another day in the life of anxiety

Well, I woke up late as usual, and my anxiety started because I knew I woke up too late to go grocery shopping before my group therapy session.

I had some anxiety about going to my group session, my second with this small group, because I wasn't sure it would be productive, I didn't feel I had much to talk about and I had doubts about my ability to give advice to the others in the group. I decided to walk to the clinic, listening to my MP3s, I needed a little exercise since I've really been neglecting that lately.

As soon as I got home, my aunt and I had to go right out to get groceries, go to the drugstore and the office supply store. This made me even more anxious, I didn't feel like driving to all these places and I knew spending all that time shopping is really hard for me, and I also knew that that would mean I would be back late to take my medicine.

But, I made it through without having to stop and tell my aunt that we had to leave the store right now because I'm having a panic attack. We had briefly mentioned breathing techniques in group therapy, and how easy it is to forget to use things like that while one is going through bad anxiety or a panic attack, but I was able to remind myself, so I stopped for a moment in each aisle of the store and took a deep long breath and let it out and relaxed my muscles a little bit. That was just enough to get me through it. The anxiety was still there, but I held off a full panic attack.

I picked up some calcium and iron supplements while at the drug store, I think I need them but I'll run them by my doctor to see what he says about that.

Right now, after having finished dinner, I'm fighting with the anxiety to write this post and respond to emails, it's not like it's a big deal, but with my anxiety those little things feel like a lot of pressure, and I feel like I'm rushing through, like I have to get this done right away and I can't stop to relax until I get it done.

OK, there, I just took my own advice and paused for a moment to do a little breathing, that's better. I have to try and not let molehills turn into mountains, and tell myself it's OK to relax while doing tasks and that I don't need to be in such a hurry as I think I do. I've observed myself today having a lot of negative thinking and having to turn those negative thoughts away.

Tomorrow night I'm going back out to Border's book store for their open mic night, a friend is going to play the flute. I kind of promised that I would come up with something like a poem or whatever to do for the open mic, but I haven't gotten any inspiration or ideas, and I feel like I haven't had the time to come with something, which brings with it a little feeling of guilt that I didn't accomplish it. With any luck, maybe something will come up in the next 24 hours that I can use.