Panic Spirals and Brain Knots
This evening I shouted at my husband. Not fair, but it happens, and from time to time he has called me on it but only now do I feel really empowered to do something to fix the problem.
Sometimes I get too close to stuff.. actually, most of the time. I have likened my world view to navigating life with a set of binoculars strapped to my face. It's really hard to see the big picture, but I see things I am interacting with in bewildering detail and often with a lot more importance than most people would place on them. I have big problems with setting priorities, and sometimes have issues with planning, execution of plans, and stepping back to look at things in a more reasonable way, when they are overwhelming me.
I'm so glad that I can feel my processes enough to identify what's going on inside my head... the intense scrutiny goes both ways. When I am overwhelmed my inner monologue goes something like:
"I need to do it, but I can't do it, but I NEED to do it, but I CAN'T do it, BUT I NEED TO DO IT...."
*brain knots*
And when I am like this I get panicky; I do things loudly, and abruptly and it looks like anger, even if all it is is me being frantic or over reactive. It hurts people's feelings. It is disquieting and unpredictable... and unfair.
I have known for a while that the key to me living a half sane life is to identify what I am thinking and telling myself and rewrite the broken bits of code. How I am looking at the world seriously affects how I am interacting with it, and sometimes I am in dire need of a re-frame. When looking back on my freak-outs I have often said to myself "BUT I don't know what to do when it gets like that! I can't change it, because I don't know what to change it to!!" but tonight I saw that for the wall it was. "I can't"?? I'm stronger than that. I am BETTER than "can't".
"It's my responsibility to do something about this before I hurt my family... let's be honest, I have already hurt my family and it needs to stop."
So where does that leave me? Well even my kids know that once you're in a panic your rational reasoning bits of the brain (pre-frontal cortex) are difficult to get online. Once you are in a panic you need something to cut your knot, to change your gear, to derail your train of thought (and other metaphors)... and if you are the one trying to do that to yourself, then you can be out of luck, so the trick is to head it off before it happens. To preempt. To avoid the problem and fix it before you nut-out... before _I_ nut out. I shouldn't hide in the second person.
So I am working on a plan. I need a new script for my mind when I feel things going crazy and I am getting too close to something that is causing me stress. I have identified that one of the issues is how I view the stressor. When I see something as "BAD" my process stops there. BAD is an absolute and to be avoided. In times of stress I have a black and white view of things, and it is actually causing me EVEN MORE stress because I don't assess things. If something is BAD there is no assessment of it. BAD, could be anything from falling in the river, to dropping a cup, to missing a bus, to falling under a bus, to spilling my drink bottle, to accidentally discharging a firearm in a shopping mall.... uhm...?!
It seems, my first step is to predict likely outcome. I'm good at this. I mean REALLY good. Some people think I am good with tarot cards and things but I am just ace with pattern recognition. One of my primary survival mechanisms for life is guessing what comes next so it doesn't throw me for a loop (you have to be good at predicting things when you have such a narrow view of the world, otherwise you'd never keep up with people). Once I have predicted things I can tell how important they ought to be.
Once I have removed BADness from the equation I can stop looking at all things as though I am the victim of something big, scary and life threatening. My threat assessors (amygdalae et.al.) can have a welcome vacation.
"What is likely to happen?.."
"I can cope with that.."
"If I can't cope, I can ask for help.."
"If I don't have help, I can endure.."
"If I can't endure then I'll be dead, so it's not my problem."
I'm bloody good at enduring, so I hope this will sort me out as far as interrupting a panic spiral before it happens, or gets too deep.
Sometimes I get too close to stuff.. actually, most of the time. I have likened my world view to navigating life with a set of binoculars strapped to my face. It's really hard to see the big picture, but I see things I am interacting with in bewildering detail and often with a lot more importance than most people would place on them. I have big problems with setting priorities, and sometimes have issues with planning, execution of plans, and stepping back to look at things in a more reasonable way, when they are overwhelming me.
I'm so glad that I can feel my processes enough to identify what's going on inside my head... the intense scrutiny goes both ways. When I am overwhelmed my inner monologue goes something like:
"I need to do it, but I can't do it, but I NEED to do it, but I CAN'T do it, BUT I NEED TO DO IT...."
*brain knots*
And when I am like this I get panicky; I do things loudly, and abruptly and it looks like anger, even if all it is is me being frantic or over reactive. It hurts people's feelings. It is disquieting and unpredictable... and unfair.
I have known for a while that the key to me living a half sane life is to identify what I am thinking and telling myself and rewrite the broken bits of code. How I am looking at the world seriously affects how I am interacting with it, and sometimes I am in dire need of a re-frame. When looking back on my freak-outs I have often said to myself "BUT I don't know what to do when it gets like that! I can't change it, because I don't know what to change it to!!" but tonight I saw that for the wall it was. "I can't"?? I'm stronger than that. I am BETTER than "can't".
"It's my responsibility to do something about this before I hurt my family... let's be honest, I have already hurt my family and it needs to stop."
So where does that leave me? Well even my kids know that once you're in a panic your rational reasoning bits of the brain (pre-frontal cortex) are difficult to get online. Once you are in a panic you need something to cut your knot, to change your gear, to derail your train of thought (and other metaphors)... and if you are the one trying to do that to yourself, then you can be out of luck, so the trick is to head it off before it happens. To preempt. To avoid the problem and fix it before you nut-out... before _I_ nut out. I shouldn't hide in the second person.
So I am working on a plan. I need a new script for my mind when I feel things going crazy and I am getting too close to something that is causing me stress. I have identified that one of the issues is how I view the stressor. When I see something as "BAD" my process stops there. BAD is an absolute and to be avoided. In times of stress I have a black and white view of things, and it is actually causing me EVEN MORE stress because I don't assess things. If something is BAD there is no assessment of it. BAD, could be anything from falling in the river, to dropping a cup, to missing a bus, to falling under a bus, to spilling my drink bottle, to accidentally discharging a firearm in a shopping mall.... uhm...?!
It seems, my first step is to predict likely outcome. I'm good at this. I mean REALLY good. Some people think I am good with tarot cards and things but I am just ace with pattern recognition. One of my primary survival mechanisms for life is guessing what comes next so it doesn't throw me for a loop (you have to be good at predicting things when you have such a narrow view of the world, otherwise you'd never keep up with people). Once I have predicted things I can tell how important they ought to be.
Once I have removed BADness from the equation I can stop looking at all things as though I am the victim of something big, scary and life threatening. My threat assessors (amygdalae et.al.) can have a welcome vacation.
"What is likely to happen?.."
"I can cope with that.."
"If I can't cope, I can ask for help.."
"If I don't have help, I can endure.."
"If I can't endure then I'll be dead, so it's not my problem."
I'm bloody good at enduring, so I hope this will sort me out as far as interrupting a panic spiral before it happens, or gets too deep.