Microsoft Word - At Last A Life Final Copy 16-03-09 (14 page)

feelings, which are only natural in the circumstances, should

consume your day? Is it such a bad thing that your stomach should

churn or that your hands should shake?

If you had sprained your wrist, you would be able to carry on with

your day without much attention to it, so why pay attention to

something that is only normal in the circumstances. You may find

that the less attention you pay to your nerves, the less you excite

them. In other words, if your stomach churns, let it churn and if your

hands shake, let them shake, paying them as little attention as

possible. I used to say “my nerves are sensitised and I am going to

feel like this for the time being - it is only natural”. Again, taking the

fear out of how you feel helps them to settle and adds no more

adrenalin, giving them the space to start to recover, or de-sensitise

as I like to describe it.

Ringing ears

This is another common symptom and one I also went through. It is

said that this symptom can be due to a side effect of anti

depressants or other medication. The reasons as to why people with

anxiety can suffer from time to time with ringing ears are still

inconclusive. I put it down to the fact that the body is a little out of

balance due to anxiety and stress. As my anxiety left, so did this

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symptom. In fact it did not last long at all and after talking to others

who suffered with this symptom, they also spoke of it as being

temporary.

Feeling guilty

A lot of people who suffer from anxiety experience feelings of guilt

and somehow think that this means they are weak. This guilt is

brought about by the realisation that someone who at one time could

do things so easily, now struggles to get through the day. They may

be in a relationship, or have children, and feel guilty that they can no

longer do the things they once could with their partner or children.

They may even fight their way through the day, putting on an act to

prove to themselves that this thing will not get the better of them,

only to go to bed at night more tired and anxious than ever. Anxiety

can affect people from every profession, even doctors, the very

people we first go to for help, so let me stress that you have nothing

to feel guilty about.

Some partners may be very understanding about how you feel, but

some may not. They may put pressure on you to
‘
pull yourself

together’ and the constant strain of trying to cope can tire you

further, your partner’s lack of understanding hindering recovery.

Thankfully, I did have an understanding partner and I explained to

her that the person she could see was not the real me. I asked her

to bear with me and told her that I wanted to be the person I once

was and that, in time, I would be. I lost a few friends, as I was never

available to go out. Certain people at work would snub me as I

hardly spoke, but I did not wallow in self-pity! I knew I had to let all

this negative stuff go and because of what I had been taught, I was

not going to add any more worry to the mix. I also knew that I could

sort all those problems out later when I was better.

At times, I felt like I was playing a role in a film, acting to try to

appear normal while other days attempting to hide how I felt. The

pressure I felt trying to maintain this act, day after day, was immense

and eventually I stopped trying to be the person I thought I should

be. So if you see yourself in this way, learn to put yourself first. You

cannot keep trying to be the person you once were. You need to

stop putting on an act, admit that you are no longer the person you

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used to be and tell yourself that you don’t have to keep up this

pretence any longer.

If you have an understanding partner, then great, you have the

support you need. If not, I would suggest that you start talking to

each other and ask your partner to listen. You can even suggest that

they read this and explain to them just how much you need their

support while you recover. If they truly care, then they will

understand and give you this support. A lot of their anger is caused

by frustration, frustration that the person they see is not the person

they fell in love with and they want you back as much as you do. A

little more understanding from them may give you the freedom to

start recovering.

Self-pity is another emotion that can drag you further into your

illness. Again this stems from a reluctance to accept the way you are

as you ask yourself the question ‘Why me?’ Constantly feeling sorry

for yourself can only eat away at your self-confidence and cause you

to feel more and more depressed about the way you feel. It is very

easy to fall into this trap and I cannot stress enough just how

important it is to accept how you feel and harbour as little self-pity as

possible. Self-pity is a destructive emotion that will only prolong your

negative feelings. You don’t need negative thinking during your time

of recovery, so let all the negative thoughts go and build on the

positives.

LOSS OF CONFIDENCE

When I was ill, my confidence plummeted. I felt as if I was worthless

and had nothing interesting to say. I did not see the point to anything

and felt as if I just existed. That is what anxiety does to you. It robs

you of your personality, robs you of your confidence and robs you of

your identity. My own experience caused me to feel as if my

emotions and feelings had become frozen. Some people say they

can’t even feel love for the people they really care about and others

don’t feel any emotions at all. This is exactly how I felt. Nothing

anyone could do or say could make me happy. They could have put

a million pounds in front of me and I would not have even smiled. I

felt numb and there were times when I thought I would never smile

again. My only thought was recovering from the way I felt. I can tell

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those of you who feel like this that your emotions do come back in

recovery. Your confidence and personality gradually return in little

strips, building up in layers, until eventually you feel like the person

you were before you became ill.

If you do suffer from a lack of confidence, then there is no better

boost to your self-esteem than getting on the road to recovery and

feeling the joy that comes with it. If you were a confident person

before, that confidence will return or become even greater. I feel

more confident now than I was before I became ill. All the hurdles I

have passed and the experiences I have come through have helped

me to grow into a stronger person. Can I just share with you a

sentence that I believe helps to build confidence, and it really works:

Never say
yes when you mean no, and never say no when you

means yes
- simple but effective. I am sure most people can identify

with this statement.

Trying to find a cause

Too many people spend too much time trying to find a reason for

why they feel like they do, searching for that childhood memory that

they believe must have triggered it off in the first place. In some

cases, something may have happened in a person’s earlier life that

they may need to talk through with a professional and, if this is the

case, then it may help to do this before they can start on the road to

recovery. In a lot of cases, however, too much importance is placed

on finding a root cause. Surely the only thing that really matters is,

not why we began to feel like this in the first place, but how to

recover.

So if you find yourself back tracking in an attempt to find a root

cause for the way you feel and you believe that gaining this

knowledge is an important part of your recovery, then go ahead and

find a professional with whom you can talk things through. If,

however, you are like me and it no longer matters how it all started

and all you want to do is recover, then let it go, just move on and

concentrate on what is important to you - recovery. You have no

control over the past but you do have control over your future.

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WE NEED ONE ROAD

One point that I think is extremely important, and I really would like

to get through to you all, is that we need one way, one road and one

that feels right. You can't have three different therapists, numerous

different books and two different programmes all running alongside

each other. All this does is to confuse you, putting more pressure on

your tired mind, which needs rest more than anything else. Your

mind is just too tired to be bombarded with different information

every day. Find one way and put all the rest to one side. Find one

road, one that feels right, and stick to it.

Do you see how this works? Yes, we all want to be better today, not

tomorrow, but this is what keeps us ill -
impatience
. We search

around thinking there must be something out there, something we

have missed, so we go from one idea to another, praying that each

will work and within a couple of weeks/months, we feel we are back

to square one. Do not be impatient with yourself, watching the

weeks go by and thinking you should be better by now. You are just

putting more pressure on yourself. Let your body recover at its own

pace and do not watch anxiously for recovery.

Just choose one road to follow and stick to it. It stops all that

searching around in your mind for an answer, tiring your mind even

further and putting you under more stress, when this is the last thing

you need. Forget that miracle cure that has eluded you, it is not

there. You did not feel like this overnight and you won’t be cured

overnight; your body needs time to heal. This statement can

sometimes help people as it makes them finally realise they don’t

have to keep searching for an answer or looking for that elusive cure

- the cure lies within them. Once you are on the road to recovery, it

can be great just to experience the improvement in the way you feel.

Before I recovered I was the same, searching for that elusive

treatment, and I can honestly say that I tried every treatment going

and not one of them felt right. At times I felt as though I was taking

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my driving test again as I struggled to learn how to get on the road

to recovery, but the more knowledge I gained, the more everything

made sense.

Recovery will come, but let it happen in its own time. Please do not

put a time limit on it. Everybody is different and some people will

recover more quickly than others. Trust me, just be patient and your

body will take care of itself.

Look at it another way:

If five million people around the world had a broken leg, not one of

them would be healed within 24 hours. If five million people around

the world had anxiety not one of them would be anxiety free in 24

hours whatever treatment they found - FACT. But this is what you

are asking of yourself when you search for that miracle cure.

When I first heard the words “Paul you don’t have to fight this thing”,

I felt so relieved. It was such a weight off my shoulders. I said, “Oh

my God, that’s such a relief. I thought if I didn’t fight this thing and try

to stop it coming, I was somehow failing myself”. It was like the end

of a war, the battle with myself was now over and it was such a

relief.

Can you see how this one sentence took away so much stress from

me? It meant I did not have to tense against it and constantly search

around in my mind, day in, day out, trying to discover the miracle

cure. I could also stop running around from one therapist to another,

one treatment to another, wasting more and more money and being

deflated yet again as treatment after treatment failed. I am sure most

of you will recognise this pattern. It is the people who make it their

daily aim to get better
, who may find they are getting worse. This

makes total sense, as their whole day/week becomes a battle. This

is a very important statement to understand.

So, don’t try and rush recovery; your body will heal in its own time.

Do not fall into the trap that can keep you ill, wanting to escape from

the way you feel today. Don’t let impatience hold you back. Even