Coronavirus, Anxiety and Me

I have been in self-isolation for the past week and I am on the verge of returning to work after this 7 day period at home.  I have been ok physically but, as the coronavirus outbreak is worsening I am really starting to struggle with my mental health.

Last year I was absent from work with stress, anxiety and depression for nearly 6 months and up until a few days ago I felt pretty stable but now I am starting to struggle, especially with the anxiety side of my mental health.

I went shopping, as I usually do on payday and I normally buy much that I need for the month ahead.  In the days leading up to going shopping, I was hearing stories of the shops selling out of essentials that I normally buy monthly which started my anxiety levels to rise.

I get paid monthly, I live on my own, I have bills to pay and my monthly salary just about covers that along with food and other things I might need.  I have very little room monthly to save any money and budgeting for food is one way that I can keep in some kind of control of my finances.  When I went shopping (and I visited 3 different supermarkets), not one had items that I rely on for my monthly food shop.  I eat a lot of pasta, at least 3 times a week as I know that what I cook will do me for 3 meals (one that evening, then lunch with the leftovers for tea), there were no tins of baked beans that I eat on toast at least 2 times a week, there was no veg, the freezers were empty save for a few tubs of ice-cream.  There were no toilet rolls or dog food, laundry products, hand wash, bath products or bin bags.  This has caused me a lot of worry and expense.  I need to eat, my dog needs to eat and I have a budget that I really can’t go too far away from.

In the end, I was forced to buy dog food and pasta on-line (Amazon had some stocks available) but I paid over the odds.  Roxy usually has one type of food and I couldn’t get that so instead of spending the usual £9 on a bag I had to buy something that was similar in nutritional value and ingredients that cost twice as much.  And I have had to bulk buy pasta online spending a lot more than I usually do.

In addition to that, I am getting really anxious about how this virus will affect those around me, both my Mum and Dad are in the at-risk group and are retired and I am worried about their health and how they will manage in having to isolate themselves with things like food shopping and just remaining safe.  My brother is also in self-isolation for the foreseeable future as he is asthmatic.

I have been watching the news, not constantly but the important parts of it as the advice the government are giving seems to change on a daily, if not hourly, basis.  I don’t know whether watching it is making my anxiety worse or not but I do know that I would rather be armed with the facts and be up to date with advice that is being given.

I’m worried about going back to work, and I can’t help panicking about what would happen if I picked up the virus and carried it to my parents or transferred it to someone else and I am worried about how the virus could affect me.

I’m worried about what will happen with work and if the office will remain open and about working from home.  I was planning on getting broadband put into my home this month but can no longer afford to do so as my food bill was more than I had planned.  Not having broadband and having to rely on mobile internet might be ok for blogging and other general browsing but I don’t have enough data to work from home for 7.5 hours a day for 5 days let alone afford to do this indefinitely.  I don’t even know if working from home would be an option when the work I do means that I have access to personal data.

And I am worried about having an extended period of time away from work, whether I will still get paid, whether I will still have a job to go back to should I take leave and whether, if I have to have time off again due to my mental health (which was stable before this virus pandemic) whether it will go down as sick leave and how that will affect my sickness record and pay.

I am just really anxious and worried about everything at the moment and I’m struggling to see anything in a positive light with so few answers to any questions, the advice we are being given changing constantly and all these stupid people who are panic buying and making the situation even worse in the grand scheme of things.

Why I Don’t Care for Modern-Day Self-Care

You only have to search the likes of Instagram and Pinterest for self-care and you are met with a barrage of posts about hair care, exercise, make-up, face masks, luxury bath products, fashion, jewellery and all sorts of other things that to me are less about self care and more about “treat yo’ self”.  It’s all sorts of flowery, feel good stuff that in itself is fine but is not really what self care is all about.

There are loads of self-care journals on the shelves now too, many giving writing and creative prompts for you to fill in as and when you choose.

And while these things can help us feel good about ourselves and assist in feeling happier and more positive on a day-to-day basis, they don’t really address the issues we face when we have mental health issues.

When you are in the pits of a mental health illness (for me that would be anxiety, stress and depression) disorder/illness/issue the last thing on your mind can be to pick up a journal and write or create.  Your only instinct is to survive and get through the episode and out the other side.  Housework, basic hygiene, eating and even sleep cease to be important and having someone tell us to take a bath with a luxury brand product is not helping in any way, shape or form.  When it is too much effort to even get out of bed and make a drink and see to our basic needs this is where I have to disagree with modern-day self-care.

I read something, a list of self-care “tips” when I had my anxiety attack the other day which gave really “helpful” advice such as “Get more sleep” and “Have a deep and meaningful conversation”, “light a scented candle”, and even “Close your eyes and rest for 5 minutes” and I got really angry.  If I could get any more sleep I would, trust me.  I have tried and failed and having some poncey list telling me that this will help just infuriates me.  As does the advice to have a deep and meaningful conversation, for me, when I am in desperate need of self care, talking to someone, let alone having a meaningful conversation is laughable, I just want to be left alone.  Lighting a scented candle, when I’m having a period of anxiety just magnifies the anxiety I already have so that really isn’t helpful.  And I’m sure whoever came up with “Close your eyes and rest for 5 minutes” has never experienced stress or anxiety or any other condition where being able to rest would be great if we could totally unplug our brain and our racing thoughts.

And then I started thinking about what self-care really is, it’s about being a friend to yourself, the best friend, the one who tells you, honestly, that you stink and forces you to take a shower, wash your hair, brush your teeth or do the washing up.  I’ve been there, and I have had no care for washing, brushing my hair or teeth, staying in pyjamas that I’ve been wearing solidly for a week, having no energy or motivation to do anything except lay there and avoid everything.  And I’ve been the one that has forced myself to go and shower, and it may have taken me an hour but I’ve done it, and, do you know what?  Just that simple act of standing under running water and getting clean has helped me feel a teeny bit better.

So, heres some advice.

Eat regularly, don’t worry if its healthy or not, even if it’s a bag of crisps or a few haribo at least you have eaten something.

Drink.  Water is the easiest.  Set an alarm on your phone and try to take a few sips through the day.

Brush your teeth.  Just this small act has made a huge difference to how I have been feeling.

Tackle one task at a time…if the bins are full then empty them.  If the sink is full then take your time and wash everything.  If the counters are grubby then clean them.

Change your clothes, if not everyday then at least every other.  It really feels like the greatest accomplishment.

Force yourself to shower or bath, even if its only 10 minutes, it will help.

Self care isn’t about long baths, lie ins, scented candles, journals or anything like that.  It’s about existing and really getting to the root of the problem, being your own best friend and doing what is best for you.  So, sorry to all you modern-day self-care lovers, but that stuff aint working for me when I’ve hit a real low.

Anxiety/Panic Attack

I woke up, I’ve been in bed, sleeping since around 11:30, it’s 3am now. I woke up unable to breathe or move, my heart racing, shaking and feeling really panicked but I don’t know why. I mean, I do know why, it was an anxiety/panic attack, but I don’t know why it happened. I’m still feeling shaky now but my heart rate has come back down to normalish, and I can breathe again. It was probably the worst one I’ve had. I feel like I need to turn on all the lights on the house and get up. I need a glass of squash, juice or anything but I’m not feeling up to doing that just yet…. and I’m writing this here because everyone I know is asleep and I don’t want to worry them, but I feel that writing it down will maybe stop it from happening again. My jaw is aching where I’ve been grinding my teeth in my sleep and I’ve managed to catch my tongue at some point which now feels really uncomfortable in my mouth 😐 and I’ve got a bit of a headache (though I’m not sure if that’s residual from yesterday). And I don’t know what to do, I’m too awake to attempt to go back to sleep and worried that it will happen again. Maybe getting up is a good idea?

Mental Health And Me – An Update

This is the first update about my mental health since writing this post, and in the time between that post and this I’ve been to the doctors for a medicine review on the 22nd November.  Thankfully some of the symptoms that I had when starting my medication (Sertraline 50mg) have subsided, the sick feeling still comes and goes but isn’t a persistent feature of day-to-day life, the hot and cold feelings have gone, and the dizzy spells are getting less and less which is good.

I’ve now developed insomnia, which I do get from time to time but never like this, over the space of a few weeks I have not been able to sleep for more than half an hour at a time if at all which is really starting to get me down.  The flip side to this is that when I do sleep, I can sleep for the whole day which has happened a few times now (the latest being sleeping through the whole of sunday 25th November).

I have still been feeling anxious and still have these anxiety attacks along with panic attacks though I can not identify a reason why, perhaps if I could then I would be able to stop them?

I spoke with the dr about all of this, he said it may help to up my medication.  I’m now taking 100mg of Sertraline each day.  I still feel unable to go back to work, mostly because my concentration levels are still really low and I keep forgetting things (like when watching tv, the adverts will come on and I have no idea what I have been watching), I still can’t settle to read a book and I’m finding myself really tired even when I have had a good nights sleep.  All of these things create a frustration in me and I know I would find it difficult in work with these symptoms, and I would end up being angry at myself for not being able to carry out the tasks I need to, taking too much time over completing tasks and generally struggling with the day-to-day things I need to do.

I’m finding it pretty hard to motivate myself to leave the house or even have conversations with people.  I feel like I’ve become a bit of a hermit at the moment.  I did manage to go food shopping at 12:30am on the 21st November…the Asda supermarket by me is open 24 hours and because I couldn’t sleep I decided to put that time to good use.  The supermarket was really quiet with only myself and shelf stackers around.  I got to walk around at my own pace and pay attention to what I was buying.  Usually, if I go in the day time I run around like I’m on supermarket sweep, grabbing things and not thinking about what I need or want in order to get out as fast as I can.  This time I only bought what I needed and didn’t forget anything.

I’ve been taking the higher dosage of medication for the last 3 days and so far have not got any more, or bought back any of the side effects I was experiencing.  I just hope that these will help somewhat!

Mental Health and Me

In a time where mental health is spoken about daily, by the hour and by the minute and in a time where there is, or should be greater understanding of the struggles and difficulties of others it can still be really hard to talk about our mental struggles.  And there is still a sense of shame about talking about our problems and also a worry that we will be defined by our illness or, even worse, treated differently because of it.

I’m writing this as I have recently been diagnosed with anxiety, stress and low mood, and consequently I have been advised to take a break from work and to start taking tablets to help me feel better.  I also have Aspergers which is part of the autism spectrum which means I process things a bit differently to others and certain things can cause me stress and anxiety on a day-to-day basis.  Normally I am pretty good at dealing with day-to-day stresses, whether it be too much noise, the lights being too bright, lots of things going on, lots of different things to do, worrying about whether I am doing things right, interruptions, the list of things goes on and on….  I have developed coping strategies for most stresses that I encounter and on the whole they seem to work.  Well, they have done until recently…I started to notice that the coping mechanisms that I normally implemented were not working so well…making lists and prioritising what needs to be done usually stopped me from panicking but I noticed that faced with several tasks to do, at home or work, I couldn’t work out what to prioritize and started to feel like I couldn’t breathe as there was “too much to do” and that I couldn’t complete any of it.  I found that I couldn’t concentrate, following conversations was becoming hard work, the background noise becoming too distracting and as loud as the person talking to me, even coming home to the relative silence of my home felt like sitting in the middle of a football pitch at half time.  I couldn’t read my book, I lost where I was and kept reading the same sentence or paragraph over and over, or forgetting what I had just read and having to go back a page to re-read it.  Even sleep, the one total shut off from the world wasn’t helping, I was waking up after having nightmares, sweating and gasping for breath, or lying there, so totally drained of energy yet unable to sleep as my mind just kept going over things that had happened. should have happened, could have happened, might happen…

And while all this was happening my skin was suffering too…I broke out with eczema on my face – on my forehead – right.between.my.eyebrows.  (Thank you body for giving me something else to add to my stress and worry list…).

I eventually, after months of pretending I was fine (I sort of made myself believe that if I got up and put a smile on and managed to go to work, I couldn’t be that bad and that it was “all in my head” and that it was just me…) went to the doctor.

The doctor that I saw went through a load of questions with me about my life, feelings, mood, work, sleep and eating habits along with lots of other questions.  He said that my eczema outbreak had been caused by stress and that he thought I was dealing with high levels of stress and anxiety based on my answers to his questions and how he read my body language.  He gave me a prescription for Sertraline tablets which will increase serotonin levels in my brain and make me feel better in due time.

I’ve now been taking the medication for a month or so now, originally I was on half a tablet each day which was then upped to a full tablet every day.  The side effects are not that good, I’ve felt sick, dizzy, hot, cold, thirsty, not hungry, my concentration levels are still really low, following anything on the tv or reading is really difficult and I can’t decide whether it’s the meds or the stress and anxiety still.  I have days where I really don’t feel like leaving the house or even seeing anyone and just existing in my own bubble, though I feel like that sometimes anyway because of my aspergers (though that sort of feeling comes after time spent with too many people and being a bit sensory overwhelmed…).  It’s hard to know what is caused by the tablets, what is stress, anxiety, aspergers, or me.

Sometimes I feel like I am just this bundle of diagnosis’ and it can be hard to sift through what is what to the extent it can become exhausting and overwhelming.  Sometimes I wonder if I am becoming my diagnosis/illness or is it becoming me?  Sometimes I just feel really lost in it all and wonder if I’ll ever feel “normal”, whatever that is?

I do  know that I am really grateful to my family and friends who I am able to talk to and who accept me for me.  I’m sure it can be difficult to converse with me at times,  I am not particularly good at explaining how I’m feeling either or putting words to what I’m thinking or feeling, so explaining how I feel can be hard work.  I’m also greatful that the doctor that I have been seeing is really patient and understanding, he doesn’t try to put words into my mouth, he sits and listens or will ask more questions to get a full picture of it all.

There is no shame in seeking help for whatever is going on in your mind, whether it is speaking to a relative or friend, a doctor or health worker, or anyone who you can trust.  If you notice that you are struggling with things then reach out and talk to someone.