WHEN THERE IS A CRACK IN THE DEFENSES AND THE HORDES ARE AT THE GATES

ANXIETY ATTACK

I actually have not been feeling up to snuff for the past week-and-a-half or however long it has been since I have last posted.  I finally started to feel a little better yesterday and today I am feeling just a little better from that.  Small steps forward count as much as giant leaps does, and I am willing to move forward a little at a time and secure my progress rather than bemoan the enduring darkness, and that I have only taken an infinitesimal step towards the light.  But, before I get into my issues and all that, I would like to share some good news with everyone!

If it is Saturday, it is down to TWO WEEKS before my darling daughter (they ALL are my darling daughter’s, dontcha know!!) KT lands on “Omaha beach” for her summer stay with her Dad.  I cannot tell you how much I admire Nixxie for allowing us to have the relationship that we have, KT and I, and it makes me wonder why when so many couples say, “it’s about the kids”, it isn’t?

We are pretty okay friends, Nixxie and I, and she generally shares happenings with the people in her life that I have met and was close to when I was in Carolina.  Her youngest nephew, “Newt” (a moniker she gave him because when he was small, she thought he resembled a newt!  Gotta love family!!).  He struggled through his entire academic career and now that he has made it, I think he is considering a career in the military.  I will speak in-depth on what I think of service to the country through the military and why it is so different from when I went in nearly 30 (!!!) years ago.

“Flat Ruthie” has made her way to Omaha and I aim to take her around town and show her what makes Omaha such a wonderful place to live.  There is a big art festival downtown, where Nebraska is a volunteer, and we will take pictures there as well.  I hope that no one minds if she stays for a bit, because I definitely would like to share my time with KT with her!

IT’S BEEN SO MANY MILES AND SO LONG SINCE I’VE MET YOU, DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT I’LL FIND WHEN I GET TO YOU, BUT SUDDENLY NOW, I KNOW WHERE I BELONG, IT’S MANY HUNDRED MILES AND IT WON’T BE LONG

One of the things that I decided to do was to cancel the away trip to the amusement park in Iowa.  It is just too ambitious as well as superfluous to the reason KT is coming west to see me.  Being concerned about making the arrangements and the possibilities of what could go wrong if going out of town was too much for me had begun to be a weight on my shoulders that was breaking me down.  Much of what caused the rise to my anxieties was centered on that, as well as being generally concerned about having a good visit with my daughter.  Being able to talk things out with my therapist helped things a great deal.

Another tripwire was my not being able to find one of my prescriptions that I need to take.  The bottle which contained my Losatan went empty and when I asked my pharmacist to see if I could get a refill, she informed me that her computer showed that I should have at least six more weeks at home.  I could not imagine where the pills were and then later that same day, I would lose my cell phone on just before I made it home from grocery shopping, as the point before I entered the bus to bring me near to my apartment, I had thought to text Nebraska to ask her if she would be as kind to come and ferry me home from the Wal-Mart on 72^nd.  Fortunately, I realized straight away it was missing after I set my groceries down, I went back out and did the cursory retracing of my route from the bus stop to my building, then came in and canceled the phone.

My apartment is officially a mess because I think that I am looking for something but I do not quite know what it is.  At one point I did because I can see the “trail” that the thoughts created, but I am looking at a pile of stuff on my little love seat and I still cannot figure out why I put all the different papers and junk over there.  In fact, staring at the mess looks like the entrails of my consciousness, something that once had meaning but is slowly vaporizing into the air.

This week I have managed to push myself to the gym 5 afternoon/evenings.  I have been going later not because I am sleeping in, but because when I get up, that is all I can do.  I will get up, take my scripts and I eat a little breakie, and then I come to a complete STOP.  Since I would be fully conscious, it bothered me that seemed to be unable to generate the momentum to sling me around and out of the orbit of “whatever” and continue on my way.  And even working out has not been able to spring me out of this mood, as it takes me as much as twice as long to do my workouts than usual.  The natural endorphin rush that usually accompanies exercise has not been able to bring me out of this state that I am in.  In fact, exercise almost seems to aggravate my current mood.

I find myself preoccupied with the idea that I have over-extended myself and that being here alone is too much.  The header, lyrics from the cover of Vashti Bunyan’s “Train Song” by Feist and Ben Gibbard (heard first via Danielle’sblog), recalls the darker side to “the Nebraska Concept”, and somehow my mind has been preoccupied with all that could go wrong even as things are going well for me.

For instance, while I miss the closeness that I had anticipated for Nebraska and me, I find that I am not “missing” it.  As she had often (enough) pointed out, we were never ANYTHING to each other, so there was nothing for me to have “missed” between us, making whatever this feeling that has come over me, a falsehood.  In fact, we are taking steps towards becoming friends, with me joining her and her co-worker as THEY run in the Warrior Dash taking place in Louisville, Nebraska tomorrow.  While I would have loved to get dirty and have fun in taking part of the run, I am also fully comfortable in staying clean and watching her and her friend do all that for me!

Going down to the gym to watch “television” has been another source of inventive fun for me, though that is only part of why I have been training in the evenings.  And my being “alone and not lonely” attitude is still in place, still as solid as ever.  In fact, I am actually quite glad that I am left to my own devices to find my own way out of my “dark wood”, and while my confidence is high in my ability to do so (you should always assume what always has happened will continue to happen… law of spiritual inertia!) without much in the way of direct assistance, to have a “Virgil” to accompany me along the way, well, it would be nice!!