The Anxiety Pirate and the Rainbow Doom-Brella

I should have known that buying this would be a mistake

The problem with anxiety is that, even when you've mostly got it under control, sometimes you still have a Bad Day. 

Anxious days turn me into an anxiety pirate.  This is my new favorite term, invented as of yesterday, so named because I spend my time going "argh argh arghity argh" and wishing I could make myself walk the plank (or head-desk, which, while distinctly un-piratelike, is more practical for everyday use.)

Anxious days start off entirely innocently, but all it takes is a few Bad Things for everything to go awry.  Didn't get enough sleep?  Accidentally had caffeine?  Lost your bus pass when you were just holding it in your hand 5 seconds ago?  Check, check, check. 

It seems silly that those kinds of things would all add up to a Bad Day.  Why not just snap out of it?  What happened to not sweating the small stuff?

Except there's something more nuanced going on in my brain.  Cocktail those neurochemicals with the right ingredients - a pinch of sleep deprivation, a dash of fugue, a heaping helping of unanticipated stimulants - and sometimes (but only sometimes!), the resulting mixture is a combustive riot against cool judgment and inner calm.  I wish it was a mere matter of attitude adjustment.  If only there were a simple cure.

Yesterday, my Bad Things came in threes: a bus ride, a traffic jam, and a dead cellphone.

Jolting with the stop and go traffic, umbrella braced between my legs, clutching at the bus rail, balancing my bag on my shoulder, and trying desperately to get my cell phone to turn on in the sticky, humid closeness of the bus, I felt those familiar tendrils of panic set in, rooting and unfurling within my belly.   

It was past the time when I was supposed to meet a friend downtown, and the bus was still closer to its start than my destination.  I tried to hard-reset my phone, to no avail - it vibrated uselessly in my palm, stuck in an endless loop of reboot, black screen, reboot, repeat. 

Oh no.  I thought, stomach cramping in knots.  I was supposed to text when I left.  Will she think I'm standing her up? 
 

A lot of my anxiety surfaces when there's a time crunch, or when other people might think the worst of me - that I'm flaky, or dishonest, or disingenuous.

What will I do when I get there? How will I find her? Where can I go?

My panic deepened, but I retained enough clarity to think through the problem - barely.  I'd find a café with wi-fi, I decided.  Maybe I could message her there.  But what café?  All the ones I knew were closed or closing.  I didn't know my way around that part of the city without my phone's maps.  Argh.  Argh, argh, argh.

I stepped on someone's foot behind me - apologized, adjusted my posture.  My back and knees were bothering me, but I couldn't ask someone to give up their seat - as a relatively healthy looking twenty-something, the "I've got back and knee problems, could you give up your seat?" request on a bus has, to date, only managed to elicit looks varying from blank-puzzled to scathing-accusatory.  I've given up trying.

Standing for over an hour now.  Sweat trickled down my back.  My bangs stuck to my face.  Futilely, I tried to brush them aside.  Someone behind me closed their window, and it felt as though the air in the bus pressed in on me even more closely.

I leaned into the seat beside me for support, and the man sitting there violently jerked himself backwards in response - one, two, three times shoving himself up against the seat back.   Did I bump his seat too hard?  Was he being passive aggressive?  Was he telling me to stand up straight?  It added to my anxiety spiral: Phone dead.  Don't step on feet! Which café? Back hurts.  Bus guy hates me…

Closing my eyes, I sought the inner calm of shavasana - corpse pose.  In yoga, we lie on our backs at the end of practice; relaxing our bodies, emptying our minds.  I breathed in the stuffy air, trying to ignore the heat and humidity and people-scent.  Breathing out, I tried to visualize a focal point beyond my closed eyes; sought to stop my mind's errant wandering.

Now, of course, is when my Jerkbrain kicked in.  Because, clearly, in addition to worrying about the beyond-my-control variables of timing and fickle technology, the next logical thing to do is panic about imminent death.

Oh no.  I thought. What if the bus crashes?  

It was as if my mind was comprehending for the very first time that cars get into accidents.  (Never mind that we were crawling stop-and-go traffic.  Anything can happen!)

My brain fixated on this new idea, and I couldn't shake it loose; after all, lateness pales in comparison to matters of life and death.

I looked at my arm, wrapped around the metal pole.  My shoulder will definitely dislocate.  I thought morbidly.  Looking down at the steps in front of me, then: My knees, too.  Not that that's anything new.

Then, looking down some more, I beheld the giant, full-size, rainbow umbrella - complete with curved wooden handle and pointy end - propped between my legs.

Oh, god.  My pulse picked up with horror.  My umbrella is a projectile.  Ohgod, ohgod, if we get in an accident, someone will get impaled on my umbrella!

A gory scene unfurled in my mind's eye.  I looked around desperately for somewhere safer to stow this newfound menace. 

Overhead compartment?  I imagined it rocketing out of bins above in a high speed crash, brightly-colored shrapnel spewing in all directions.  No. No-no-no-no.

So, I stood there - gripped in terror, cold sweat trickling, contemplating my imminent shoulder and knee dislocations, and fearing the dark, dread implement formerly known as my umbrella.

Retrospectively - not even a day later - I can look back on the moment with humor.  I can write about it and laugh.  I can tell it to others with broad gesticulations and a sarcastic, self-deprecating smirk.  But, at the time, I truly believed the bus was going to get in a high speed crash.  I legitimately thought someone would end up impaled on the end of my rainbow umbrella.

When I got off the bus, I was a mess in every sense of the word.  But free from the heat and crush of people and sense of imminent doom, I formed a plan.  I got to a Starbucks with wi-fi, messaged my friend, and she came and found me.  She didn't hate me or think I was a flake - she knew that traffic was horrible that night.  It all worked out okay, but even if I'd told myself that - even if I'd known it - it wouldn't have helped.

Anxious days have a start, but they don't always have an end.  Even when the great panic-inducing event has passed, there are always other things to worry about.

Social media, in particular, is a huge anxiety trigger.  I get into big debates with people online, but I get overwhelmed - sometimes I'm fine, and sometimes it leaves me with a clenching stomach and a racing pulse. 

Or, I post something about my life, and then get obsessively worried about minutiae.  Like, for example, later that same evening: I posted a Facebook status update about applying to grad school, but I really didn't apply the real or the hard way; I just signed up to take classes.  It's what I meant to say, but it didn't come out right.

Enter stage left.  Curtains rise.  Cue epic internal drama:

Self 1 [wringing hands]: Do I clarify my post? Caveat? Delete it?

Self 2: 9 people have liked it, and 3 have already commented.  Who knows how many other people have already seen it? What if they're commenting right now?  If you delete it, they'll know! 

Self 1: That's better than people thinking I'm a self-aggrandizing-jerk-pants-imposter-face!

Self 2 [resolutely]: What about hiding it from your timeline?

Self 1: Brilliant!  There.  Now it's hidden.

Self 2 [wails in anguish, sudden realization]: It says it'll still show up on people's News Feeds!

Self 1 and Self 2 [in unison]: ARGH!

Logically, I know it's just Facebook.  It isn't a big deal.  But it still ends up tying my guts in knots and sending my body into fight or flight mode.

My method of coping, more and more frequently, is to be open - not just about having anxiety, but about why I have to do things a certain way, sometimes.

"Sorry, I know decaf coffee is a super lamer thing to drink.  I love coffee, but I have anxiety, so the caffeine jitters feel too much like that."

"Do you mind if I handle making the restaurant reservation? Then I won't worry about it as much." 

"Sorry, I thought I was up for the party tonight, but there are so many people I don't know there, it's making me feel anxious.  Raincheck?"

I'm not trying to be passé about having these issues - and I certainly don't want to make it seem like I'm trying to offload the burden onto other people - but somehow it's getting easier and easier to acknowledge that, yep, I'm working on these things, I'm not always perfect, sometimes I need to be in control, and sometimes I might freak out a little bit about something completely inconsequential, like a Facebook post, or my phone not turning on.

It's also a reminder - a solemn one, at times - that, yes, I still have anxiety.  Yes, I still need to take medication.  No, I probably won't ever be 100% better. 

It's a reminder that even though I'm so, so much better than I used to be, this is still a part of me.  I probably have to learn to live with it.  If I have to live with it, I might as well accept it.  

And while I'm accepting it, I might as well be able to have a good laugh at its expense every now and then, like about that one time I was an anxiety pirate with a rainbow umbrella of doom.  It's a bit of a mouthful, but I think I can make it work.