This is me..standing naked.
Sometimes hiding doesn’t help you. Sometimes sharing your naked self by however you choose not only helps you but helps someone else.
What saves your sanity and brings you back from the brink when your anxiety is at it’s worst? At it’s worst for NO REASON?
When you are vomiting because you can’t control it. Rocking yourself back and forth trying to fall back asleep. Standing in the shower sobbing because it’s the only thing that makes you feel better. Not wanting to wake your partner up to sit with you through this because you feel like it’s an inconvenience to anyone else to have to sit with you through it. Waking up with your heart racing and nothing but dark, dense clouds of all the things that will never happen wrapped around you.
Where is your safe place to ride it out? The bathroom? The bed huddled under blankets? Maybe sitting on your closet floor surrounded by the empty effigies of your other self? (maybe I’m the only one). I like to look at the pretty things that I don’t wear because my depression and anxiety keep me in a uniform.
My anxious self is not who I am. My anxious self is not the person the world sees. Is it a good thing to be so good at hiding your anxiety that nobody has any clue? No, it’s a terrible fucking thing. Because that means your coping mechanisms are turned ALL the way up and firing on all cylinders. NOT GOOD. If you do this too then you know just how utterly exhausting this is.
I have two safe places. My bathroom at home and my music playlists blasting through my wireless headphones (it was a much needed upgrade). Since I was a kid, music provided a world within a world for me. Where I was still a part of this one but I was also part of something else. Something that gives my anxiety something to focus on while the other half of my brain can accomplish tasks.
The one thing in the world that could cure this anxiety wasn’t medication. It was my cat Mr. Ed. He was the only thing on this planet that squashed all of it....every single little shiity, insidious seed of anxiety sitting inside of me. He knew that just by laying down with me, snuggling the way he always did for 18 years, that I would be ok after that. Saying goodbye to him was the single most difficult thing I think I’ve done. It was and still is such a deep seated visceral ache in my soul, all the pain is still as fresh today as it was when we said goodbye to him. We sobbed into his long lush fur to please come find us again. The following 2 months were the worst of my life. I barely slept. I finally couldn’t take it and needed to find a new gato to bring home. I’ve had at least one cat my entire life and I needed one now more than ever. Along came the most amazing cat who’s more like a dog in a cat suit. Frankenstein is 18 pounds of big soft black cat love. He’s learning to snuggle and doesn’t snuggle with us at night like Mr. Ed did but he’s young. At about 4 or 5 he’s still got crazies and plays so much more than Ed ever did, even when he was young. We like to think Ed sent Frank to us.
I pet Frank and listen to his deep rattling purr...at 3 am...in the bathroom. He throws himself down and makes biscuits in the air waiting for pets. He rubs against my legs or lays down next to me for a couple of minutes. Just when the relief starts to creep in, he gets up. He’ll get it eventually.
I look at houses for sale in cities I’d like to live in on a real estate app on my phone....at 3 am ... in the bathroom.
I craft and think about crafting almost obsessively. I knit, crochet, make beaded things, and am now learning paper crafts. Anything to keep my hands busy helps to keep my mind busy. Everything I create I give away a piece of myself to that person. For what is good sold that could be given for free with much greater joy?
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