Worrying about things that can't be changed & feeling like something's "not right"

[Sparkle1984]

I have a long history of anxiety/depression episodes, particularly around existential themes and worrying about things which are outside of my control. My episodes tend to come on every few months or years, and then they go on for a few weeks or months until they fizzle out. For example, during my anxiety episode in 2012, my main theme was worrying about death and dying (I was worried about my older relatives getting older and dying, and even myself getting older and dying!). I had medication and other support for this and felt much better, but once I came off the meds, the anxiety came back just as bad in 2013 - it was a similar theme, about death and dying, and I was also worried about turning 30, which is linked in with my fear about getting older and eventually dying! So I went back on my medication and had online therapy, and felt much better again (although it seemed to take longer to recover the second time round). In February last year I turned 30 and I didn't really feel anxious at all and I actually had a good time on my birthday - it was like the anticipation was much worse than the actual event.

So last year I weaned off my meds for the second time, and finished completely in September. I felt fine for the first few months, but as soon as 2015 started, I felt like I was very gradually going downhill again, although this time the anxiety themes had changed somewhat - back in January I remember getting feelings that I'm not as good as the other people in my team at work, because I thought I was being assigned less challenging tasks than many of my colleagues, and also because they wouldn't promote me to non-junior level (although thinking rationally, that's probably more a reflection on the company's budget than my own performance). Then once I got over that worry, I began obsessively worrying about other things like blushing in front of other people, and stuttering, and my self-confidence started to decline. I have had occasional issues with blushing and stuttering in the past, but I was OK when I was still on the meds.

This year I also began to worry more about things I hear on the news (which obviously I have no control over), particularly things to do with the economy, austerity and its effects on ordinary people. I think it was mentioned on the news more often due to the election campaign. Even though I remember feeling a bit sad/disappointed about these sorts of things when the recession first happened a few years ago and the fallout from it, it never weighed so heavily on my mind before this year. Then following the announcement of the election results, I began to worry about austerity more, concerned about how the country (and other countries affected by the recession in similar ways) would end up in years to come.

Although I feel my mood and anxiety gradually started to go downhill at the beginning of this year, I think April is when things started to get more intense for me. It was at the beginning of April that I had a nightmare about my anxiety coming back, and in that nightmare I had an intense sense of hopelessness, which remained with me for the rest of the morning after I'd got up. In the following weeks, I often had a general sense of uneasiness like something wasn't right, although the anxiety wasn't with me all the time and I still felt like I could relax. Also, my stuttering got noticeably worse in April, which is a symptom of my anxiety. (That isn't the first time I've had a nightmare that's predicted the start of an anxiety episode - the same thing happened to me back in July 2012, and then just a couple of days later I began a really bad anxiety/depression episode and a month later was when I first went to the doctor's to get help).

Then last month, the anxiety and depression intensified even more, and I felt as bad as I did during my previous relapse in April/May 2013. I went back on my medication a month ago, but I still have quite a few bad moments and it feels like it's taking even longer to work this time. This time around, the anxiety about death and dying seems to be more in the background - I seem to be worrying about more other things like "what life will be like when I'm older?", "Will this country/world become dystopian?", "What will happen if I'm unwell when I'm older? Will there be anyone to look after me?", "What will happen to the economy in this country - will inequality continue to increase?" and "What will quality of life be like for ordinary (ie non-wealthy) people in the future?"

As you can see, these are all thoughts about things that are out of my control. That's one of the worst things about my anxiety - I feel a compulsion to worry about things that I can't control, and it's very difficult to stop it as the thoughts are always in the back of my mind. It's like a constant negative vibe in the back of my mind and I can't relax or enjoy things as usual.

Even though I've been back on my medication for a month, I still often wake up early, feeling anxious and low in the mornings - I have this weird feeling like something's not quite right, and that things will never be the same again. I also frequently have that feeling when I'm at work - it seems that something somehow isn't right, but I can't quite put my finger on it (although there has been a lot of redundancies and resignations in my department lately, so that could be part of it). It's hard to describe, but in some ways it feels like I've somehow woken up in an alternate universe this year where everything seems "off" and somewhat sinister, and on my bad days there is a near-constant sense of foreboding in the back of my mind. Over the last few months, I feel like I've lost interest in many of the hobbies I used to enjoy last year, and even though I'm trying my best to get back into some of them, it just doesn't feel the same any more. It feels like I'm viewing everything through a negative lens and I can't see the world in the same way I did last year. I also sometimes feel like I'm grieving for my old self, because last year I felt more happy and more confident than I'd felt in many years, but now that's all gone. :weep:

How do you deal with worries about things you have no control over? I often worry that because the things I worry about are mostly outside of my control, it means the worries will never go away and that I'll have to live with the anxiety forever, and that I'll never feel 100% again. Another question I have is - is it the anxiety and depression causing these negative worries and thoughts, or is it the negative thoughts and worries causing the anxiety and depression?

[sial72]

Hi there
The 1000000 dollar question, what comes first? I would say the negative thoughts bring on the anxiety.
I think that rather than deal with things you have no control over, you have to work on the control issue.
Control has also always been (and still is my main issue), now I have a health issue that is out of my control and it is proving to be very difficult as I am having to give into the fact that life is what it is and there are a lot of things that are not in our hands.
Medication can sometimes be helpful but unless one changes certain things when we give up the medication we end up going back to the same place.
Have you had any form of talking therapy?
You can get better xxx

[Sparkle1984]

Thanks for your reply. It is interesting you say I may have control issues. I think in some ways I find it difficult to trust people, and that could be linked to certain traumatic incidents from my childhood, such as being badly bullied at school, my parents getting divorced, and my grandfathers both dying when I was very little.
I remember a party game where everyone has to stand in 2 lines, the people in the first line have to fall backwards and it's the job of the person standing behind you to catch you to break your fall. I remember being too scared to fall backwards, because I didn't feel like I could trust the person behind me to catch me (even if it was someone I knew well) - I would think things like "What if they make a mistake somehow and don't manage to catch me?" When I ask someone whether they have done something, I often have to check for myself to make sure, even if it's someone I'm really close to like my parents.

I feel really disheartened because during my previous 2 anxiety episodes, I made a lot of effort to change my lifestyle to become more healthy (such as eating more healthily and getting more exercise) and I also used CBT techniques to try to change my way of thinking. So I thought my anxiety wouldn't come back again, but it has, and it's nearly always worries about things outside of my control. My usual coping techniques seem to stop working so well when I'm having a relapse, so I feel like I have no choice but to go back on medication each time. I did have some online counselling during my last anxiety episode in 2013, which was helpful for me at the time as it helped me to put things into perspective more.

This time I'll be having one-to-one therapy, face-to-face, and I have my first session on Tuesday evening. I'm really hoping that this will help me, and that I'll learn some techniques to reduce my anxiety so that I don't keep having episodes for the rest of my life.

[Oosh]

The confident you hasn't gone. It's just that it's very easy for a worry or a doubt to appear in your mind and kick you back into the anxious groove very quickly. The confidence disappears in an instant but it can quickly come back in an instant if you learn to not attach any of that negative meaning to the re-appearance of the anxious thought and just let it go on its way.

It's not "back". It's not a "setback". It's just another worry or another doubt. Don't give it's harmless re-appearance any power.

Anxiety I've found is like being trapped like this. Being worried back into the trap. Take away its ability to trap you like that by stopping believing it's these powerful things when it turns up. Stop believing and worrying you have no control over it. You absolutely do.

You don't need to have answers to all of those worries. You just need to control what it is you are focusing on. A billion,trillion worries exist in this world. But you're only worried about a bunch of them, the ones that have entered your awareness. Control your awareness. You became aware of them at some point. Now become unaware of them again.

Your worries worry me too. But I look away from them.

They'll only stay in the back of your mind if you don't believe you have the ability to look away from them. Don't doubt.

These new habits take repetition. The confident you is there right now as strong as ever. Focus on the right things and you'll find it again. Focus on anxious things and you'll get anxious again. Your focus changes, just like that.

Remember things you did that were confident.
Remember when you were happy and liked yourself. These things are made up of ingredients. You can't make those states back up if that space is filled with worries.
Fill your mind with confidence inducing, enjoyable stuff and flip yourself back into that non-anxious, confident, enjoying groove. I do it all the time. I have a lot of triggers. I have a lot of memories stealing my my confidence daily and I shush them and regain confidence immediately by focusing on the things that put me in that place. It becomes a sort of support inside yourself that you grab onto when something shakes you up. When those positive beliefs are there you don't plummet anywhere near as easily.

Your nightmare - I think the worry about setbacks came first when you were awake and it then appeared in a dream. That's how my dreams work. I dream about what entered my head that day. Sometimes you're not aware that they did. So I don't think your dream means anything other than that you were fearing setbacks.

[Sparkle1984]

Thanks, Oosh. I like the part about controlling my awareness, and that even though trillions of worries exist in this world, I'm only worried about a few of them. I think in the days of social media, it's harder to become "unaware" of my worries. For example, I go on Twitter and Facebook to chill out, and most of the things on there make me feel happy or neutral, but sometimes people post or comment about things that trigger my worries. A few weeks ago, I did unfollow or mute the accounts that tend to post a lot of things that I find triggering, but it's very difficult to stop them all.

When I'm not going through an anxiety/depression episode, I tend to be happy and relaxed most of the time, and I'm able to dismiss any worries or negative thoughts much more easily. But when I'm going through an episode, I find it harder to dismiss these thoughts and I tend to dwell on them more. Even when I'm not thinking about them, I can still feel them in the back of my mind.

Over the last couple of weeks, once I'd got over the worst of the medication side effects, I have been trying to get back into some of my old hobbies and interests. Sometimes I find I don't enjoy them quite as much as I used to, but it's still better than doing nothing and at least it helps me to gradually build up my self-confidence. Also I've made a list of things to look forward to (such as my holiday, meals out that I have planned, visits to the cinema, meeting with friends and so on), so when I get a negative thought I try to re-direct my focus to the things on this list. Since this episode began, I have found it harder to get excited about things, though. However, I'm hoping my sense of excitement will come back over time.

I'm now going to prepare for my first therapy appointment tomorrow evening. :)

[sial72]

Hi Sparkle
Let us know how you get on, I'm sure you'll recover soon! X

---------- Post added at 20:18 ---------- Previous post was at 20:17 ----------

I meant how you get on at your first appt tomorroe

[Oosh]

Good luck with your appointment sparkle1984.

Yeh, tell us how it goes.

[Sparkle1984]

Sorry for the late update - I've had a busy few days. My therapy appointment went well. The therapist was very nice and sympathetic and I think I will get on very well with her. As it was the first session, I was mainly talking about my history with anxiety and depression, so I didn't have a chance to go into too much detail about my specific worries.

She set me 2 "homework" tasks - firstly to do more relaxation during the day, such as diaphragmatic breathing and relaxing my shoulders when I'm at work. So I've been doing that when I feel particularly tense. It doesn't seem to have much effect on the intrusive thoughts though, but of course it's still early days and I'll need more practice. The second task is to have a daily worry period - whenever I get a worry come into my mind during the day, I write it down in a notebook, and then in the evening (usually after tea) I have to spend half an hour thinking about the worries and also coming up with challenges to them. When I tried this yesterday evening, I noticed something interesting - when I was thinking about the negative thoughts and worries, my mind kept wandering off towards neutral/positive things. Yet, during the day, when I'm trying to focus on day-to-day tasks, I find that my mind keeps wandering towards the negative/anxious thoughts.

Another thing I find is that my mind seems to be almost constantly thinking about how I'm feeling, like my mind is constantly checking to see if there are any feelings of anxiety and depression, which gets annoying. I can't just seem to "forget myself" and get completely into the zone when I'm doing other things, even the things I enjoy. Even if I try to re-direct my focus to the present moment, it feels like the worries are still there in the background. Sometimes when I try to dismiss the negative thoughts, it feels like they rebound on me - like if I try to tell myself "that thought doesn't matter, I'm focusing on something I enjoy now", I will get a thought like "but it really is awful, what if that worry does come true, and what if the thoughts never go away?". It's almost as if I'm arguing with myself, lol! Before this anxiety episode started a few weeks ago, I wasn't constantly checking myself, and I could go through my day-to-day work and my leisure time carefree, without constantly thinking about worrying and negative thoughts. Does anyone have any advice on how to overcome this?

[Oosh]

I found writing early on as a way to survive my anxiety alone. At the time I didn't have anyone to talk to and I had overwhelming anxieties, like you.

What if I'd gone insane.
What was I going to do about the various friend issues that were going wrong.
What if I was schi...
What if people thought I murdered that person on TV and locked me up (I didn't lol)

I KNOW from years of that, that you can work through these anxieties, calm yourself down, show yourself reason, build confidence and find solutions. I'd work to reach that point, a solution that I felt genuinely gave me some peace or hope. Then I promised myself that after I'd stopped writing and later in the day when that anxiety popped into my head again instead of thinking of the anxiety I'd think of the solution I'd come to. I had an answer to those anxieties when they came.

I saw a a Horizon on TV once that showed the brains of anxious people, people with that typical anxiety prone nervous system and in a brain scan it showed the different parts of the brain working. They concluded that the anxious people who went on to have reasonable success in life were the ones who were able to self-talk and calm themselves down. They could see the blood flow going to those different areas of the brain responsible for these things.

I think that's what you learn to do. In doing that you build confidence in your ability to wrestle any anxiety under control.
You learn to see them for what they are and lose fear of them and of this idea that you don't control them.

You listen to an anxious personality in your head a lot of the time and it becomes dominant. But sometimes do you hear a calming, reassuring personality ? Strengthen it. Use its perspective more. Use it to find perspectives that calm and lift you.

You don't always have to find THE answer. It obviously helps if you can. But it's effective if you can just have AN answer that gives you control of that out of control/anxious state that it creates so you can navigate past it. Eg you can make fun of fears to make them look powerless. You can make yourself laugh. Laughter is a change of state. It's not THE answer but it is success in changing your state to a much more desirable one.

If there isn't a real answer backed by science yet then make your own ? I have my own on things like death. They are not THE answer they are just MY answer that makes me feel better.
As long as you find some calm and reassurance with it then it's effective.
Remember success is about relieving and managing the anxious state NOT finding THE answers to human race long questions.
Can you find answers to change your state ? YES !
You are managing anxiety not finding the answers to life, the universe and everything.

This isn't only the way in anxiety it's the way as a human being. We have this incredible awareness and it can make or break you. Success is in navigating through it.
Bad things happen to people but the strong take it and give it no meaning or give it positive meaning and use it and they move forward and past.
It is a mental skill that can be strengthened.

I think you may be worried about losing people. Maybe you worry you won't be able to cope. You will be able to cope. That journey from being here to realising that will change your personality. Beliefs about yourself will change. They'll change by strengthening that calming, reassuring personality and being there for yourself. Be your own parent (that personality in your mind) and calm, reassure yourself and give yourself solutions to your problems. Ride that anxiety wave and manage each one effectively as they come throughout your life and move forward.


You were bullied. Do you have difficulties making relationships ?
Do you have plenty of people in your life. No doubt you'll have trust issues. Maybe this is why you fear losing people.
The world is full of good people. There is an abundance of them.