Sabotage

"Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening another entity through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction." (wikipedia)

That about sums it up.  Not only do we do this to ourselves, but we do this to everyone around us whether we realize it or not.  I was famous for doing this, especially to my husband.  Why?  Because I was in a bad place and he wasn't.  So, if I wasn't going to have fun, why should he?  Anxiety is an extremely selfish disease (I'll talk about that another time, it's on my list) and if you've been suffering for a while, like I did, you are probably really damn good at sabotaging the relationships in your life.

I was a horrible person to be around, I admit that.  Jealousy brought on so many emotions in my head that I wasn't capable of handling.  Those who aren't capable of handling said emotions tend to do what we know best...lash out irrationally.  I was stuck in the house all the time outside of work and rarely going out with my mom or maybe my husband.  I was very envious of those people who could just walk out of the house with the intent of doing something fun.  When people would bring up going somewhere or doing something, I immediately shot it down as dumb.  "Why would you want to do that?  That's stupid."  If they've already done something I would do my best to act as uninterested and unimpressed as I possible could.  It wasn't because I really thought what they did was dumb (or maybe it was, doesn't really matter) but because I was in a place where I couldn't do anything and this would make me feel worse about myself therefore I'm going to try to make the person feel as close to how I'm feeling as possible.  If I feel like shit, then so will you was my attitude.  It's no wonder a lot of us sufferers lose friends.  I wouldn't want to be around someone like the old me either. 

My husband took the brunt of most of my issues simply because we lived together and I was around him most.  If he was going to go out, you bet your sweet bippy I was going to plan a fight, fake an ailment or do a thousand other things in order for him to either 1) stay home or 2) go out and have a bad time.  When he did go out, I would sit up waiting for him getting madder and madder if he wasn't home at a time *I* thought he should be home at.  Then, most often, I would blow up at him again when he got home just to seal the deal guaranteeing a craptastic night for everyone involved.  Sounds like fun, right?  Of course during the height of my anxiety issues, I had no idea I was really doing anything wrong.  My emotions felt real and I thought this was the only way to handle them.  Of course I would feel bad after it, and I wrote my fair share of apology letters, notes, e-mails, etc.  But, like with anyone with a problem, that was short lived and the cycle continued over and over.

Thought you were the only one who did that?  OR Maybe after reading this you realize that you do, in fact, do this?  It's a common issue, don't feel so bad.  More often than not we don't even realize we are doing it.  This negative behavior becomes a habit and it's hard to break.  When you feel yourself starting to feel this way you have to tell yourself to STOP and force yourself to actually think about what your actions are instead of just blowing up and dealing with what just happened later.  More often than not we don't really mean what we say, but we blurt it out anyway in hopes to hurt the other person.  If you take five minutes to stop yourself before you get to that point and look at it from THEIR point of view, you might see things differently and choose your words and attitude better.  It isn't their fault you have an anxiety disorder that keeps you locked away the house or keeps you from social situations.  It's not their fault that going out to dinner makes us anxious because we hate people watching us eat (yep not alone there either).  So why do we feel it's our right to blame them and sabotage their lives?  They have every right to go out, live life, be excited about trying new things, and *gasp* do things with out us.  It's not all about us as much as we like to think it is.  We have to stop acting like children and throwing a tantrum when we don't get our own ways.  It's not an easy feat but it can happen with practice.  Start walking that mile in the other one's shoes, you may be surprised what you see!

Tonight I leave you with the Beasties :)

SABOTAGE!

Much Love and Light~

Tammy