Mental health post #7: Anxiety Traits

First some business: y'all know I'm not a trained health professional, right? I am simply talking about my experiences with mental health issues. Just want to make sure you understand so there's no suing me down the road... ;)

There are so many things I've been thinking about writing that I find it hard to be concise and cohesive. I hope you will excuse my poor skills at articulation--please always feel free to ask for clarification on anything. If it's something I don't feel comfortable sharing, I'll say so. You don't need to feel like you are prying. One of the things I recently pondered was some of the specific behavioral traits I see in myself when I am particularly anxious. (I talked a little more generally I think in post #4 when I described a day in the life of...anxiety (name that Beatles tune!) Here they are in the ever unglamorous list form:

1. Repetition: when I am anxious I find myself being repetitious. I mean that in both the literal and figurative way. Literally, I repeat myself over and over. I re-ask questions, I repeat instructions and requests, and I bring up the same topics over and over again. Anxiety got me one-track minding it all the time. This is, I'm sure, completely annoying to my loved ones, but also to me. One way I've heard neural pathways in the brain described is as well-worn roads. Our brain likes the path of least resistance too and will continue to re-travel down the same route because it's easier. I find when I am falling into this trap, it can be difficult to look outward too, and be concerned about the people around me. It takes effort and practice to get out of those ruts and put my brain into another gear. Since I want to make new roads that are less anxious and less-inwardly focused, I take the effort to do this even though my brain becomes alarmed when I am not hyperfocusing on the thing worrying me.

2. Irritation: yeah this is one of those things that is not by itself an indication of anxiety because we get irritated when difficult things happen in our lives, or we have PMS, or we didn't sleep well. But if I am suffering from an overload of anxiety, there is a good chance that I am going to be wrestling internally with irritation. I'm not always perfect at keeping a lid on it and sometimes I find I need to take a walk or have some alone time while listening to podcasts (or eat or sleep or whatever the case may be). The consequences of unchecked irritated behavior may seem small, but they stack up quickly. I appreciate in the love languages book (by Gary Chapman) how he talks about relationships being like a bank account: if you are constantly overdrawn with your loved ones, they find it hard to have a healthy relationship with you. So irritation, for me, is something I like to address as soon as I recognize it as a problem. Even if it means just stuffing a cupcake in my mouth so I can have the social capital to deal with whatever is needed at the moment. ;)

3. Poor concentration: so when a person is anxious, their sympathetic nervous system hits the gas and sends out stress hormones like adrenaline & cortisol throughout the body. And when a person is chronically anxious, they can chronically have this gas pedal gunning the engine. When I am anxious, I find that I have poor concentration. The amount of anxiety affects how little or much concentration I can tap into. Conversely, if I have zero anxiety at all, I actually feel like I don't have much in the way of concentration skills either. I've heard some people call this brain fog also.There must be a sweet spot of low-level anxiety that is helpful in situations that it's called for: tests, performances, etc.

4. Compulsive habits: yes, I'm talking about nail biting, hair pulling, and picking to name a few. I believe the DSM-V included this, called excoriation disorder. As a life-long cuticle picker (not proud of this!), I can attest to the fact that there is something calming about these habits. I don't fully understand it, but I can tell you that you can generally tell how bad my anxiety is by how bad my nails are (though I believe that it has become so habitual to me that I often do it while reading which is my most favoritest recreation outside of sleeping). This is related to OCD I believe. OCD, like most other mental health disorders, functions on a spectrum. I know there are other compulsions people feel: I occasionally went on a check-on-my-kids-to-make-sure-they-are-still-breathing obsession, or checked the locks somewhat excessively. But this wasn't as much of an issue for me as I know it can be for others.

5. Inability to commit: waffling, indecision, these are the common issues I face when anxious. I struggle to see myself capable of doing anything else because, as mentioned before, my body is already running with all pistons firing at all times. In my healthy state, I can make good choices about how much I can say yes to. When I am anxious, I may say no to everything because I cannot reasonably decide if I can handle it or not. Or I may say yes to too many things and then have to say no to all of them out of desperation.

6. Poor memory: ever walk into a room with no idea why? Multiply that times infinity and you get life with extreme anxiety (depression too for me). Unless we are talking about the top thing on my mind that is triggering my anxiety reflex, I am forgetting things right and left. I should clarify that this isn't necessarily something that can be measured between people. For instance, Derek misplaces things every.single.day. ;) I know it's not anxiety most of the time for him. The trick is to measure your performance against that of times in the past, and throw out the other variables that may be affecting your memory. Are you sleep-deprived, have low blood sugar or under the influence of a prescription medication? (Have to bring that last one up because we all have elective surgeries at sometime in our lives.) And, do you have other signs of anxiety?

7. Startle reflex: when we lived in family housing at the University of Michigan, Derek used to startle me almost every day, even though he made noise as he was coming toward me. That still happens today, but not to nearly the effect it once did. For a long time I wondered why I was just so prone to being startled when other people weren't. I posited that it was from anxiety. A decade later, I read a peer-reviewed article that confirmed that people with chronic anxiety can suffer from an over-active startle reflex. I don't even need to explain how this makes sense because we all get that our bodies can act differently when on constant high-alert.

Okay, sorry for another epic read. At some point here, I am going to address how mental illness has affected my close relationships. It's a little hairy to discuss so it may take some time, but I promise all will be divulged and nothing held back. Just kidding, I need to time to make sure I don't put my foot in it... ;)I'm also hoping when the semester settles a little, Derek will have some time to talk about things from his perspective as someone married to someone who has mental illness. (He's a perfect foil because he has NO mental illness at all. Not sure how he got so lucky but he definitely does not have the orchid gene!)

Picture note: Jocelyn, pretty sure I don't look as good in this as you. Also the kids told me that I'm not allowed to wear this in public. I'm considering wearing it while I run down Timpview Drive when the high school gets out...