I feel worse, it's not working.

Sorry for my absence yesterday.  I had one killer migraine due to a stressful day at work and the moon phase (full moon tonight).  I was also having a hard time anxiety wise last night.  I've been having discomfort on my lower right side that logically I know is a back issue, but last night I let the pain get the better of me and spent better part of the evening anxious and checking over and over that it wasn't my appendix.  Yes, even as better as I am in general, I still have my off days.  I was talking to my husband about it briefly this morning and not only was the moon phase just right, my day at work just right, wrong time of the month in general, but I've opened a can of worms by starting this blog.  I never really thought about it prior to my idea to start this blog but it makes perfect sense.  I am airing out my dirty laundry so to speak and of course it's going to stir up some old emotions, emotions that need to be dealt with and face with head on so that I can say good by to them and continue down my road of recovery .  It's only natural that by visiting old wounds, I may get some of those anxious feelings again.  The big difference this time is I know what it is and how to handle it.

At any rate, going through what I did last night and then talking about it to my husband this morning made me add this topic to my ever growing list of things to talk about here.  As I stated before, I did CBT to help me recover from this horrible disorder.  It was a self help program that I followed for 16 weeks.  With the first week one of the things that was mentioned was that you are probably going to feel worse in the beginning, but they promised it would get better.  Sort of like what happened to me last night.  They weren't kidding when they said that.  My first few weeks into this program I felt like shit ran over by a big mac truck.  My anxiety was on a whole other level I didn't even think was possible.  Forget about general anxiety (feeling anxious all the time) more like panic attack anxiety.  Ok I just made that up but my panic attacks went way up, I had more symptoms and side effects, my sleeping was non existent, and I just thought "holy crap I just spent a ton on something to make me feel worse, it's not working!) 

Many people feel like this.  In fact, I'd be willing to bet most people feel like this.  It's A LOT to deal with and for someone who is on edge and over sensitive to begin with, it feels like pure hell.  We have to face things we swept under the rug for so long.  We have to admit to things we were so quick to blame others for.  We have to start coming to terms the fact that we do a lot of these things to ourselves.  It's a whirlwind of emotions that can become quite crippling and unfortunately cause a lot of people to give up.  Who wants to feel worse, right?  That's so not what we signed up for!  We signed up for a quick fix. 

Quick fixes simply don't exist.  This isn't an oxiclean commercial and Billy Mays isn't going to yell at you and magically take your stains away.  This is, for most of us, a life long debilitating issue we've been dealing with.  It is going to take a lot of hard work and commitment on your part to better yourself.  And when I mean hard, I mean HARD!  I'm not going to sit here and lie to you and tell you that I sat and listed to a few tapes, did some homework, and POOF I felt better.  I strapped myself into the longest roller coaster ride you've ever seen and the first few weeks were a constant, belly flipping, down hill drop.  BUT, I can promise you that if you keep working at it and work through the initial shock of it all, it does get better. 

Two weekends ago I got in my car BY MYSELF and drove two hours to another state to meet up with girls I initially met online while we were all planning our destination weddings.  Two years ago I got on a plane, BY MYSELF, and flew across country to meet up with another girl from the same group to go wine tasting for a SECOND time (I flew out there once prior).  This once agoraphobic girl climbed up on a boat four months ago, had some island boys strap me to a harness, and I para-sailed Grace Bay, Turks and Caicos.  So, it definitely CAN be done.  It takes a LONG time to get there but the journey is so worth it.  It took me 16 weeks to go through the program initially and then probably another year going over it again from time to time before I really spread my wings and got the courage enough to know I could fly and I would be ok.  You CAN get better it just comes down to how committed you are to it and how bad you want it.  I have faith in all of your that are struggling right now! 

Much Love and Light~

Tammy