes me physically sick. I have missed a lot of work because it’s so easy to work myself up into a frenzy. I love my work 90% of the time. I love what I do, but that fear of not doing a good job lingers.

I have the same feeling sometimes in public. It’s constant worrying. For example, did I shave my head right? Does it have stripes on the back of my head that I missed? Is it red? Is it razor burnt? Everybody sees it and they’re judging me for being sloppy and unkempt. In reality, people don’t scrutinize that much, but my brain doesn’t accept that all the time.

Today I was at the gym and was worried about everybody looking at me. Am I doing things right? Do they notice that I shake a lot? In reality, no one really cares. My brain just didn’t accept that.

It has been really bad in the past without it being controlled. I control it a bit with medication, but I use cognitive behaviour therapy as well to help myself. Lately it’s just been a bit sloppy. I don’t know why and it kind of bothers me a bit.

A lot of what I DON’T do is because this anxiety takes over. I could be so much more productive and happy without it. Some days I don’t let it bother me. It’s just hard to do lately. I don’t release my projects to the public because of it.

My husband is my mental health expert. It’s hard sometimes because he’s able to diffuse some of my negative thinking patterns and make me realise that I am overthinking things. It has been up to me to get by since I moved.

While out today after the first workout I’ve had in a very long time, I thought about my life in general and need to make some changes. I want to unleash my full potential. I’ll get there, but it will take time. But you know something? I think that’s totally acceptable to me.

Heartrated

| Ben

Hi there. Before I start just let me preface this by saying that I’m posting from my phone which will mean this will be short and sweet. Oh, and there may be terrible grammar in here too.

I’ve been busy. I can’t explain why my work life has exploded. I haven’t even really worked more hours or anything but the work I’m doing is more strenuous. Maybe that’s why I feel so worn out.

I’m also feeling like the anxiety is starting to creep in. There are reasons for that because of the job I work in but it’s at a bad level. Let me show you what it’s been like courtesy of my smart watch.

Let me explain. You can see when I’m at home (probably asleep) vs when I’m at work. A heart rate that is over 100 beats per minute is considered tachycardia. This is at rest. I say that loosely though. I am incredibly anxious at work but a lot of it is physical too. Hours of having a high heart rate from doing something that isn’t strenuous isn’t great.

I’m incredibly out of shape too. Not big or chubby but out of shape. I’m going to try to work on this because my strength is so low lately. My husband has resisted my requests to go back to the gym for a few years because I’m usually happy to pay more for bigger facilities that has a pool. I think I’m going to go back because my lack of strength and energy is scary.

Did I mention that my blood pressure that day was very high too? Scary stuff. This is the kind of stuff that has made a lot of my family member’s lives miserable. I need to break that cycle.

I wish myself luck.