Category: anxiety

anxiety

Hands

Posted on by Zander Maverick

Is it just me? When my anxiety is high, my hands seem to have an excess of energy. They want to flop about like a fish out of water. Whether it’s rubbing my hands together, snapping, or just random hand movements, I find it weird. Am I alone in this?

You will also notice this with my running my hand through my hair, but that can also be because my scalp itches. That is not as good of a sign than my rambling hands.

I often won’t notice my weird quirks until someone points them out to me. As it so happens, my husband loves to point out quirks and ask me why. Eh, I say. I didn’t notice.

0
anxiety, Sleep

Dreams

Posted on by Zander Maverick

Sometimes my dreams cause a surge in my anxiety levels. When this happens, I wake up in a panic. Then I realize that I don’t know what I am panicking about so I start having a panic attack.

These are days that I rarely make it through without help. Sometimes it aligns with my days off so I can just have a mimosa or two. Nobody judges you for alcohol in the late morning if it’s mimosas.

Other days it doesn’t line up to my days off. These are the hard ones. I can’t exactly pop the bubbly at work. My antidepressants don’t take the edge off. I just run amok like a chicken with its head cutoff until I can get home and curl up in bed with a book.

I need to find something that takes away that edge that isn’t alcohol. My mind is too busy and too loud to meditate effectively.

0
anxiety, depression

Happy

Posted on by Zander Maverick

I was happy today. It was strange.

I don’t mean I was happy that it was Friday; or I was happy that the weekend was starting. I wasn’t necessarily happy about something. I was just…. happy.

It is not uncommon for me to be happy about something, but I am usually stressed while being happy about ABC or frustrated but happy the weekend is here. To be just happy, that doesn’t happy often. I actually had to look deep inside to figure out what I was feeling because it has been so long.

When you are happy and you know it, treasure it. It’s important to be happy about this or that, but it’s also important to just be happy.

1
anxiety, depression, Motivation

Flashback

Posted on by Zander Maverick

I have these songs that freeze me in time. When I hear them again, I’m thrown back into that day. For better or worse, I’m there. These songs and moments can make me laugh or make me cry. The songs can make me dance or make me vogue.

I love music. There are songs that cause goosebumps all over my body. There’s a name for that, but that’s another time. I don’t listen to music all of the time because I can get lost in it and lose track of time. When I’m at work, this is not a good thing.

I don’t remember what I had for dinner 7 days ago but I remember the guy I had a crush on in high school when Everything I do, I do for You comes on. I remember the heartache of rejection that happened only in my mind. The course of life changing because my brain told me so.

I remember musicals that aren’t very fun, when people would sing the (loudly) in my apartment well after midnight. Those moments make me laugh and sigh because I am fond of those people but lord those same songs over and over.

When a song comes on, if you see my eyes glaze over, just know that it’s one of the songs that gives me a flashback.

0
anxiety, depression, emotions

Haunted

Posted on by Zander Maverick

I am often haunted by the past. With some things, it’s a nearly non-stop haunt. With other things, it’s something popping up after months or even years. This is depression. This is my brain turning against me.

Sometime people ask me what prompted a post. I can’t always answer that. Sometimes it’s because I’m not in the moment anymore and the haunting is forgotten. That is why I keep this blog. I don’t need the exact details, just the feeling of those hauntings.

Other times I won’t answer what prompted the post. The goal of my blog and my posts is to give you an overview of the day in the life of someone suffering from Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). There will be times that I get specific, but I don’t need you that far into my brain. I don’t think you would like it either.

So feel free to comment and chat. If you need to ask questions, go ahead. I will answer them… maybe. It depends on where my haunting has left me.

1
anxiety, Motivation

Decisions

Posted on by Zander Maverick

I am at the point in my anxiety where it is very difficult to make basic decisions. I skip meals when I can’t decide if I’d rather have a can of soup or a sandwich. I fret for hours over whether I should buy trash bags this week or wait until next week.

During times like this, I need to get a personal shopper. Tell them what I need and what my tastes/needs are with the item(s) and either give them my card or have them get me a price (with a finder’s fee of course) and then venmo them the money to take care of it.

I am so frustrated. I should be able to do simple things like pick out some pots for the new plants that I won at work. I should be able to decide what time of potting soil to buy. And my lucky bamboo needs to be moved to a bigger container so I have to decide whether I keep them in water/rocks or switch to potting soil.

That doesn’t even get to the other decisions and purchases that I have to make. I get so frustrated when my anxiety locks my brain up like this. Why does my brain get so overwhelmed with everyday choices like this?

Decisions. Decisions.

0
anxiety, depression, emotions

Axis

Posted on by Zander Maverick

Most of us don’t remember the World Wars. Most of us don’t remember the concentration camps. I mean, we can’t. We give Germany a side eye for the Nazis and Hitler because that’s the appropriate thing to do.

The election in 2020 isn’t about being a liberal or a conservative. It’s not about being a Democrat or being a Republican. It’s about Axis and Allies. As a country, we have to decide if we are still going to stand up for freedom. Do we believe in the Constitution (let’s not get technical on originalist vs modern)?

I try to keep politics separate from here. My depression knows no party, no affiliation; but we are on the brink of disaster and it is destroying me. It confounds me that so many Americans hate the core values of America while proclaiming to be patriots. We are all created equal. There is nothing about keeping the Mexicans out or deporting the Blacks. There is nothing about hatred for the LGBT community.

This election is not like any election in modern US history. We have to decide whether we want to be Axis or Allies. I’m afraid that we are going to choose wrong. And if we do, gods bless us. We will need it.

(note: I will not get overly political on here. I just needed to get this out)

0
anxiety, depression, Sleep

Midnight

Posted on by Zander Maverick

It’s 12am and I’m awake. I shouldn’t be. I think my manic episodes are coming back. My brain and my body just get so focused on things at times that I wonder if I am really in control here.

Tonight, I felt the need to have a nightcap. That was 4 drinks ago. My mouth wants to inhale the contents of everything while my body wants to consume the soul of every bottle. (side note: do bottles of alcohol have souls?)

I need to go to sleep because I work in the morning. I am breaking so many of my cardinal drinking rules; and yet, here I am. It’s 12am and I’m awake.

I can’t sleep. I can’t sit still. I can’t focus on any one thing. Also, I’m 20% Scottish I guess. Ancestry DNA keeps updating and I think I just got distracted. But I might get a kilt while I’m here.

I wonder if they have small apartment cats. Like, they have outdoor cats. Do they have “I live in a small apartment but I would love to worship a cat” cat? I miss the apartment on Talbott street with the long hallway that the cats would zoom up and down. And the porch that I would sit on while watching real thunderstorms. If you have never seen it literally raining sideways, you’ve never lived in the Midwest.

I got lost. It’s midnight. I’m not on Talbott street. I don’t have cats to worship. My brain is going 100 miles an hour. I need to go to sleep. Yet, here I am.

0
anxiety, depression, emotions, Song Lyrics

Money

Posted on by Zander Maverick

They say that money can’t buy happiness. I wonder who “they” are in this saying. I have to say that having money can make one happier.

Money can’t buy it, baby
Sex can’t buy it, baby
Drugs can’t buy it, baby
You can’t buy it, baby

I’m going to flip scrip on Ms. Lennox. I am going to reach into the heart of a boy that grew up without money; without happiness.

Money can buy it. Sex can buy it. Drugs can buy it. You can buy it.

Money can buy happiness in the sense of not stressing about how to pay rent or buy groceries. Sex can buy happiness buy providing validation to a person’s self. Drugs can buy the mental calmness that eludes oneself. You can buy all of these things for me.

But buying these won’t make me happy. Money won’t guarantee happiness. Sex won’t guarantee validation. Drugs won’t guarantee a better mind. You won’t guarantee a happier me.

There is a world of difference between can/can’t and will/won’t. That distinction is critical.

0
anxiety, depression, Motivation

Breathe

Posted on by Zander Maverick

Sometimes my body forgets how to breathe. I don’t know why, but it does. It’s random. I will be going about my business and suddenly I can’t breathe. I don’t mean an asthma attack situation, I just can’t expand my lungs to take in a breath. My chest gets tighter as the seconds go by and a panic will start in the corner of my brain. Luckily, like a swimmer breaching the surface of a cool ocean, my lungs expand and I intake a huge breath.

I assume this has something to do with my depression or anxiety. I mean, it has to, right? I take my pills throughout the day to avoid the majority of my issues. My life is better than it has been thanks to those pills. I just… feel like something has to give.

There are side effects that I have from the medications, but they are far less damaging than the underlying issue. I wonder, though, if I can do more. There is an old phrase that says something like “Go big or go home”. I could go big and try the TMS option, but do I need to? Are the risks worth the potential reward?

I hope that my breathing keeps on going for a long time. I sometimes worry that worrying over the little things will lead me to do something crazy. Other times I worry that I am too scared to do what needs to be done. And yet, another part just likes to float along on the mimosa train, bouncing between television that I listen to, but don’t really watch, and the games on my phone.

Pieces and parts. Muscles and breathing. Mind and…

0