What haven't I Done in the Name of Anxiety?!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Thu Jan 26, 2006 8:20 am

I was just looking back at old posts and this one made me laugh. Here are some of mine:

If someone asks me "How are you?" I immediately freak out thinking they know something that I don't and that I am going to die.

If someone ever says I look tired or pale I immediately think this is the end.

Every time I get the slightest pain I have to tell my husband, just in case something is wrong he'll know what to tell 911. *LOL*

I have to take my temperature before I take a hot bath just in case I have a fever because I don't want my temperature to go up! Then after I get out I'm convinced I've over done it and my temperature is too high or I've raised my blood pressure because my skin is red.

I've diagnosed myself with pretty much everything there is and if I even read about something new I convince myself I have it before I even read the symptoms.

I have a six-month-old little girl and if she cries for what appears to be no reason, I ask my husband if he thinks she might sense that I am going to die. (silly, I know).

I carry a paper bag with me everywhere I go in case I hyperventilate.

For the longest time when I would go to bed I had to make grinding noises with my teeth so I didn't have to notice my heartbeat.

I would have my husband check my pulse to make sure it wasn't too fast.

Not long after my first panic attack for about two months almost everynight I would make my husband take me to the hospital and we would sit in the parking lot and play cards until I felt better.

When my husband got a job working in the mall I was afraid to stay home by myself so I would sit on a bench outside of his work for 8 hours! (that is probably the dumbest thing I have done)

I used to be afraid to walk up the stairs (and still sometimes am afraid) for fear if I became out of breath I"d never get it back!

If I go to a chinese restaurant I often freak out afterwwards wondering "what if" I am allergic to something there. Same goes for fish or shrimp which I don't normally eat because I don't really like it but if I try it I convince myself I am allergic (although I'm not allergic to anything).

If the weather looks really bad and it's stormy I have been known to go sit in the basement just in case a tornado should drop right on my house.

I'm sure I could do this for hours and hours and hours...but I'll leave it at that for now.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sun Feb 19, 2006 9:07 pm

This is such a good posting, what a great idea!

Lets see if I can remember some funny ones:

I was babysitting, I was about 17 at the time, the kids had already gone to bed. I went into the fridge, and grabbed myself a brownie. I was sitting at the kitchen table, about halfway through the brownie, when I noticed a small joint in an ashtray behind the curtain......At that moment I decided that if these people smoked pot, then the brownies had to be full of the stuff, I ran into the bathroom and forced myself to bring it up. Never babysat for that family again.

I was about 21, and there was the most beautiful man, on break from college, working at a convenience store, I started stopping in quite frequently. He had the greatest body, blue eyed blond with a great smile and personality....and I just loved to go in there, just to look at him, and I was hoping he would aask me out. After awhile we began to flirt, and finally one night he started to ask me out...........he was in mid sentence, and I put down my purchases, walked right out of the store and never went back....poor guy.

I was taking a college corse, the day came when each one of us had to give a speach, I was ready...the student that was giving his speach right before my turn was a nervous wreak, he couldnt even stand, he sat in a chair at the front desk, you could hear the nervousness in his voice, and he had a death grip on the sides of the desk.......I went into full blown "Im outta here mode"......walked around campus till the class let out, and told my professor that I wasnt feeling well, he let me give the speach to just him.......and that was that.

Looking back, these little happenings are a bit funny, but at the time they were very very real.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Mon Feb 20, 2006 6:09 am

Gertrude,

I liked your post. Isn't it funny how now we can look back on things like this and think they are funny, but at the time we are going through them we are so nervous and scared that we can't see them as funny at all??

Crystal

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sun Feb 26, 2006 8:30 pm

One more....

1)When I was in Community College, the class I dreaded most was Speach.....I left that class to the very end, and I actually tried to...(I think its called clep out of, like when your very good at math they give you a written test and if you get a certain high grade, you dont have to take that class).......what ended up happening was, I took Speach class during the summer session, which is only six weeks long, and went to the Dr. who gave me a prescription for Inderal, take one , one hr before performance, Dr said it is used quite a bit for people who do public speaking......I ended up with an A.......in a class that I dreaded for yrs.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sun May 27, 2007 6:27 pm

This is an old thread but is too good not to share. I thought I'd add a few of my own.

When I was a kid, my parents were always late picking us up from any activity. I had the worse panick attacks thinking they weren't going to pick us up.

I once ate what I thought was expired pie. I ran to the computer to ask a bunch of people on a message board if I'd be ok. As it turned out, I misread the date. Phewf, close call there!,ahaha

When I was in elementary school, I thought the mean girls who teased me and who also sat behind me on the bus could read my mind and would tease me furthurmore.

I was leaving the mall the other day and stopped at a four way stop. I'm positive that it was my turn, and as I was turning, another car started advancing. I sped off into the yield and started thinking "what if it wasn't my turn." Well, the car ended up behind me and followed me all the way down a main drag, and into my development. It freaked me out and I started to think he was pissed off and angry at me and would follow me all the way home and create what us anxiety suffers hate......a confrontation! :O well of course the car veered off and just happened to live in the same development!

I got a nasty scratch from a family member's dog tonight and started worrying that it would get infected. I was wearing a gold bracelet( not real gold more like metal) that has a strange metally smell to it. Well the large scratch was right near the bracelet and I worried metal would enter my blood and make me sick. Oh that's so crazy!
It really does seem so much more absurd when you right it down. I can't believe the things that go through my head!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Aug 07, 2007 6:42 am

I used to wait in the car ALL DAY while my husband was at work. I would make him park all the way in the back of the parking lot so no one would walk by me and wonder why I was just sitting in the car.

I cannot handle raw chicken or meat for fear of getting salmonella.

When I was younger, I would barricade my door at night becasue I was afraid I would get up and somehow hurt my parents and sisters. That's when I was afraid that I was possessed by the devil.

Or when I take medication, I have to check and double check the glass to make sure that the pill didn't jump out of my mouth. Or when I take a new medication, I have to tell my hubby when I took it so that if anything happened to me, he'd know why.

Oh my, the list could go on and on! Good thread!

forever young 06 · Post by **forever young 06** » Wed Aug 08, 2007 5:15 am

Its amazing isnt it how we all basically did the same things? LOL
when i first started driving again,, I made list of streets to where i needed to go, that had NO stop signs or Stop Lights!!! Couldnt handle those.
I also made sure, i had in my purse, every phone number of my husband, each of kids, and all my friends, "Just in case" i got in an accident.

When i would go to the grocery store, since i couldnt handle shopping all at once,, i made a list of the essential items i needed,, Knew EXACTLY where each item was, and how to get in and out with in 10 minutes.... (I know, funky)

I had HUNDREDS of EXCUSES WHY, i couldnt do something when i was anxious, of course i never said it was anxiety... If one didnt work, id used another.
For 6 yrs that I was homebound,, my excuse for NOT going outside was, Its to HOT, to COLD, to many Bugs, Stomach Ache, Headache, etc.

looking back on all this,, I can Laugh now!! Because i see how thoughts can really change your thinking!! Knowing deep down they arent rational thoughts, but we beleive them anyway:)

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Fri Oct 26, 2007 1:39 am

I'll add too:

~In 8th grade I cut my hair very short like a boy's, dyed it dark brown (it was longish and blond) and wore only extremely unattractive, baggy clothes in the hope that if I looked ugly no one would ever talk to me.

~Every morning for about 3 months when I was in 6th grade, as we neared the Middle School where my mom was to drop me off, I'd burst into tears and sob. My mom would have to drive around the neighborhood and school area for 20-60 minutes until I calmed down. Then I was fine and went to school.

~Whenever I was around ppl I didn't know well, I'll tell everyone I was on some street drug so they would chalk up any potentially odd behavior of mine to being high.

~I quit many jobs bc the first day or two weren't perfect and I didn't feel perfect. Or I never tried to for jobs in the first place bc I didn't think I could do them perfectly, or I saw a person who worked there and "knew" we wouldn't get along and I'd be miserable.

~I sometimes thought ppl could read my mind. Everytime I got that idea in my head, all these horrible/ disgusting thoughts would pop into my head, and I'd be so embarrassed bc everyone knew what I sick/ crazy/ deranged person I was.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 4:38 am

Oh, this is too good..Never posted, this is my first time..but reading all of these posts made me literally laugh out loud and it felt so good. I am trying to recover from my anxiety right now and have a ways to go, but at least I can laugh at myself..

~About a month ago we got flu shots at work. I was totally fine getting the shot, but after I came back to the office i felt the panic coming on..i was totally convinced that whatever was in that shot was going to kill me..i had really worked myself up over it. Did I just give myself the flu? Was I allergic to the ingredients in the shot? There was nothing I could do to take that shot back..it was in me for good!

~I have this fear that I am going to forget how to breathe. Have I been breathing my entire life? YES! This fear is starting to go away, but when it began I would wake up in the morning and think, OMG, I'm going to have to breathe all day..i just wanna go back to sleep so I don't have to think about it!

~When I was a little girl I would avoid the cracks in the sidewalk, convinced that I really would break my mothers back.

~I bring my own sheets with me when I stay at hotels. I have watched too many news programs that involved bringing out the black light...no way I'm touching their sheets...and I like to bring my own pillow too because I am convinced that all of the germs inside the hotel pillow are going to harm me...i don't think I'll ever stop doing this!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Wed Feb 06, 2008 4:30 pm

I once went to the hospital, even though I had a hysterectomy and knew I couldn't get pregnant..but I kept thinking I felt these twinges in my stomache..for some reason I thought maybe because they left my ovaries..that I could possibly be pregnant..To my humiliation..it was only perhaps too much gas..and I overheard one of the nurses say "what did she think there was an alien in there?"how embarassing..I can laugh about it now..