Christmas is over. Now what? The days immediately following Christmas are just weird. I don’t know how else to explain it. After all of the preparations and hype of Christmas…BOOM! It’s over. The presents have been unwrapped, family has come and gone (or maybe not), …
This is the BEST caramel popcorn you will ever have, and I’m not exaggerating! My grandma made this every year and brought a tin full of the popcorn for each family to take home. I love caramel corn, but truly none of it tastes quite …
Anxiety. Where do I begin? I have been planning to write about this subject for the past four months, but I just don’t know where to start. Come to think of it, I’ve had anxiety just thinking about writing this post. What if I say the wrong thing? How do I even begin to cover this topic? It is never ending! Will people think that I am professing to be an expert?
The first thing I want to say is that I’m not any kind of expert on anxiety. I do know that a small amount of anxiety is normal and can even be a good thing. I also know that this can be so severe that it impairs daily functioning. Yes, I work in the mental health field. I know many people that suffer from debilitating anxiety, both at work and in my personal life. I LOVE several people that suffer from debilitating anxiety.
Let’s face it, most of us have some form of anxiety from time to time. I don’t think anyone can truly say they have never suffered from it. Anxiety comes in so many forms. Perhaps you have the symptoms, but just don’t recognize it (or choose not to recognize it). I am the first to admit that I have anxiety in certain situations. Crowded rooms with many people in very close proximity is enough to make me want to crawl out of my skin. If I have to be in this situation, I need to sit in the corner or at least at a far end with my back against a wall. Even at my own home, I often need to give myself a “time out” and recharge my batteries alone in my bedroom, away from everyone else. It isn’t because I’m mad. It isn’t because I hate people. It is something I physically and mentally need to do in order to function.
According to http://www.hhs.gov, there are five major types of anxiety disorders:
1. Generalized Anxiety Disorder: Exaggerated worry, even with little or nothing to provoke it.
2. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) : Recurrent unwanted thoughts and/or repetitive behaviors.
3. Panic Disorder: Intense fear with physical symptoms that may include chest pain, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, dizziness, or abdominal distress.
4. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) : Usually develops after traumatic events in which grave physical danger occurred or was threatened.
5. Social Anxiety Disorder : Overwhelming anxiety and self-consciousness in everyday social situations.
As I was preparing to write about anxiety, I decided to ask the real experts…those that suffer from anxiety on a regular basis. I asked them what brings on, or “triggers” their anxiety, and what kind of anxiety symptoms they had. The following is a list of the responses, in no particular order. As I read through these, I attempted to categorize in my mind what kind of anxiety each one represented and if these were normal everyday anxieties or debilitating anxieties. I’ll let you do the same.
Triggers
Symptoms
I now posed the question about ways that my experts found helpful to ease their anxiety. Again, I got several great suggestions.
There were other coping strategies that were mentioned such as the use of alcohol or other non-prescription substances to numb the effects, smoking, nail biting (one of mine, sadly), pulling hair, and self-harm. Of course, these are not recommended but I felt I should include them as part of the “big picture”.
This is a technique that works very well for many people when they begin to experience severe anxiety symptoms. Sit in a quiet place, and concentrate on the present while observing the following:
5 THINGS YOU CAN SEE AT THIS MOMENT
4 THINGS YOU CAN FEEL AT THIS MOMENT (EX: YOUR CHAIR, YOUR FINGERTIPS, THE FABRIC OF YOUR CLOTHING, ETC)
3 THINGS YOU CAN HEAR AT THIS MOMENT
2 THINGS YOU CAN SMELL AT THIS MOMENT
1 THING YOU CAN TASTE AT THIS MOMENT ( OR THINK OF 1 THING YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF)
Grounding truly helps to halt racing thoughts and bring a person back to the here and now.
As I said, I have loved ones with severe anxiety. One of my loved ones used to suffer from frequent panic attacks, which felt to them like the exact symptoms of a heart attack. Once we learned what was going on, my loved one would call me with the onset of an attack. I would remind them that anxiety is sneaky and can manifest itself physically. I would “talk them down” from the attack by reminding them it is a vicious circle. The emotional anxiety brings on the physical symptoms, and the more upset one gets at the symptoms..the worse the anxiety becomes, which causes the physical symptoms to increase..and on and on. Reminding them to take deep breaths and remember that this is anxiety and it will pass helped to ease those physical symptoms as well.
Again, I’m not an expert, but hopefully some of these suggestions will help just a bit. Anxiety is REAL , hard to live with, and nothing to be ashamed of having. Thank you to everybody that shared your stories with me. I welcome and encourage any comments with other stories or suggestions. 🙂
This peach dump cake is about as easy as it gets, but tastes much like a good old fashioned peach cobbler. I usually sprinkle a bit of cinnamon over the peaches before baking, but this is personal preference. Top it with some vanilla ice cream …
Losing my mind (and other things) Do you ever misplace things? I notice that I do it more and more as time goes on. Usually it’s just little things that I quickly find once I calm down and stop having a “shit fit” about it. …
My seven year old grandson Simon is full of personality, and he made a special video on his mom’s phone while she was napping after a long day of work yesterday.
Although this isn’t typically what I put on the blog..he’s my grandbaby and I couldn’t resist all of this cuteness! If you stay with the video until the end you’ll hear him asking for subscribers! 😂❤️😂
I’ve written before about my wonderful grandma that lived to be almost 106 years old. Ha…I accidentally just typed 206, but I caught the mistake…you would have been REALLY impressed, eh? I remember one time somebody asked grandma what kept her going, and she replied …
Guess what? It’s the 6 month anniversary of Cookies and Cursewords! I can’t believe it has already been 6 months! This is a good time to reflect on what I’ve learned during my first six months of blogging. When I first started the blog, I …
I actually had another post written out for tonight. It was a nice post, and you’ll see it in a few days. Certain circumstances have caused me to go in a different direction for tonight. I just have one question. Why the heck do I always fall on my ass, or do other embarrassingly klutzy things?
Tonight I am home alone, almost. It’s a quiet, rainy night..a great night for blogging! I left my favorite notebook in my car, so I ran out to grab it. As I opened the door to scamper to the car, I slipped. On what? Rain? There is no ice out here..it’s just wet. Oh…I see what I slipped on. Wet leaves. As I slipped on these wet leaves, I instantly recognized the familiar slow-motion movements of me getting ready to land on my ass. Grabbing the wobbly iron porch railing, I managed to somehow do a little spinning porch dance and stay upright..barely. Of course, my next action was to look around and make sure nobody saw me. Nope. It’s raining and everyone is inside. Whew! . I can already tell I’m going to be a bit sore tomorrow.
This leads me to think about all of the spills that I’ve taken in my life, and especially all of the klutzy incidents in my adulthood.
11. Sixth grade.
I sucked at physical education class, and was determined that this would be the year to pass the “flexed arm hang” portion of the physical fitness tests. As I was practicing by hanging from the t-shaped clothesline pole, my friend decided it would be funny to pull my legs down. Boom! I fell on the hard concrete holding the pole in the ground. Bad news: Broken collarbone. Good news: 6 weeks with no physical education class!!
10. Drunk around the rosy.
I was in my early 20’s and with a large group of friends at a local festival in a nearby town. We had been drinking all evening and decided to walk to the park and play on the “merry go round” spinning play equipment. One of my friends started spinning those of us sitting on it…faster..faster. My friends jumped off. I stayed on until I FLEW off and into the nearby gravel on my face. Broken glasses and a huge road rash on my face. I didn’t feel it that day but I definitely did the next morning. Ugh.
9. Pop can fiasco.
This was not actually a FALL..well, something fell but it wasn’t me. I was with my friend Brenda in the store. To this day I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I somehow knocked a few cases of canned pop (soda, whatever you call it) off the end display. Cans started rolling everywhere. It seemed like the entire aisle was filled with rolling cans of pop. I turned around to get Brenda to try and help me clean them up( or at least stop them from rolling into the next aisle) and she was GONE. Nowhere to be found. Vanished. A nice stranger helped me since my friend deserted me due to embarrassment!
8. Porch #1.
This time I was not drinking. My husband, kids, and I were visiting friends at their mobile home. They had their dog leashed to the porch. I walked out the door, not realizing my foot was tangled in the leash. Down I went..landing on my knees this time. Huge road rash burns on both knees. The worst part was trying to bend my knees when they scabbed over. Still have a scar on one knee, and this was over 25 years ago.
7. Water balloon volleyball.
My sister Lorna had this great idea to set up a volleyball net in the backyard and play with water balloons for her birthday party (we were adults). It actually was great fun, but the grass became very wet and slippery. I was playing very aggressively until I slipped in the grass and went down. This ended with a trip to the ER and a hairline fracture, which seemed to take years to heal!
6. High School play.
My son acted in high school and they did a production of Putnam County Spelling Bee. This is a hilarious play in which they call actual audience members to participate. Now, I think some may have been aware prior to be called up on stage.. but not me. It was dress rehearsal (thank goodness), so not QUITE as crowded. There was a scene where everyone does this crazy dance and I wasn’t suspecting that I’d be pulled down out of my seat. When my son pulled me down,I instantly fell to my knees in front of the entire audience! I got up quickly, no worse for the wear..but still embarrassing!
5. Boy Scout Parade.
My youngest son was in cub scouts, and the pack had to meet at the park to line up for the parade. I got my son to where he needed to go, but my husband was in a hurry to get back to the car for a good parade watching spot. I was hurrying across the bumpy ground to try and catch him when I tripped in a hole. Not only did I trip, but I flew and then proceeded to roll down the grassy incline for several feet. MANY people saw me. Thankfully nothing was hurt, except my pride.
4. Porch fall # 2.
I worked for the Head Start program and we were required to do home visits. I had just finished a visit with a family that had a tall wooden porch. It was icy, and wooden porches get very slick. I came out the door, slid at the top step, and landed on my pelvis on the ground (5 steps down). I seriously did not think I could move but somehow got up and made it to the car. When I got back to the office I pulled my pants down (Brenda was my lucky witness), and my entire butt and lower back had already turned a dark shade of purple. I didn’t go to the dr for this one, but it hurt for a very long time.
3. Black ice parking lot.
This was also when I worked for Head Start. We had centers in several different towns and I was visiting one of our centers to observe as a coordinator. I was running late and got out of the car to hurry in the building. I THOUGHT the parking lot was just wet, but there were patches of black ice. Of course, I slid on one of these patches and went flying.. facedown into a huge puddle of water. I was completely soaked. Completely. Luckily I remembered that this particular center had a dryer in the adjoining building, so I headed over there. Nobody was in there,but I found a blanket to wrap in while I threw my clothes in the dryer. My friend April had been waiting for me in the classroom, so I called her and asked her to come to the adjoining building (without explaining what happened). We still laugh about this today.
2. Porch fall #3.
This was actually a fall from my six foot deck. It was Mother’s Day 2000. I went out on my deck to water my plants. We had a gate on the deck entrance, which I thought was closed. It wasn’t. All I can remember is the slow-motion type fall, landing on my face and wrist (trying to brace my fall). My glasses flew, there was blood everywhere. I ended up with a broken wrist, multiple facial cuts, and two black eyes. I looked like a monster for at least a week. I had pictures of this, but I can’t find them. I did find a picture of my friend Brenda and I several weeks later with Kenny Chesney, while I was still wearing my cast.
Porch fall #4!
This happened four years ago, in early March. I was watching my 2 year old, very ornery grandson Simon. I was in the kitchen making a fruit salad to take to the high school for a play cast dinner. I heard my screen door open and shut. When I looked out the kitchen window, I saw Simon running as fast as he could down the porch stairs. This was also a wooden deck type of porch, and when I went running after him I quickly realized the precipitation falling from the sky was ice, not rain. My feet slid out from under me and I immediately knew that I was not okay. My grandson saw me and believe it or not, came running back up onto the porch. I remember saying “Simon, I’m hurt. Go get grandpa.” He started patting my back and said “Sowwy Mamaw”. He couldn’t say grandma yet. I crawled back to the door and somehow got back inside, but I couldn’t get on my feet. I knew my ankle was broken. After surgery, a plate, and screws (and a miserable recovery),I was good as new a couple of months later. This was, by far.. the worst.
There have been several others as well, such as the time I got my poncho caught in my sister’s car door and she drug me on the street for a full city block, or the time in Colorado when I stood at the bank to look at a “babbling brook” and fell all the way down and into the water. I still have a small visible rock imbedded in my skin from that one. I can’t forget the time in 9th grade when I was hurrying up the stairs from art class, tripped and fell all the way DOWN the stairs instead!
There’s no message or moral to this post, just wanted to let all of you get to know the real me a little bit better.
One more thing..after my near fall on the porch tonight, I realized I couldn’t get my notebook anyway. My husband is gone with the car!
