Tag: anxiety

Posted on by — Leave a comment

let’s talk agoraphobia

Happy Friday, Readers!  It’s a wet, wet day here in San Francisco, but I’m safely in the office and the coffee is hot!

I thought I’d take a minute today and talk about one of the “issues” I battle everyday.  See, I’m an agoraphobic.  Taken literally, the translation from the greek means “fear of the marketplace” but since the world has evolved, so has this monster.

Agoraphobia can be seen as a spectrum of sorts, and people with agoraphobia can have intense fear, anxiety and even panic that keeps them from living their life the way they want to.

At its worst, agoraphobia can make a person housebound, unable to leave the safety of their home because of the fear.  Some are unable to move outside a specified “safety zone” without someone there to help them.

Psychology Today has a good article here.

Thankfully, mine is not that bad, though having people with me who know how to spot my panic attacks starting and how to help me through them is a blessing. I still manage to get my own groceries, I go to work (most days), and I travel.

But, every one of these things can induce anything from minor anxiety to heart stopping panic.  There are days I won’t even open my front door.  Days where just going to get the mail is a major achievement.  There are days when I think nothing of getting in the car and heading out into the unknown though too.

Like any other chronic condition, it is a constant part of who I am, but its severity and my ability to fight it change all the time, and because I also live with chronic pain, it can also affect and be affected by the levels of pain I am in.

On bad pain days, I spend all my energy battling pain, and I have nothing left to fight the phobia, so I generally stay within my safety space.  On days when the phobia is running high and I know I have to go out into the world anyway, there’s seldom anything left to manage my pain.

It can be a vicious circle.

I’ve come to terms with this being a part of who I am, and I have mental coping mechanisms that help me handle crowds, unknown spaces, etc.  Crowds are hard. Crowds require days of mental prep and days of hibernating after.  Sometimes they require pharmaceutical help.  I take a very low dose of Xanax when needed.

Yet, I go to concerts and conventions and conferences.  I get on trains that I know are going to be standing room only long before I get home.  It’s terrifying and it’s exhausting and if you asked most people around me they’d tell you that they had no idea I was terrified because I’ve learned to hide it.

Why?  Because I’m a stubborn bitch that refuses to let my misfiring brain keep me from things and people I love.  At least, not all the time.  Maybe someday, when I’m a doddering eighty year old writer with a library of books in my quiver, I can become a recluse, and eccentric cat lady who never goes out and never lets anyone in, other than my young, gorgeous assistant/nurse who makes sure I eat and take my meds.

So today, I won the battle, despite the rain and the messy commute and the people.  I’m at my desk and now my cup of coffee is empty, so it’s time to go search for more.

May your weekend be amazing!

Posted on by — Leave a comment

people on a train

Every weekday morning, I get up, get dressed, and head to the office.  My commute, like so many others, consists of a half mile walk, a 40 minute train ride and a half mile walk.  Door to door, it’s about an hour or so.

When you get to the station, stand in the same spot, and ride the same train every day, you see a lot of people doing the exact same thing. I tend to take one of the limited trains being used to ease the overcrowding problem on BART, particularly on the Pittsburg/Bay Point lines.  Most mornings, I see the same crew of folks while waiting.  A few get on the SFO train just before mine, but most get on the same train.

I only know first names, if I know names at all, but we’re friendly and we worry about the ones who don’t show up.  We keep track of vacations and family drama.  We share pictures of our pets and kids and grandkids.

On the train, it’s a little different.  I see a lot of faces that I know, but I know nothing about them.  We get on, go to our preferred seats, plug in our headphones and zone out for the ride.  This is good people watching time.  Of course, I give them names…because I’m a writer.

There’s Bible Guy.  He gets on a few stops after mine, stands across from my usual seat and opens his Bible.  He spends most of his time reading.  He never speaks.  He never makes eye contact.  He gets off at West Oakland.  I noticed this morning that he wasn’t on the train.  I hope he has some good holiday plans, and is off on vacation.

There’s Cranky Lady.  I don’t know that she’s actually cranky, but she always has this look like she’s pissed off at you before you can say a word.  She doesn’t respond to a smile, to a hello, to letting her go before you.  She just glares.  I haven’t seen her in a while.  I hope she’s doing alright.

There’s TV Movie Thug Guy.  He is the stereotypical white thug guy.  You’ve seen him in any movie or television show that has a mob element or dock workers, etc.  He even dresses the part. He nods his head every morning when I make eye contact.

There’s the Working Mom and her friend, Power Suit Lady.  They always sit together and they talk non-stop the entire 40 minutes.  They aren’t usually close enough for me to hear over the noise of the train. My favorite conversations though are when one or the other makes the other one laugh.  Working Mom has the BEST laugh!  Today was one of those days.  It’s a great way to start a work day.

Oh, yes!  There’s Makeup Girl too!  Haven’t seen her at all this week.  She gets on one stop after me, and spends the ENTIRE train ride applying makeup.  At least a solid half hour of putting on makeup, and when she’s done, I see no difference from when she sat down without makeup, other than her mascara.

Of course, this time of year, you get the travelers too…the ones who have never ridden BART before, and can’t seem to tell from looking which way the lines go, or who think they can just jump the line…the ones with more luggage than hands, the ones with their entire life crammed into a duffle bag nearly as tall as they are, etc.

Riding a train during commute hours is like a window into the lives of thousands of characters.  And as much as it can stress me out, if I can keep myself out of a panic attack, I can tell myself stories about them to entertain myself.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

stillness

There is a stillness in the woods.  It isn’t something you can find in the hustle-bustle of a city.  It is something unique to the woods.  Step off the paved road and onto a carpet of grass, fallen leaves, pine needles, step between the trees.  You don’t have to go far to feel it.  Just enough that you can’t see the road, can’t hear the cars.

The hush settles over you and that stillness sinks deep into you.  Here, you are connected to the earth beneath your feet, to the years stretching back into the ancient past and forward into the unknown future.

This is one of the places I am home.  All of the anxiety flushes away.  All the worries and needs and concerns drift off and I am at peace.

I took the picture above on my mini vacation earlier this month.  It’s the type of place I imagine Mason feeling quite at home.  I imagine I would live quite happily in some little cabin out there, surrounded by trees older than our country and that stillness.

Of course, only if I had a good internet connection!  I may love that stillness, but I was raised on modern conveniences and I love my internet.

It was something like this I had in mind as I settled Mason Jerah into his childhood home…a place where magic doesn’t seem so much of a stretch, where life teems and the very air seems to vibrate with a feeling of home.

It’s nice this morning, with another busy day stretched out ahead of me, to take a moment and close my eyes to try to recapture that peace, that stillness…before deadlines and emails and to-do lists fill up my attention.

Have a great Tuesday, Readers!

Posted on by — 1 Comment

it is very people-y out there

I have a form of agoraphobia.  I’ve stopped saying “mild agoraphobia” because then it gets dismissed as not a problem and then people don’t understand why I have days like today.

Today, I woke up feeling anxious.  My heart was beating fast, and when I thought about leaving the house, the beat picked up momentum. I did a few grounding exercises and managed to get up and into the shower.  I knew I had to get to the office.  The office isn’t *safe* like my home is, however it is a familiar place with plenty of open space and familiar faces so it is infinitely safer than *out there* is.

I have routines that help me on days like today.  I have a couple of grounding exercises, I have a set pattern that is my “getting out the door” signal to my brain and body that we are leaving the house.  I have my headphones and music that help keep me inside myself as I walk to the train.

This isn’t just social anxiety.  This isn’t just me being introverted.  I’m an introverted extrovert most of the time.  I wish I had the words to paint you a picture of what is going on inside my head when I have to force myself to leave the house.

Every human interaction is work.  Interaction that requires conversation is more work.  Each additional person involved in that conversation increases that work exponentially and eventually I will need to tap out.  Today that limit is two.  Any more than two people attempting to interact with me at a time and I can’t.  Some days it gets as low as one.  Somedays, I can’t even handle one.  Those are the days that plans get changed and I stay home, locked inside the safety of my domain.

Today was one of those mornings where everyone at the train station wanted to talk.  By the time I got on the train, I was shaking.  By the time I got to the office I was exhausted. By the time this day is over, I’ll be a wrung out mess.

The frustrating part of all of this is that I love people.  I love meeting new people. I love observing people just going about their daily lives.  On days like today, when the agoraphobic anxiety is high and the desire to hide in the private sanctuary that is my own home, I just can’t people.  It is all I can do to get through the day if I have to be away from my sanctuary.

If I didn’t have to keep a roof over my head, I might have called today a mental health day and stayed in the quiet cocoon of home.  But, my boss doesn’t understand the condition and he would be annoyed if I tried to explain to him that I couldn’t people today.

So, I’ll power through.  I’ll put in my earphones and play some Flogging Molly or Dropkick Murphys loudly to create a sonic bubble around me and hope that my coworkers take the hint.