The Ups & Downs

[Mart0310]

I thought I was well on the road to recovery again, and then come the Brain Scan this week, after months of cancelling and rebooking.

It really was the worst two days ever, dealing with the scan itself and waiting for the results the next day, facing the reality of what those results might be. Thankfully the news was good, I got the all clear, the best news!

All over I thought, the anxiety will drop now I thought .... It didnt! major derealism yesterday afternoon, followed by intense panic this morning levels like I havent experienced in months :(

I guess the scan has pushed my levels up and its a case of waiting for it to settle again .. So bloody hard!

[lindy lou 2]

I imagine it was a result of the previous tension. I had to have a 2nd ECG as the first was unreadable due to anxiety, the second one was perfect, such a relief and then , like you I was in panic mode all of the next day.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Yeah, I know what you mean, Mart. Something big can push levels up and they can stay there for days...BUT they do come back down again. You've been through tougher times and you'll sort it.

I've always found with my GAD that it can be a different outcome depending on various factors. Sometimes I walk out and feel relief as I am no longer forced to do X appointment or thing and other times its raised levels the rest of the day and feeling odd the next day too.

I guess thats GAD for you, it latches onto anything it can to keep itself up there.

Can you do anything to try to break its spell? Relaxation? Maybe some exercise to burn the chemicals off? Or something that just distracts you for a bit? Sometimes its like we need something to snap ourselves out of it and as long as we don't then try to think about it again (which can start it again) we can move forward again.

Its very good to hear about the all clear. Those scanning tubes are a panic for a lot of people.

[Fishmanpa]

I equate it to the coals on the fire analogy. They've been burning hot for a while. The food is done (the all clear) but the coals will stay hot for a while. Eventually the fire will go out....

Positive thoughts

[Mart0310]

Thank you both! just hearing you say its a normal response has brought my anxiety down about 10 notches! Theres always that horrible question in your mind ... what if Im going backwards again, thank you both so much, gonna hit on a bit of distraction I think, ipod is my weapon of choice today! :winks:

---------- Post added at 08:55 ---------- Previous post was at 08:54 ----------

Thanks Fishman, the visual helps too

[MyNameIsTerry]

Yeah, I agree with that one FMP. Your friend CPE1978 (chris?) used a jug full of water on his blog. Same deal, the water needs to drain off.

No, you aren't going backwards, Mart. We often use the term "blip" for this. Recovery journeys are full of them. When you are in them you think feel really tough but you come out the other side, look back and realise it wasn't as bad as the bad old days of anxiety.

[Mart0310]

Well the good news is, its starting to settle, finally I can see the wood for the trees again. Mainly down to a bit of reassurance from you fine people. Thank you!

Never ceases to amaze me just how quickly a few choice words can turn things around. Im actually tempted to head off to the caravan this afternoon now, so thanks again you may have saved my weekend! :yesyes:

[MyNameIsTerry]

Yeah, go for it, Mart. Keep the positivity going and its going to be a nice day for it too!

Sometimes you can snap out of these blips and it shows that you are much more capable. To prove that, think back to the times when you were your worst and how nothing worked and months were spent like that. You can't snap out at those stages but now you have much more control over it all and can switch it around, it sometimes just means finding the right thing to start the process off.

There have bee many times where I've been feel a bit down or anxious and I've had a quick chat with one of the guys stacking the shelves in the supermarket or on the till. Just the basics. I've found that lifts my spirits. Maybe it just breaks us out of our heads for a bit as they say a lot of this is about internalising and we bring on or intensify our existing symptoms.

Have a good weekend and don't look back!

[Mart0310]

Thanks Terry,

I think you may have a point, my natural reaction when panic hits is to retreat into my shell, I dont talk about! Its only when I start talking about it that the sensations start to settle. I guess its the reason counselling works for me, Difficult to go to a session and talk about nothing!

Thanks again for your wise words this morning, very grateful :winks:

[MyNameIsTerry]

No worries, you would do the same as would everyone on here.

Something I've found is that the thoughts just keep going round & round and sometimes it seems to reduce them by using tools that include writing down thoughts or worries. Some people find journaling good for this or you can use CBT tools like Thought Records to challenge them. I think it's not just challenging though, I think by writing it down you bring it into the physical world and it perhaps becomes something you can more easily try to resolve. Maybe there is a sense of closure too? This would be part of the aim of the Thought Record.

When I was still working, I would have ideas of tasks coming into my head all the time. It would happen at home too and I usually tried to remember it or create lists. I would even be having this problem when trying to get to sleep and on some occasions when waking in the night! This was all when I was developing obsessional thoughts about my work.

What helped along with the lists was writing down things to do tomorrow before I went to bed. If a had a task or idea pop into my head I would keep a pen and paper by my bed. This did help and the reason it did was because I got it out of my head and onto something I saw as physical.

So, if you find talking helps, is it to offload it out of your head? If so, maybe a writing form could help you?

If it's the ability to talk it though, I don't know whether a Thought Record and maybe speaking combined with it would help? In some psychodynamic techniques they use something called "chair work" where you move between each and play two roles. You might find ways to use something like that for self talk and again it tries to make that change in how you view your surroundings to encourage you to think it differently. I don't know much about it and how it's used but it might be worth a look if it makes self talk slightly easier.

[lindy lou 2]

Just reading this is making me feel a bit better, I am very panicky today. I have been having a few better days lately, last sat was great, I managed to go out with my husband to the local & had the best day, I wanted to go today, but, had a bad nights sleep, & I hurt a lot from decorating yesterday. Yesterday itself, I had a really calm day, went for an early dog walk with my friend, then painted. I have arthritis, so I am paying for it today. Pain seems to panic me for some reason. So my husband has gone on his own & I feel like a failure again. But after reading this,I am just trying to rest and tell myself, tomorrow might be a good day again.

[Mart0310]

One thing I learnt early in CBT was that we tend to look at what we havent achieved rather than what we have. If you read back across your week, you have done a fair amount! Be proud of that!

Not everyday is great, but the upside of that is that we appreciate the good days so much more. When I recovered from Anxiety last time, I remember thinking how much more I appreciated the simple things in life - a walk in the park, a drink with mates etc. Everything has a positive, even anxiety ;)

Another thing I think we tend to do is write off entire days, when in actual fact it may only be a rough few hours.

Personally I think you have done amazing this week, I think youre entitled to a well earned break this weekend, enjoy your day at home ;) Take reassurance from the fact that you are having good days and you have the drive to do things when you are feeling good, you are pushing your boundaries, which shows how far you have come in your recovery. Again be proud, its so hard to see our own sucess sometimes.

The pain/panic is a familiar one, I remember talking to a counsellor about this once before. Here's what she told me - Anxiety is a natural response to pain, we all respond to pain this way because its not enjoyable. In a usually not anxious persion, low/med pain may cause an anxiety rise to lets say 3. That person is starting with an Anxiety base rate of zero therefore the impact of the rise is minimal. For an already anxious person it becomes very noticeable - With an exisiting base of rate of anxiety of lets say 5, a natural increase of 3 in reponse to pain takes the bodys overal anxiety level to 8 - Thats pretty uncomfortable anxiety for most. I guess the answer is to accept why the anxiety is so high that day, rather than fight it and cause it to rise even higher ;)

---------- Post added at 15:27 ---------- Previous post was at 15:18 ----------

Makes a lot of sense Terry, when I was in counselling before I used Journalling a lot, as you say making the thoughts physical has quite an impact on their value. In most cases what was in my head sounded absolutely rediculous when I wrote it on paper!

Taking away the fuel is often all it needs I guess. :unsure:


No worries, you would do the same as would everyone on here.

Something I've found is that the thoughts just keep going round & round and sometimes it seems to reduce them by using tools that include writing down thoughts or worries. Some people find journaling good for this or you can use CBT tools like Thought Records to challenge them. I think it's not just challenging though, I think by writing it down you bring it into the physical world and it perhaps becomes something you can more easily try to resolve. Maybe there is a sense of closure too? This would be part of the aim of the Thought Record.

When I was still working, I would have ideas of tasks coming into my head all the time. It would happen at home too and I usually tried to remember it or create lists. I would even be having this problem when trying to get to sleep and on some occasions when waking in the night! This was all when I was developing obsessional thoughts about my work.

What helped along with the lists was writing down things to do tomorrow before I went to bed. If a had a task or idea pop into my head I would keep a pen and paper by my bed. This did help and the reason it did was because I got it out of my head and onto something I saw as physical.

So, if you find talking helps, is it to offload it out of your head? If so, maybe a writing form could help you?

If it's the ability to talk it though, I don't know whether a Thought Record and maybe speaking combined with it would help? In some psychodynamic techniques they use something called "chair work" where you move between each and play two roles. You might find ways to use something like that for self talk and again it tries to make that change in how you view your surroundings to encourage you to think it differently. I don't know much about it and how it's used but it might be worth a look if it makes self talk slightly easier.

[lindy lou 2]

Thanks for that Mart,I am trying to push the bounderies, but have to accept the good & bad days, as you say, when the good days happen, it feels so good.
Then bam, another bad day.
I want to get over this myself, so I know how to deal with it in the future, meds may help a litle at first, but I don't want to have to rely on them.
There is a lot of negativity going on in my life at the moment, & I have such negative thoughts, I try to make positive thoughts when I can.
The hardest thing for me, is that my sister in law is dying, with a brain tumour, my only brother texts me , talking about his heartbreak, & wanting to die or commit suicide. People tell me I should ignore his texts, he shouldn't be putting it on me. But I just cannot do that, I am not hard hearted in any way, he is a complicated person & refuses councelling, he is too private for that. I on the other hand gab to anybody, I would love councelling myself, to help me understand all of this, but cannot afford private, the nhs have not offered me much except meds, I am weaning off them as much as I can.
Thanks for your reply,
all best wishes to yourself, I will keep searching for help on here, at least then, I am not putting it all on friends & my husband.
Linda.

[Mart0310]

Gently pushing yourself forward is the only way I believe, you cant do it at anyone elses rate, and like you say meds are a short term solution, they deal with the symptoms not the problem itself.

I lived with Anxiety for 10 years before counselling, it was the best money, well spent! I was pretty much anxiety free, and believe I would have stayed that way, a bit of a health scare at the beginning to the year sent me spinning back into anxiety, although nowhere near as severe as it once was! Im back in counselling now and hopefully the road again despite the horrible blips along the way!! :shrug:

It sounds to me as if you are making positive leaps towards your recovery, just remember not to be so hard on yourself :)

Totally understand the impact other people have on your anxiety, its almost impossible to prevent, and in honesty, it would be a very natural life if we did would it? there will always be outside pressures beyond our control learning how to deal with them is key I guess.

[lindy lou 2]

Yes you are right I really need to get stronger,in order to help my brother,when the inevitable happens, so, I suppose I have to think of my own recovery for that very purpose. Coming on here & talking it out is beginning to help, that is why I am having some better days. Talking today has helped me get through it. Thanks everybody.:)

[MyNameIsTerry]

Thats very true about the scale of anxiety, Mart. We have to fill in various monitoring forms for CBT as you would have I'm sure and one of them was a GAD-7 scale for things like this. It has buckets for whether anxiety is within normal range and several to classify when you are over that threshold. Mild, moderate, severe. They are rated 0-3 over a series of questions to add up to a total score to find which bucket you are in for those who haven't seen them.

If I recall rightly 10+ means clinical intervention may be necessary but underneath this it may be classed as manageable. The lowest bucket inside 1-10 is classed as normal levels.

Mine was often not far over 10 although in hindsight I thiknk I should have marked it a few points higher. But as you say, you take my 11+ and add a 3 for an event trigger or pain and its clinically more significant. Add that 3 to someone who is in normal range and they may just cross a boundary into mild but as long as it doesn't create a permanent increase, its of no significance.

Its a good thought provoker for how your disorder started to. Mine was a steady build up over probably a year and then one day I snapped with an anxiety attack. So, in in my case I reckon I was slowly building up that score and it wasn't coming down due to constant daily stress. Eventually it crossed the line and I felt it. So, because I wasn't really feeling it before, its obvious that those levels may not even need to be on normal range as long as they are more mild.

Pain is dealt with by certain neurotransmitters too. Serotonin & norepinephrine are ones I know of. Something I have noticed is that in my blips, I'm less tolerant to physical pain. That maybe because of too little or perhaps too much with overstimulation?

I completely agree with you on writing days off and I can remember telling my therapist this. You wake up and it starts and then the negative thinking comes, the worrying about whether an attack will come or whether it will be like this all day and what will tomorrow be like, etc. This ultimately means we bring more negativity, more negative thoughts & emotions, etc so we not only intensify it but prolong it too.

Its a bit like the deal with insomnia. If you spend your days worrying about not sleeping, you won't.

The answer lies in not allowing this to happen but its hard going and takes time to learn. I don't profess to being at that level yet but I have managed to do quite a bit of it so that it no longer holds me back quite as much as it did when I would write the day off. Now I get on with it and feel the frustration, get sick of it still, etc but the day still has its possibilities and tomorrow isn't really a thought unless its a particularily bad blip but it still has a possible positive in there for me.

---------- Post added at 05:00 ---------- Previous post was at 04:55 ----------

Lindy - If I was in your situation I think I would want someone qualified to deal with a suicide risk to assure me that ignoring them is right. The Samaritans have a lot of training before they allow them to take calls and I'll bet they have a lot of monitoring too. So, for the unqualified to say that is something that is not based on an understanding of the difference mindsets of someone in those mood states. People can't easily be put in yes or no categories anyway and moods change in how they influence people so there could be times where that may be right and times where it is not.

I guess they could mean that you are enabling him to obtain reassurance. Like in an anxiety disorder. The trouble is, this is a mood disorder and they are quite different and not necessarily subject to the same patterns. When my mood gets really bad (when I was very bad) I would have periods where I didn't care if the world around me burned but other periods where I just wanted someone to be with me and help me.

[lindy lou 2]

Hi Terry, I don't know how to check if he really is a suicide risk, he would not take any advice from me to call the samaritans, I will have to deal with it when she dies, obviously we will go over to him, when it happens. His doctor has tried to get him on anti depressants, but he won't take them, the doctor & the carers know what a state he is in, and if necessary, I will call the doctor myself,& try to get them involved, he is too busy helping to look after his wife at the moment, it is when she has gone I will need to be there for him, that is why I am trying to get strong, for him. I think he had some sort of a breakdown when our mother died, then he came out of it after 2 yrs, He is a great believer in spirituality, as am I , My friend who is psychic told me, if you commit suicide you have to come back & go through it again, I don't know if it is true, none of us do, but, I told him that, & I think it has made him wonder if he could risk doing it, I will keep telling him anything I can , if it will prevent him from it. Just got to play it all by ear, it is this hanging over me that is the worst.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Hi Lindy,

I used to work with a woman who had a sister like this. Her husband had died in an accident and she took it very hard. Every year when the anniversary came she had to be there for her because she was afraid for her safety. She said it was very draining on her to have that worry in her life and she didn't have an anxiety disorder so its even more lumped on top of you with all these med changes. The fact you are still able to keep going and make gains shows you do have a lot of strength inside you.

Use places like this to vent it out, people understand. I rarely talk about my problems in the real world too, I think a lot of us are the same. Its very hard for partners to understand and I know my opinion of anxiety changed overnight when it happened to me. I felt ashamed how I moaned about other managers who had more established work areas than me and still they went off. I later found out that its irrelavent, it just takes that push over into anxiety, no matter what is, and things change and get much harder.

The concerns over your brother are worth talking to someone about. Maybe you can get some advice about it? Some charities run groups for carers to to talk about the drains on their health so maybe mental health charities such as MIND or Rethink may be able to give some advice on what to look out for?

Goals are good, don't put too much pressure on yourself by being fully recovered by X time, you will get there more quickly without that pressure. Eitherway, no matter what happens when it does, you will handle it, its only a question of how hard it will be but I find you are seem like you are getting better compared to how you talked when you joined. It can be useful to look back at old posts to see how far you have come as posting styles change and use of language.

[Mart0310]

I agree completely with Terry, there is a lot of strength and positivity in your words.

You sound very much to me like someone who has come quite a way down the road to recovery, keep on walking! :wacko:

Well despite my stressful week and bouncy blippy anxiety levels, Ive managed a weekend at the Caravan, no idea why but my little peace haven makes such a difference!

Heres hoping for a positive week for all of us :yesyes:

[lindy lou 2]

Hi Mart, glad you got to the caravan , I could not even get out to socialise at the pub this week & only last Sat I went & had a great day. Friday this week was the calmest for ages, now I am having a lager at home whilst cooking & listening to ABBA, because I am an old fart & I love it because I used to dance around the kitchen to it with my fun loving Mum, who sadly died at the age I am now. Such happy carefree days. I find myself lately , in the midst of this hell, thinking "whatever I feel now, I have been lucky enough to have had a pretty good life " when compared to lots of poor souls. I have a husband who sticks with me, even though he cannot really understand all of this, he is an honourable man who will put up with it, he says, he is starting to see glimpses of the old me. I hope I will one day be back to the person I once was. Sorry for the ramble , only had one can of calling, just needing distraction by talking. Anyway glad you got to your haven.

[Mart0310]

The fact that your husband is noticing a change is a real marker! During my recovery I found the closer I got to feeling like my oldself the easier it became, eventually it just reaches a point where the anxious thinking has less value than your desire to do all the things you are missing. It becomes easier and easier to stiffle those anxious thoughts in favour of fun!

Your attitude is great, you are gonna get there, despite not doing what you planned to do, you are still having fun dancing to Abba, good on ya and you look back on your life so far with gratitude rather than resentment, that is half the battle I think :yesyes:

As for our ever suffering partners, of course they can never really understand how it feels, how could anyone possibly understand without the physical experience? They do however understand us, know exactly how to motivate us and when to just be there, much the same as we do for them. They dont need to do anything more than that do they? :yesyes: