!@#$%^

[tartary_lamb]

There has to be some way to outsmart your body chemistry.

No, seriously, folks. I know why I feel like this. This whole heart won't stop pounding, oh god everything's a crisis and everyone hates me thing? The jittery, useless ball of unfounded anxieties and stress? It's hormones. More specifically, it's hormones fucking with an already naturally

Comments

[barometric]

This. You'd think that knowing why you're reacting to things a certain way (and knowing that this is not a fact-based response) would contribute to being able to, you know, feel better. Or at least cope better, or calm down slightly.

And yet no. Rational thought is absolutely no help on that front. The only thing it helps with, in my personal experience, is sometimes allowing other people to cope better (because I apologize and/or interact less).

I feel like popular culture has lied to me in some respect on this front. I have the strong impression that at some point in my life, it was communicated to me that if you confront your emotions rationally, you can stop feeling things that you recognize as irrational. This is patently false, and I am somewhat bitter about that. I mean, maybe there are people out there for whom realizing that some of their emotions are irrational would be a major step forward, allowing them to make positive changes in their behaviour and mental health! I think I probably know some of these people. Lucky

[angstbunny]

it was communicated to me that if you confront your emotions rationally, you can stop feeling things that you recognize as irrational. This is patently false, and I am somewhat bitter about that.

THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIS

THIS THIS THIS.

Because, yeah. I know exactly WHY I think the way I do, WHY I feel the way I do. But it doesn't do a damn thing in helping me CHANGE. Urgh.

BITTER BITTER BITTER

[barometric]

Yeah -- so for example, I've recently started meeting with a councellor-type person, and I feel like I respond to a lot of what she says with: "yes, I know that intellectually, I really do. It hasn't helped."

Really, I feel like I use the word intellectually a lot when I'm explaining myself to her. Frankly, if I felt all the things I knew, I'd be one of the best-adjusted people in the world. And then I wonder: are there people who don't know these things intellectually? Am I at least better off than them? Or are they just equally wound up but less frustrated about it?

[angstbunny]

Yeah, same here. It's why counseling hasn't really worked for me. Or at least, insight-based counseling, which seems to be the dominant type out there. The talking cure. If you can discern the root cause of whatever it is that bugs you, you can cope better. I think there ARE people who don't have insight into what ails them. And insight-based counseling can work for them. Just not us. And HA, same here. If I get a nickel every time I use the word "intellectually," I'd be fucking rich. It's actually a form of a coping mechanism. For me, anyway. Possibly the one and only piece of insight I ever gained from counseling (it may not work, per se, but at least I can vent confidentially and without judgment, which is something). When one rationalizes, one distances oneself from one's emotions, so as not to feel them, or feel them less intensely.

[tartary_lamb]

So very true. At least I'm a little more on the ball this time around; usually, I completely disassociate and all decision-making goes out the window.

Thanks!

[angstbunny]

HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGS.

Yeah, I second what B. said. It's so not fun to KNOW and yet the knowledge doesn't seem to help at all. Boooooooooooo.

Weak sauce.

*HUGS!*

[barometric]

[off topic reply, but I can be B. on the internet and in RL now! Unanticipated bonus!]

[tartary_lamb]

I'm actually already taking propranolol. It does help; I'm less likely to be completely frozen with fear than I once was, but I still find functioning effectively (at least, effectively enough to resolve what's stressing me out in the first place) difficult if not impossible when the anxiety hits.

I may not be taking enough. I'll talk to her.

[pintsizeninja]

No, seriously, folks. I know why I feel like this. This whole heart won't stop pounding, oh god everything's a crisis and everyone hates me thing? The jittery, useless ball of unfounded anxieties and stress? It's hormones. More specifically, it's hormones fucking with an already naturally anxious disposition. *big squishy bear hugs* This is something I've struggled with for such a long time, as you know, so I understand this completely. Every time I start getting anxious because of some stupid reason or another, I know it's completely illogical. You're totally right - the world isn't ending, and we know it. But our bodies don't seem to know it, and continue to respond like the sky is falling and everything is burning, and nothing will be the same again

[tartary_lamb]

Thanks. To that list of things that ease my troubled state of mind, I add your icon. Damn it, woman.

Do let me know how Yoga works out for you. I've always been reluctant to take medication, having been prescribed anti-anxiety and anti-depression meds as a kid, but these days I am taking a couple of (thankfully mild, non-addictive) things that seem to be helping. But, really, I'd rather not have to take them forever.

In my immediate circumstances? It's work, primarily, with a number of other, less obvious stressors that crop up whenever I think about the future or, uh, the present. >_o;

My shrink, because it's what shrinks do, attributes most of my problems to as-of-yet unidentified childhood traumas, but so far as I'm concerned that stage of my life is a blank slate. I can't remember a damned thing, other than the fact I was freaked out and miserable the entire time.

But yeah, thanks. I hate this stuff, I really do.