My Setback this Weekend

[Camden]

I had an anxiety setback yesterday and early this morning. I’d been doing very well and then thoughts of the following things all bombard me at once:

1 I’m gaining weight and eating and drinking too much.
2 I don’t have enough time to exercise.
3 It’s going to be a very busy and stressful week at work.
4 My grandma suddenly became ill yesterday
5 My inlaws’ house is nasty and my OCD makes me dread going there
6 I have flashbacks of my old job and how I’ll go back if I screw up with my current job.

I could barely eat dinner last night and I felt sick to my stomach and had a flushed, hot feeling face. I felt really weighed down and brain fogged for the first time in a long time from the anxiety.

I slept okay but woke up feeling horrible. I had tingling hands and toes and I felt like I was going to throw up. My heart was racing despite still being in bed. I took a lorazepam and did some deep breathing exercises before leaving for the day. I still felt nauseous while eating breakfast. My anxiety has zapped my appetite and made me afraid of going to restaurants in the past. I hope I’m not going down that road again!

My appetite goes both ways with anxiety. Sometimes I can’t stop eating, other times just the thought of eating makes me feel sick. It’s very confusing.

 

[Cuchculan]

Maybe, just maybe, some of it has to do with your current work situation. You did mention how things were not going great. How you thought it made you look bad. I am sure that is still on your mind. That could account for how you might be feeling at the moment. Might bring up some of this old stuff again. Once one old thought begins to settle in again, it can open the flood gates for a lot of other older thoughts. Thus bringing you right down with it. Small case of just viewing it as a setback. Nothing more. You don't have to go down any dark roads again. We can view things as a once off happening or we can allow them back into our lives again. That depends on us. And how we react to them.

 

[Jonathan123]

When you wake up in the morning you lay the foundations for a bad day. Anticipation is a curse! Because we set in motion a spiral of anxiety/symptoms/fear/ anxiety! Now I am not suggesting you can wake up all bright eyed and bushy tailed. No way will that happen, well, not yet. But by allowing the feelings to come and ACCEPTING them without withdrawing from them in fear can slowly work wonders. It's by no means easy, but it can be done. Like all ways out of anxiety, it takes time, patience and perseverance.
I have seen people with 20 or more years of anxiety recover. When I had it there were no websites like this, or indeed, few had computers. (Dinosaurs were about then!!!!). But my 'Bibles', the books by Dr. Claire Weekes and her records helped me so much. Still in print on Amazon.