There are certain negative
stigmas and stereotypes that some assume are true of anxiety
sufferers. If we cannot work we are lazy. If we do not go to college
we are goalless. If we have panic attacks we are crazy. We hear
things like “Just get over it” or “It's not that bad!” and we
are left feeling misunderstood and incapable of relating to others.
These hurt us. They slow our
recovery. They reinforce our anxiety and phobias. I have always felt
most unmotivated when being criticized.
And yet I have also found
that, in the face of criticism, I have the best opportunity to reach
out to others and bring them into an understanding of what I go
through and what I'm doing to recover.
~*~
I have always been a
self-conscious person, but I am most self-conscious of my anxiety.
For years I looked to defend myself. I knew people were
thinking I wasn't good enough, laughing at me behind my back. These
projections were part of a pattern of distorted thinking. Even when
someone complimented or encouraged me, I was irritated and offended
because they seemed not to see my pain.
When I was eighteen I moved
back in with my mom for the first time in six years.
My mother understood what it
took to get over anxiety. She had gone through it and had recovered.
At one time in her life she did not work or drive, and had regular
panic attacks. When I moved back home with her at eighteen, she
played hardball with me, pushing me to step outside my comfort zone,
and I reacted very poorly to this because I didn't understand
what I was going through, what it would take to get better.
My problem was that I was
more comfortable in my state of anxiety than I was in growing as a
human being. I was complacent and lacked motivation. Without
motivation, getting over anxiety is almost impossible.
My mom didn't begin to grow
until her life circumstances required her to (this worked for her,
but shouldn't be thought of as a generalization; some find it easier
to recover when they have help and support of family and friends,
others do better when they're absolutely forced to, but most are
somewhere between). When she found herself divorced, single, with no
one else to rely on but herself, relying on herself became the easier
thing to do.
I was in a completely
different set of circumstances. I felt relatively safe. I was
prepared to dig in and fight tooth and nail anyone who tried to make
me grow up.
I was not ready because I
had others to rely on, and when I was ready, I wanted to take
things slow, to ease into exposure therapy, but my mother's idea was
that the longer I took, the harder it would be.
There was a balancing act
there. I had a need to do things slowly, safely, or not at all, and
my mother had her need to have me recover as fast as possible. Her
needs versus mine created a conflict that many people with anxiety
face with their parents, lovers, spouses, doctors and friends.
Today I can peruse anxiety
forums and groups on the internet and see the exact same pattern of
behavior unfolding. I read people criticizing friends and loved ones,
all for the same type of behavior I once criticized my mom for.
Encouragement might as well be a slap in the face for many of us. The
difference for me now is that I realize my mom wasn't out to get me.
She was trying to help me the best she knew how, using what worked
best for her.
~*~
I was looking to defend
myself. That was who I was at the time, the role I was playing. And
so I saw conflict in places it didn't exist.
I cried for help, then would
tell the rescuer to go to hell.
And the more I fought people
for looking down on me, the more they looked down on me. By using
conflict, I could make stigma grow. If my mom ever thought I
was lazy, I enforced that idea by acting like an inconsiderate jerk
to her when she suggested I do something.
In
the end lashing out wasn't working, and I had to find another way. In
my early twenties I was studying anxiety and absorbing the
information like a sponge, and I was studying Taoism, which promotes
a balanced lifestyle, and an understanding that all things are
connected. I realized that my actions could influence others in ways
I didn't want or expect them to.
I
also knew, from studying psychology, that people behaved the way they
did because of inner motivations, fear being a prime factor. I looked
at my behavior and discovered how my hostility toward their words
caused them to intensify their hostility toward me, and if they had
given me a compliment or encouragement, how my anger toward them
could easily teach them not to give me support again.
Ignorance was where stigmas
came from. If I knew I wasn't really lazy, but others were saying or
insinuating that I was, then it was their ignorance. How could I work
through this?
I put myself in their shoes.
I sought to understand where their criticism came from.
My maternal grandmother's
side of the family is a large one. And they grew up surviving. They
started working young just to get by. They worked as if their very
lives depended on it. My grandmother and her brothers and sisters
worked themselves to the bone because it was all they knew to do.
Seeing that, it was easier to understand why they would look at me and not trust my
“emotional” reasons for not holding a job. They had problems too,
everyone does, but they buried them and went headlong into their work.
Some even buried anxiety and depression, so they weren't
unaware or immune to my experiences. They weren't necessarily
stronger than me, they just had no one else to rely on but
themselves, whereas I had them and others.
Once I thought about their
feelings and motivations for what they did in life, I found I could draw strength from their struggle.
~*~
People like to see results
and there was one thing I was not doing. I was not showing others
what I was accomplishing. Being introverted, I work best alone and
that was what I was doing with my anxiety, but I was missing out on
the help I could get from my family, even if that help only came in
the form of understanding and an end to criticism.
Much of what I do to heal isn't visible to the outside world. I
primarily work with meditation, coping statements, deep breathing,
and positive self talk, all things I can do on my own. No one is
inside my head, and it's important not to assume people know what I'm
thinking. The only way people would see that I was working hard was
to show them, to talk about what I was doing, how I was doing it, and
invite them to help me.
Some days I spent hours in my room meditating or visualizing overcoming a
phobic situation only to be condemned by a family member for spending
all day in my room. It was rough when I tried so hard and got no positive feedback for my effort. Sometimes it was easier to just give up and stop trying, but I couldn't rely on staying in my room, not interacting with my own
family, and expect my situation to improve.
Obviously for any of this to
have worked I had to be productive.
In order to show others I was working hard I had
to work hard. There have definitely been times where I wasn't
motivated, and I had nothing to show.
And it was important that I
kept the lines of communication open, not resting on my laurels, but staying proactive, especially when I felt I was going in the right direction. If communication stops, people will eventually drift
back into their old habits, and the cycle will begin anew.
In the end it is hard to
call someone lazy when you know how hard they're working. It is hard
to call someone a coward when you see how many risks they are taking.
And most people can and will appreciate being involved in the
recovery process, especially family and friends who want nothing more
than for the anxiety to go away.
Further Reading:
Tao of Anxiety: Series
Further Reading:
Tao of Anxiety: Series
Posts
JR - a portion of the world we each live in is our own...and no one can relate or even imagine that place. Labels of any kind can be cruel and crippling. I know this all too well myself.
ReplyDeleteWe each reach plateaus in the journey at our own pace, and learning to distill the true efforts to help from the self-serving expectations of others is an art and challenge in and of itself.
Be proactive...leave communication lines open and be well!
Ron
Thank you, Ron!
DeleteIt's funny. As an avid runner/weight lifter I know all about plateaus, but I never thought of them in terms of personal growth, at least where my anxiety is concerned. I'm going to chew on this concept for a while, I think.
Thanks for sharing! This has been quite a journey. I can relate to how too much criticism actually demotes a person and can actually make them want to give up. And it is also true that people cannot read our minds, and we have to let our loved ones in. Some great insight and advice here. Take care!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Lena!
DeleteIt's a balance between the two. We need encouragement, but we need to know the difference between it and criticism. That's probably true for everyone.
Criticism and judgement can definitely help deflate one's resolve and cause them to react with hostility. It's not hard to feel defensive when you are trying to overcome something but are being misunderstood and "pushed". We all have to do things when the time is ripe...only we know when it is, not others, though others sure are good at putting their two cents in!
ReplyDeleteThought provoking post. I'm behind in reading posts and writing my own..glad I caught up to reading this one! :)
Thanks for reading, Jessica :D
DeleteThe trick is knowing when the time is right, isn't it? haha...and everyone thinks they know.
As an outsider looking in, I wonder if your mother focused on you simply so that she didn't have to focus on herself. She knew what she want through and didn't want to see you go through the same. Plus, I think a lot of the anxiety people feel now is through being alone.
ReplyDeleteWe put so much value in doing things for others nowadays it seems we can't stand to do anything for ourselves or even consider what it is we want without outside influences. I'm struggling with that right now as I've always been focused on making others happy or trying to predict what they think I should do.
I am quite enjoying the self-discovery some days while others are filled with angst, regret and feelings of despair.
We'll get there. Keep holding on, learning of your path to being you and sharing it with us so we can help in anyway we can.
Thanks so much, Sarah! We will definitely get to where we're going, and hopefully we'll appreciate the journey.
DeleteI think my mom does fear that I'll struggle like she has struggled. She feared for me.
I have met a lot of people who admit the same thing, that they do for others but find it difficult to help themselves. It's always easier to give advice than to take it. We always know what others need to do, but struggle with figuring out our own lives. We need perspective on our own lives, but it's hard when we're so close to the wall. We have to step away a little bit.
Good luck :)
It's true how sometimes it is far more comfortable to stay in our anxiety than to get out of it. Starting all over again is always difficult, not to mention, if people around us don't seem to realize the effort we're doing.
ReplyDeleteYour post made me think again of the many times I struggled and sometimes still continue to struggle to just be myself, no matter what people think or say. Knowing that we are doing something about our many anxieties however is half the battle done.
I haven't been here for a while. Glad to read your posts again.
Thank you, Anne. I'm glad I've been able to help you. That makes it worth it :)
DeleteLiving through difficult times myself, I've realized that I have no idea what that person I just stood in line with at the grocery store is going through or the neighbor I briefly chatted with or . . . or. We have to live empathy. You are brave to write about your experiences. xoxo
ReplyDeleteThat's a great insight. I find that helps me to be compassionate, and being compassionate helps me to relax big time!
DeleteThank you!
I have family that lives with the whole "snap out of it!" mentality like it sounds like so many people do, which doesn't help anxiety at all. The stigma that someone with anxiety just needs to fix it with a quick pill, or just needs to grow up and deal with it is so prevalent in society... it just doesn't work in the long run. Everyone deals with it differently, it's not a one size fits all, and I wish people understood that better.
ReplyDeleteReally liked the article, even if it took me a while to get a chance to read it! Thank you for these posts!
I'm glad you finally did :)
DeleteI agree, but I'll add also that I don't like the mentality of taking pills and getting over it quickly because I also see anxiety as a great opportunity to pause and look at ourselves, to figure out what we are, what our expectations are. I really believe that severe anxiety is existential as much as it is physiological and psychological. So much of anxiety also depends on how we think about ourselves, who we see ourselves as, and the expectations of those around us. It's almost spiritual.