Microsoft Word - At Last A Life Final Copy 16-03-09 (11 page)

snowballs, you start to feel physically better and then you

aren't as tired. And so the cycle continues. That is the true

way to recovery. I'm not 100% better yet, but at least now I

know there is hope. It's like John Mayer writes in his song,

"I'm in repair, I'm not together, but I'm getting there"

Thank you. God Bless.

Jeff

Again this email came from Jeff a few weeks after the one above.

Last night was unbelievable. I think I've finally figured it out.

It's not about forcing yourself to accept it every second of

every day, it’s about your attitude towards it. I admit, these

past three days, there have been times when I have felt

absolutely HORRIBLE, but I kept saying to myself “do it

anyway. Talk to your room mates. Go to dinner with a

friend. Get your work done at work. What has anxiety done

to me so far? It hasn't killed me. It hasn't allowed me to

topple over and pass out. It hasn't given me an infectious

disease. Okay, so I feel crappy during the day but am I really

going to let this stop me from doing what I want to do? What

I have figured out is that your attitude can determine A LOT!

I can either a) cower to this and sit in my basement all day

watching movies and wonder why in the world this happened

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to me or b) I can accept that I feel this way, and then do

anything and everything I want to, regardless of whether I

feel like doing it or not, or whether it feels like a huge effort.

There are times when it’s hard to convince myself that I am

Okay. But then I just look at these amazing quotes that

come from your book and I can just keep going. I must say,

my co-workers are wondering what in the world I am taking

about with these quotes. "Come on do your worst, I no

longer care?" Sounds rather disturbing if you didn't know

what I was talking about. But they help me, and that's all that

matters. I have had some good days in the past, but I

always fell back into the giving up attitude. There was

actually a period last night of about 20 minutes where I felt

NOTHING at all. It was a very short period of time, but I was

stunned, shocked, amazed. And I wasn't even aware of how

I was feeling because I was so caught up in the project that I

was working on (a get well card). And yes, then it came back,

but I kept my attitude positive. And yes, like you mentioned, I

still think about it all day, every day, but that is okay because

it has become my habit. Habits are hard to break. If I'd

spent four months biting my nails, I wouldn't be able to stop

in the first day, week, or month even.

Paul, you have become very therapeutic to me already, more

so than any therapist has. My psychologist has been rooting

through my past trying to figure out why I might feel this way.

But that's not it. I'm an emotionally stable, social butterfly

who just had a HUGE build up of stress over time (perceived

medical problems, worries about relationships, loneliness at

times, final exams etc.) No wonder I've gotten to this point!

But it stops now.

And starting to stop began with you... Thank you. I hope you

don’t mind me emailing you my progress, it’s just I feel I want

to share the realisations and progress that I am making.

Jeff

Below are some words of comfort for others, posted on my blog:

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Hi, I’m 21 and a 4th year nursing student. I suffered an

anxiety attack in April of 2008 and went down the road of

deep thinking, constant worry of how I was feeling which left

me with constant anxiety and feelings of depersonalisation. I

found Paul’s information in the summer and started applying

it to my life. It took a while to understand the information and

truly apply it to my life. I just want to say that my anxiety has

been leaving me layer by layer. I want to tell you all, or

reassure you all, that it is TRULY a process.

The key is to LIVE as normal as possible and focus on

outside OUTWARD tasks like reading, exercising and

socialising. This stops the constant inward thinking of your

condition and gives the mind the break it needs. As I applied

this behaviour, I noticed moments of normality that keep

adding up as the days passed!!!!

I am not fully recovered. However I feel it is just around the

corner. It’s just a matter of keeping my mind busy and

focusing on outward tasks rather than me. This does not

mean I run around frantically doing things to forget my

anxiety as this would be running away. No, if It’s there, it’s

there. It is just sensitised nerves that I can do nothing about

anyway, apart from giving them the break they need.

Everyone worries that they may be the only one who doesn’t

recover; it’s part of the self-doubt that we all have when

suffering, but keep following Paul’s advice. Live your normal

life alongside anxiety, accept the thoughts and let them be in

the background. Try not to analyse them (it takes practice I

know - but small steps at first) and face any fears that you

may have head on. Do not avoid doing things, going places

that you would have done before the anxiety, even if you feel

strange. You are changing behaviour and to do this you need

to live alongside the old behaviour for a while, until the new

behaviour overtakes the old one. I also now understand that

if I do TRY to feel better then it is actually causing me to care

about how I am feeling, which causes the worry and

obsessing habit to return. I think I am on track with

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something here. It’s that basic need to be in control that

holds us back.

I promise you Paul’s method works, it has been a life saver

for me. I truly hope this encourages other people.

My reply to this post was:

Yes, that is exactly what I try to get across. I am really glad you were

able to apply it and also keep the faith that this would work rather

than going for the quick fix. Too many people are so influenced by

the way they are feeling at the moment, that they don’t see past

today. Rather than searching for recovery or demanding it, you have

let it come to you. There has been a lot of talk on here about people

having a bad day and again thinking they are back to square one.

“It’s back, so this is me forever then” is their attitude. You may have

to go through these bad periods many times. You will have many

setbacks and you will have some up and down days, but just enjoy

the good and don’t get down about the bad, they will pass. Don’t be

influenced by how you feel at any given time, it’s not important. It’s

the continued ‘living’ that will bring peace. And you’re right, it is a

process. It’s not about how you feel today or tomorrow, it will come

in its own time.

Another post from my blog, encouraging others:

I know how awful it feels to wake up to a new day feeling like

nothing gives you joy and everything you do seems

meaningless. This is the hard part to accept and it is very

easy to start going against the stream again without even

noticing it. But you should have seen me 6 months ago

before I landed on this site and compare it to what I am now,

there’s a huge difference. What I did was nothing more than I

jumped in the stream and stopped fighting back. The key

thing for me was to become more active. It was REALLY

difficult at first because everything felt so meaningless but

the more I left home the more meaningful things became and

everything started feeling more natural. There have been up

and downs for sure but, hey, that’s what life is like anyway.

Don’t expect an instant salvation just because you have

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found the key to recovery. Stick to the course and keep the

faith.

This post came from someone who, within two days of reading my

book, went from being a complete wreck to viewing how she felt in a

completely different way. As she makes some very good points and

understood truly what I was trying to get across, I thought it was

important to add it.

Hi everyone. Well I guess I am kind of new to anxiety in a

certain sense. I have always been a bit of a worrier and used

to freak myself out that I had every illness in the world. My

biggest fear was (like many) going mad or “losing my mind”.

Well this site and Paul’s book has been a wonderful help to

me, and it’s only been TWO days since I read the book.

I suffered a very tragic loss in Oct 07 (stillbirth at 25 weeks)

and it tore my reality apart. Literally, I went into tremendous

shock and was so upset that what I was feeling was

happening to me, to ME!!! The world terrified the holy crap

out of me and I had no idea who/what/where/how I was.

Somehow I held it together, after so much falling apart it

didn’t seem possible. Anxiety was HUGE at the start, I had

no idea what was happening to me at all. I was terrified I was

going to get postnatal depression/post natal psychosis

(because others did) etc. etc. I convinced myself at one

stage that I actually had it and, of course, cue the scary

thoughts which fuelled that belief. I got so depressed thinking

I had it and so the cycle went on.

We moved house and I went back to work. This lifted my

spirits for a few weeks but I felt the down-ness coming back

again and it kind of spiralled up until a few weeks ago when,

on a Saturday, the feelings and scary thoughts got SO bad

that I honestly thought that day I was having a nervous

breakdown. The scary thoughts were the worst for me. I was

convinced I could do some harm to my partner - so bad that I

was terrified of my kitchen knives (ALL BECAUSE OF ONE

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THOUGHT) and because I pondered and completely

obsessed about that thought, I was convinced even more

that I had post natal depression which made me worse and

so it went on and on -cycles of anxiety, fear, depression,

adrenalin, frayed nerves…not sleeping…EXHAUSTED

physically and mentally!!!

How I continued going to work I will never know. I was going

around like a ghost, like a shell; it was awful. I was beating

myself up constantly because I SHOULD have been feeling

better…I just should have. But I shouldn’t! I found Paul’s site.

Believe me, I am a true information gatherer and, of course,

like many of us, convinced myself that I had every symptom,

disorder etc. The amount of times I asked my partner if he

thought I had this or that. No amount of convincing would

pacify me.

Then I found Paul! It’s only been a few days, but now I finally

realise what’s causing all of this. Yes, I went through a

terrible trauma. Of course my poor mind and body wanted

and needed to shut down. But did I give it the break it

deserved and needed…NO! Of course I didn’t. Now I finally

realise where the bodily feelings come from…adrenalin

people…adrenalin!! That’s simply it.

I thought I was doing okay until we were on our way back

from Manchester on an early morning flight. My stomach

turned once at the thought of going back home and BAM that

started me off thinking “oh no, it’s starting again” and I was

messed up for weeks. Then I came across Paul’s book

(Thank You).

I have learned that no matter what I’m feeling it’s okay.. It’s

okay.

And that’s all there is to it. Whatever I am feeling, I am

feeling and that’s okay. If I feel derealism…is it any wonder?

My mind is tired and shut off and needs a break…so it’s

okay. If my stomach churns (which it still does a lot) that’s

okay. My body has developed a habit and my memory

believes that somehow I’m not safe - that’s okay too - habits

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take time to change. It’s all part of it, and that’s okay. If my

hands shake, sure, that’s okay too…I’m still working away.

Scary thoughts…I’ve learned a lot from this one… I didn’t