Attack anxiety! Journal of HM

[Hastings & Main]

Thought about doing this for ages, but never found a middle-ground mood to actually start it.
Replies are welcome but not necessary. Unless I ask a question

I will be giving a bunch of tips that have helped me out as well. They've helped me out, but I know they won't work for everyone.

Also, I'm gonna be throwing in the occasional poetry since it's VERY therapeutic, and I just hope no-one sees it as 'pretentious' or as me trying to show off or anything. It's the best way I know to explain my feelings.

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So I've been pretty good with my anxiety the past several months, which I'm attributing to my consciously being aware of my issues, whereas what is normal is me being self-aware of the FEELINGS these issues cause.
It's a long process, but it's merely solid practice.
Like learning a series of steps to write a computer program, it gets easier the more times you do it, even if it isn't necessarily fun. Not that it's any kind of work to recall what's tripping you up as you fall, so to speak, but the first step of "What, now I gotta constantly remind myself not to feel this or that way?" sounds like a bad chore.

It's basically memorization, and it comes along as naturally as learning the alphabet or long division with repetition, and after a few times, one of your issues will fall away all defeated. And it sounds way too easy, but after one issue falls, you see where the solution is coming from and naturally apply it to the next big anxiety problem. And it feels good, because you're helping yourself out of a mental jam.

Having said all that: oh yeah, you're gonna have bad days again! But mine are shorter periods of, well, 'withdrawal', I guess, since I sort of have to shake myself up and go on the attack against this stained part of my conscious.

Also, I actually started exercising!
I figured I got enough of a workout for my body at work where I walk around pretty much non-stop for 10 hours, but it's 'exercise' in a non-controlled manner, in a place I really don't want to be.
A couple I know who lived in the top floor of my apartment moved out (I told them all about my SAD etc, since they've been through heavy abuse and had issues we could all relate to) and gave me a very cool chin-up bar, and the rush after just a few pull-ups - 'cos I can only do a few - my mood improved quite a bit. All this time of hearing that advice, I thought it was BS, but nope...

Well, this has been pretty long, and I totally forgot the event I wanted to write about that was going to be this first post, so I'll try to remember it for later or get into some tips next post.

 

[Hastings & Main]

2

3 PM, on my way home from work, I get off the Skytrain at my stop, I see a beautiful woman about 20-something and she does a double-take looking at me back before she boards the car I got off. I look over her head to avoid her eyes and for a couple seconds unknowingly lock eyes with this other beautiful woman who doesn't look away as she approaches me as we head towards the escalator down.

With a slight jerk I realize I'm making eye-contact and again, look over her head like I'm looking over the platform behind her, looking like I'm not interested AT ALL.
I quickly look at her again, and she is doing that thing that we (meaning people) do when we're not given back the attention from someone we catch eyes with: looks down and quickly around her unassuredly, smile fading, pats her hair like it looks bad or something. "No - you're beautiful: I'm the one who's at fault here." is what I mentally think at her.
This is all in the span of like 3-4 seconds, and this is how much attention I pay to what is going on regarding how my SAD affects me as well as other people.

Wow, writing this out is really no fun at all.

Anyway, I quickly hit the escalator first, her right behind me, me feeling bad - not only for myself and killing yet another chance to meet someone but for her because I made her feel uncomfortable with herself, if even for those short few moments. Out on the street, I looked in the opposite direction as she brushed right by me crossing the intersection the opposite way.

You can probably realize how depressing this all is, right?
A desperately lonely man for years, and I can't even instinctively smile at a gorgeous woman who shows interest. MY instinct, is to dart my eyes away like I've been hit with direct sunlight after coming out of a tunnel.
This exact situation happens to me an average of twice a day.

By the time I ever get over "this", I'll have p****d off/alienated every woman in the neighborhood.
In fact, one day a few years back, while walking home, someone called after me, "DO YOU ENJOY BEING ALONE?"

All I had to do when I got off the Skytrain, was smile at a woman.

::

 

[Hastings & Main]

Another relatively easy day.
Opening up to co-workers a bit more every day and feeling more comfortable around them.
And it only took ten years!
I also just realized that when you're pent up and withdrawn it makes most others keep their distance, and that helps in keeping things awkward for everyone. Once you let bits of your personal self get seen, people warm up to you.
The growth is sorta like a tree, in that it takes inches to get anywhere at all.
You don't just shoot up into the free air with everything in clear perspective when you first start to crumble away at the SAD.

Again, self-esteem is up, despite many many obstacles and a few people (like my upstairs neighbors) who want me to be meek, mild and ineffectual and back in my shell, but that shell is pretty damn u8ncomfortable to get back into these days and maybe soon I won't be able to crawl back in at all.
And with the extra confidence I'm getting more female attention, even if I still don't know what to do with it. But at least I'm sloooowly learning not to duck my eyes down with an angry look. I've gotten up to a slightly surprised expression with an "ooh?"on my lips.
Probably very goofy looking, but it's better than giving off that I'm angry.

Have to pick up speed with this attacking my anxiety (which unbelievably gets so much easier once you start) and run with it, because I have very many ugly things to tackle coming towards me and need all the strength I can save.

 

[Hastings & Main]

my ghost

watching movies
pretending I am watching them with you
going for walks
alone
pretending I am walking with you,
talking, sharing, laughing

eating breakfast
lunch
dinner, alone,
wishing you were here to help make the meals
and enjoy them
with me
but
I dine alone.

getting drunk
getting drunk
getting very drunk
hoping one day
I can get so very drunk with you
but for now
the moment
tonight
and for very many nights past
and for very many more nights to come
I will empty these bottles alone.

playing with the cat alone
sweeping the floors alone
washing the dishes alone
accumulating a lifetime of memories of being alone.

wrestling with life alone
dealing with life alone
fighting life alone
mentally keeping myself alive alone
wounded, alone

sleeping alone,
waking alone.

you are a figment
a ghost-partner
phantom conversations held
within wishes,
your answers only an estimate
of how I think you would reply

imagining your scent,
the feel of your presence both
physical and the other way,
sounds from another room:
a shower starting, a chair bumped into,
the swearing after it, footsteps, clinking utensils
quarters dropped on the floor, soft one-sided conversations
with the cat in your talking-to-a-cat voice
the door shutting when you leave and the
miniature brief sadness felt for the time not together
even though we need it and that
tickle of electricity
when the door opens again

all I hear at this time of writing is
the unpleasantness of the upstairs neighbors and
the echo of these keys being struck,
tap
tap
tap.