For the Days When Your Nervous System is on Fire

This afternoon, I hopped on my walking pad and lit my current favorite candle and settled in to write my regular monthly wrap-up post. It’s one of my favorite posts to write each month, and I always look forward to it.

But I found myself staring at a blank screen, getting distracted by scrolling on my phone, and just generally avoiding the whole thing.

Why? Because I currently feel like I’m being chased by a bear, and that can make it really hard to focus on anything productive.

I’ve talked about this before, but I live with a generalized anxiety disorder. It’s mostly under control through medication and exercise but some days it just hits me. And when it does? It’s almost impossible to actually function. Every hour of work feels like a herculean effort, and my body is so exhausted from the constant-tensing and the not-sleeping and the heart-beating-a-million-miles-a-minute and all I want to do is climb back into bed and binge watch Gilmore Girls.

But, you know, I’m a mom and I have a job that needs to pay the bills and giving into my anxiety isn’t always convenient (or possible). Over the years, I’ve learned a lot of methods to help me manage my anxiety and continue to function when my nervous system is going beserk, so since I can’t focus on anything else today, I figured it was a great time to share.

If you also live with anxiety, I hope it helps. Also, I hope you have your own tips you can add in the comments below because I’ll take all the help I can get. And, if you don’t have chronic anxiety, I hope you’re still able to find a tidbit or two that might help on that random day when you happen to feel your body go into overdrive.

How I Manage My Chronic Anxiety

I know my triggers.

When I first started dealing with anxiety, I would ask myself “what am I anxious about?” In the early days, I could almost always pinpoint a specific moment or thought that had set off the “my skin is on fire” feeling, and if I addressed that it would pass.

But, unfortunately, my anxiety has only gotten worse as I’ve gotten older and that method isn’t nearly as effective these days. In fact, when I’m on a stretch like this where it’s been 4 or 5 days of constant panicking, I don’t even ask myself what I’m anxious about anymore. I’m anxious about everything and also nothing. There isn’t always one single thing that has set me off, and often it’s just hormones or the phase of the moon (kidding, kind of) and I just have to roll with it.

That being said, there are a few things that I know tend to cause higher anxiety days for me. They include:

• Being in my luteal phase.

• Being in my PMS-y phase.

• Not getting enough sleep.

• Having too much caffeine.

• Not moving my body enough.

• A chaotic or messy environment (there’s a reason I’m a clean freak).

Often (but not always), when I’m having an anxious phase I can pinpoint at least one of these things that’s happening. I can’t always do anything about it, but just the knowledge that I’m anxious because my period is coming and this is just what my body does can be oddly comforting.

I don’t push myself too hard.

I used to try to “fix” my anxiety by doing things. And honestly? It worked. I’m a very structured and organized person and I looooooooove a to-do list. I learned that if I would just throw myself into work or cleaning or doing, it would distract me from the anxiety and give me a little dopamine hit from accomplishing something.

But the problem is, that’s like putting a bandaid on a bullet wound. Sure, it makes me feel better in the moment but it doesn’t actually teach me how to live with the anxiety. In fact, over time it made me more anxious because the moment I felt those old familiar feelings come, I would rush to distract myself. And then my body was constantly bracing for it because we can’t let ourselves actually feel those awful anxious feelings!

If therapy has taught me anything it’s that I absolutely have to let myself actually sit in and FEEL the anxiety. It sucks. I hate every second of it. I think it’s stupid and terrible and the worst idea ever.

And also, it helps.

Not at first. At first it just feels really shitty, if I’m being honest. But, over time, I’ve learned to stop fearing the feeling of anxiety. I’ve learned to sit with it for brief times and just let myself be okay with being anxious. This one is still very much a work in progress, but it has helped more than I thought it would.

But also, I don’t let myself fully give in.

Of course, as with everything in life, this can be a careful balancing act. If I let myself feel the anxiety too much, then I fall apart. I cancel plans and avoid leaving the house and don’t try new things and hole up like a scared little rabbit and then the anxiety wins.

I don’t know that I have any magical advice for how to let yourself feel your anxiety without turning into a puddle of mush, but I find for me it can be helpful to be specific about it. If I’m feeling anxious I might give myself one hour to rot in bed and watch mindless television, but then I tell myself I have to get up and get back to life. Or, I’ll sit and just feel awful for 10 minutes, then I have to try something I know helps (like a walk or some yoga).

I MOVE! MY! BODY!

My husband tells me I can get a little preachy about this one, so I’ll keep it brief: moving my body is the single biggest tangible thing I can do to help manage my feelings of anxiety.

It can be a run, a walk, yoga, lifting weights - anything. But, the more anxious I am feeling the more important it is to get my exercise in.

I let the sun touch my skin.

Sometimes I don’t wanna. Hiding in my house feels much easier. But science (and past experience) says that getting outside is helpful for anxiety, depression, and just about everything else. So, I make sure it happens daily.

I write it down.

Sometimes I’m anxious because there is just too much noise in my head. In my years of studying the Enneagram, I’ve learned that my type (1!) is an external processor who is thinking-repressed. That means I have a ton of thoughts in my head but I don’t always know how to sort through them productively, and the only way I can actually process my thoughts and feelings is to get them out of my body.

Sometimes that means talking it out with someone, sometimes it means talking to myself while I vacuum (yes, seriously), and sometimes it means grabbing a piece of paper and doing a major brain dump of every single thought jumping around in there.

And, you know, sometimes it means dedicating an entire newsletter to how I manage my anxiety because I can’t think about anything else.

I have a list.

And finally, the first ever method I tried to manage my anxiety is one that I still use - I have a list of things that help. When anxiety has taken over my mind and body it can be hard to know what to do. So, I started a note in my phone and wrote down everything I know that helps, even marginally.

It includes things like:

• Going for a drive and listening to music

• Going for a walk

• Laughing with my kids

• Reading a book for a while

• Working on a puzzle

• Getting myself a little treat (like a gas station drink or my favorite chips)

They’re all little, actionable things that I know can help pull me out of a spiral. And when all else fails, I turn to this list and start crossing things off one by one.

Of course, I’d be remiss if I didn’t also mention that one of the biggest things that has made a difference for my anxiety overall is therapy. I was not managing my anxiety well (or at all) when I started visiting my therapist, but over the last year of regular visits I’ve learned so much and I credit my confidence in managing my anxiety completely to her.

So, even though I’m still going to be living some days feeling like I’m being chased, these are just a few things that help me remember there isn’t actually a bear behind me.

I’d love to hear your experience with anxiety, or how you manage spiral-y days!