How can we be two things at once?

[NoPoet]

Is anyone else as weird as me? I have made myself ill with anxiety over the last few weeks, mainly due to obsessing about my symptoms and problems until I am bordering on being depressed, but I'm still able to go out and do things with family and friends?

If I still enjoy a social life, why do I feel anxious all the time? Is it normal, or even possible, to spend the best part of every day feeling tense and stressed out?

Does anybody else find themselves able to live a fairly normal life while still obsessing over their own problems?

[goingmadder]

Hey Poet..

I know exactly what you mean...

Sometimes, well most of the time I can be anywhere, a bar, restraunt, park, nightclub, i could be chatting away or dancing, playing a game and yest simaltaneously I am in total mental chaos, I am analysing my every thought, comment, action, I am questioning the same in others, I am asking myself whether what I jst said was true, thoughts build up in towers i call it stage thinking where by i start with a small minor thought and it eventually ends up with me being a liar, being evil, horrible, unworthy of this persons company, love, affection, whatever!...

Its bizzare because the whole time half of me, the half thats "real" i guess is having a fantastic time... while the other half is slowly but surely driving itself up the bl**dy wall...

I have sat in a bar or wherever (when the the analysing and anxiety has reached a peak) and looked at the people around me, people i know and strangers alike and I have screamed at them (IN MY HEAD) HOW CAN YOU ALL BE SO CLAM? WHY AREN'T (AREN@T) YOU ALL THINKING LIKE ME? HOW CAN YOU ALL SIT THERE SMILING? DON'T YOU REALISE THIS IS ALL FAKE? I have felt like Im not even there like i am totally invisible...

The wierdest one and I guess I may be going off the topic here so do excuse me but just need to let this one out while its sitting in my head... I have had (on more than one occasion) the thought that perhaps I am mentally handicapped, that I have downs syndrome and that those around me are simply humoring me the whole time... I know this is totally insane, but the fact that i even have to remind myself of things like, I have 9 gcse's all above c, I have 2 daughters, I have a job, I am currently studying off shore financa and administration, I mean come on.. .. Sometimeslike just now re reading what I have just said makes me laugh because of how irrational it is and how nuts i sound. But nonetheless these thoughts pop in my head and thats that.

ANyway i feel like i have thought myself int a corner and i need to relax so im gonna go smoke a ciggy...

Please if anyone has had carzy thougths like mine please let me know...

Thanks..

Poet! You are not alone buddy I do beleive that is the point i was trying to make but i got carried away..sorry

X

[PoppyC]

Hi
PyschoPoet - You are not 'weird! Well if you are, I bet I am weirder lol Maybe we should start a poll about who is the weirdest!
I can get like this about being out and seemingly joining in but underneath I am a different person. I am not quite like it so much now - hardly at all - so there is hope that you wont always feel as you do.
I would sit and analyse other people. I could be out anywhere, having a good time, but part of me would be looking at other people and thinking too much about them - if that makes any sense - I would be thinking 'why are they so calm - I bet they dont have any problems' and I used to think, 'all these people and I bet no one has anxiety except me'. One part of me would be happy and chatting and the other part would be 'thinking too much' about my anxiety and other people.
If anyone made a comment about me, I would go over and over that comment and then my thoughts would spiral from seeing it as a harmless comment to eventually me never wanting to speak to the person who said it again! I would imagine big 'falling out argument' scenarios. - (castatostrophising as my counsellor told me)
I dont think so much like that anymore. With every thought I have about other people I then give a flip side to that thought.

[NoPoet]

Hi you lot, thanks for replying :D

Pink Panic, I thought your reply was good, why did you delete it?

It's hard to imagine that four weeks ago my mates were remarking how I didn't have a care in the world. I loved spending time alone, I was buzzing off life, I was happy and reasonably content.

Sometimes it's hard to imagine ever going back to that after what I've been through in the last few weeks. I have definitely been a shadow of myself for the last month. Has anybody ever felt like that, but then managed to actually get back to being themselves again?

That's the scariest thing at the moment -- thinking I'll never get back to being me.

[goingmadder]

hey poet..

It is scary when you feel like you're always going to feel this bad.. but truth be told, i have found looking back at the years its laways happend in waves.. sometimes the anxiety has lasted for weeks months other times day sometimes just hours, but it always does go away... So far its always come back but i put that down to the fact that its only been this past week that i even realsied i had GAD, i always thought i was nuts becasue i had learned to beleive the negative thoughts about myself.

I can't say for certain that the Anxiety will ever go away forever but i certainly do have faith that with the right knowledge and support we can keep it at bay and nip it in the bud when we feel it coming ...

Todays been a bit wirerd for me, up and down with the anxiety but being on here and reminding myslef its the GAD and it will pass is helping...

Love to all and big hugs

X

[worriedGrace]

I am a real Jekyll and Hyde character. I can be at home in the morning so frightened and tense that all my muscles hurt but somehow I manage to get dressed and get the bus to work and as soon as I go in the door I am the life and soul of the party and nobody would ever guess what a wreck I really am. A work colleague once said that they couldnt imagine me being afraid of anything! How little they know. I should have been on the stage. It works in reverse as well. As soon as I get indoors I am my usual miserable self. My father was just the same and it drove my poor mother wild. People thought he was such a lovely man but it was another story at home.

[Pink Panic]

Hi Poet,

Sorry mate, I just meant to delete part of it and then add more but me being me I deleted the whole lot by mistake! ....... Morning anxiety didn't help either!

Now I have come back I have forgotten what I said but I think it was that when you are alone and obsessing then you need to try distraction. Anything that takes your mind off the symptoms is good, mine is usually mylaptop or episodes of Peep Show but anything that you can really get yourself immersed in will help mate.

Don't worry you will get back to your old self in time.
I have been through this before and I was 100% back to my old self so it can be done. Unfortunately my personal circumstances and major stresses such as divorce etc., made me ill again but hey I'm getting there and so will you. :hugs:

[NoPoet]

It's reassuring to know people understand, thanks everyone :D

I've had a fantastic day out with my dad today. Two good nights' sleep and the citalopram effect have helped to keep my head clear of unnecessary scary thoughts, and I realised a few things about my condition. I hope other people can look at their own problems in a new light after this.

Number one is that I'm definitely running away from some things. Dating, getting a new job, fear of mortality, these are issues that have hurt me badly this year and I have done absolutely sod all to deal with them. Even thinking about them puts me in a taxi to Panic Street Station.

Number two is that a lot of my anxiety is caused by being stuck at home bored. Not particularly something to worry about, is it? What is really getting to me is spending a lot of time worrying about my problems. I have had major anxiety attacks in my room, in the downstairs front room, even in the bog, all places which are sacred to me, especially the bog. All of these places now seem scary and the thought of being in them stresses me out. It's called association. You have several bad episodes in one place and your brain automatically associates that place with feeling bad.

The solution? To actually go to the places that scare you and spend time doing something that you enjoy there. So if you're scared of the opposite sex, get some good friends together and go clubbing or go round some bars. You don't have to talk to anyone you don't know, just get used to being around them.

If you're scared of a room in your house because you associate it with anxiety, go in there, sit down, take a few deep breaths and put your favourite programme on.

Don't get lost in your own worry. Remember the REASONS why you feel so bad. Hold onto them like a lifeline. You need to DEAL with these reasons, you need to actively try to resolve them, cos no drug or treatment is going to work if you don't work with it.

[Pink Panic]

Hey Poet,

Great to read that you had a fantastic day out. :yesyes:

Wow mate you really are working through your issues and that's fantastic.

I can feel the positivity in your post, keep it going. :yesyes:

PP
xxx