Panic paradox

One thing is for sure and that is that mental ailments are far more complicated to cure than physical ones. There are of course plenty of physical illnesses that are still to be cured after years of trying but those researching have visibility to work with. They can see the problem through their own eyes and collate the data to draw their conclusions. That is not the case with mental problems where every solution hangs on a theory created by the very thing where the problem resides. It is invisible and cannot be scanned or measured. And by that I am not trivialising physical ailments but instead illustrating the complexity in diagnosing and treating problems of the mind.

It is because of this that the road to recovery is a journey of self discovery. Possibly it is a valuable one. People apparently come out the other side stronger for it which I can see. Additionally I can see first hand that you learn so much about yourself, your anatomy, your mind and other deeper things- if that is where your path takes you. For example by the latter I mean you may try yoga, tai chi, meditation, visualisation, relaxation or something alternative that you would never have tried had the problems not occurred. So maybe there is value to be had but in order for that to have any meaning it would have to be viewed after recovery as there is certainly no room for appreciation of this state when you are amid it.

With the time that passes our understanding grows. The more we read, the more we experience and subsequently the more we conclude builds our knowledge base. But that information alone has not as yet led to recovery, in my case any way. Understanding is needed to remove the bewilderment at least and then build a strategy towards some sort of progress or quality of life. I am a great believer in feeding the mind as much information as possible and letting it draw its own conclusions so over the past 3 years or so I have digested as much written material on the subject as I possibly can. That provides one part of understanding. Just as important is our analysis of our own experiences because we all have different ones so must cater for our own situation accordingly.

What I have learned over the past couple of days is that my own progress of late is not actually progress at all. But that is not a bad thing all told. What I have done is increased my present quality of life. By extending my borders I have been able to live out new experiences which have built my confidence and given me something to feel happy about. I won't knock that and I am still very positive about recent times but at the same time I have been deluding myself that I am in some small way making progress with will lead to a long term recovery. In actual fact I am not. Knowing that though is vital because it was the delusion that brought about the intensity of the panic when it arrived yesterday.

Over the past month, or maybe longer, I realise now I have managed to lower my general anxiety. This has allowed me to feel a little more comfortable, at times, when out while also allowing me the confidence to stay out longer and go further than I have before in these past 3 years. That in itself is a great of course and something I must hold on to, cherish even. The new directions I have gone in the last month or so I wouldn't change for the world when the alternative was being stuck indoors. But the triggers are still there to set off panic and when the switch is tripped I still collapse like a house of cards. It is this which curbs progress and the reason why although I am slowly stretching out further I will get to a point where the prison walls are solid again. By not being able to cope with panic when it comes I am vulnerable and no amount of new experiences is ever going to take away that fear because panic will always be waiting in the shadows waiting to strike.

There is only one way to overcome this and that is to experience the panic. That is what I realised yesterday at the nursery when it hit me and I couldn't cope. It was a reminder that no progress has really been made. On the journey to the nursery I was surprisingly calm, so much so that I commented on it to my wife. In the car park I was still very relaxed. But it only took one trigger. One small set of words to push the first domino over. When my wife commented that we were early and would have to wait five minutes I was fine. Each grain of sand that dropped though started to agitate me. Now we were not moving and now I was tuning straight in to that train of fears with no distraction. Now I realised the panic switch had been flicked and knew that there was no way to reverse it. While I tried to forget, distract, avoid and tackle head on the fear continued to build until I was shaking from the neck down pleading with my wife to take me home straight away. From a false sense of security in my relaxed state thinking I was making progress I was given a reminder but from that I have gained more understanding and stripped off the illusion I had created and bought into. As horrible as the experiences are we sometimes need these reminders or at least I did.

That leaves me now to contemplate the problem. In all my living moments there is only one problem and that is panic. My anxiety is a fear of that panic. Without the fear I would not have anxiety problems. Panic is what makes me restless when alone and makes me scared when I venture out the door. Just panic. While I can improve my life to a degree around this problem like I have been doing I am never going to be truly free until I can rid myself of the panic- or of the fear of it. Again both are one in the same and need each other to exist.

This brings me to the paradox. I have gathered enough knowledge and experience to draw the conclusion, as many others have, that we need panic in order to overcome it. Panic will not just go. It is fuelled by our fear of it so while we remain anxious it will strike at will. The only way to overcome it is to experience but at the same time in experiencing it we feed the habit of fear by not being able to cope with it. That is the paradox for us all stuck in the position. There is only one way out and that is to experience panic without fear. As I once read its not a case of hoping panic doesn't come but instead of knowing that it may come but if it does it doesn't matter. And when it doesn't matter it will then lose its power and will eventually go. Our struggle is what keeps it alive. So just how do we get to the stage when it doesn't matter? Now there is the question and an answer I will, for the moment, keep searching for. Until I find it I must concede that it is here to stay and fight it as best as I can. We are told not to struggle which I can see but when you can't accept it is the only way until a solution is found..

Struggling

As I turned the corner my heart sank. The food van came into view but was obscured by a number of bodies. An hour earlier I had been out for a walk and there was only one person being served but I was too out of puff to go over. After a short rest I was ready to get something to eat but now all these people blocked my way. Rather than turn around though I decided to go forth. With each slow step I was taking a large inhalation of breath and then exhaling it as I tried to regulate the irregular. But as I walked amid the tight group of people behind the 6 people waiting to be served my jaw started to quiver like a child who is on the verge of bursting into tears. It was starting. Different from Monday but the panic was coming. This time I wasn't going to make my stand, this time I was mentally off the scene like hare.

Defeated again for the second time in a week I made my way home with my tail between my legs cursing every ounce of my stupid body. I had been taken down there by a daily photography challenge. Its just a fun thing with no prizes but its a good stimulant to getting me out. Today's subject was a hot or cold filled roll. That's why I was there and went away empty handed but the smell of the cooked food also made my little tum feel large and empty so I was all the more annoyed at not being able to fill it and instead had to make do with a couple of bags of crisps.

Since Monday's little panic attack I have been struggling badly and despite trying not to let it hold me back I am getting battered down every time. Its not just queueing but life on the whole which I am finding hard just now. Yes I'm still determined. This is the stage in the past where so many times I have thrown in the towel because it was so hard and felt so futile but regardless of how little I am able to do I am still doing what I can. But it is infuriating that months of 'progress' can mean so little after one episode.

Text books say panic lasts 20-30 minutes, if I remember right, but that is bullshit. Maybe the intense panic lasts that long but the effects of it can last for days or even weeks. Physically since Monday I have been shattered, agitated, weak, stiff, shaky and what not. Even walks around the blocks have been difficult and one yesterday almost had me in a panic because I felt so bad. But I do know it will pass and I just have to keep things ticking over until they do. It is though frustrating.

To be honest I forgot how bad it was. I am sure everyone's experience varies in terms of the sensations they get and the intensity of them but in essence we all know that when putting ourselves through the wringer the problems do not come to an abrupt end when we come out the other side. The effect it can have on us mentally and physically are probably not something the medical profession realise. My mind set has not changed since Monday but my body just isn't working the way it has done for the past few months when I was able to walk x kilometres per day without problems. Now as soon as I am out the door I feel like I am coming to the end of a marathon. When things were going well I promised myself that I would not let bad times hold me back but I forgot just how hard it is when you are in a heightened state of anxiety to do what you were doing when you had less of that. I know what is happening and why it is happening but still it angers me. I know the panic has led to heightened anxiety which is now virtually constant and in turn is leading to tension which is tiring me. The adrenalin is wearing me out and on top of that since this mix is not effecting my sleeping pattern its like one ever increasing snowball effect of physical exhaustion.

There is a rebel within us all though which is what makes acceptance so hard. I know in an hour's time from typing this post I will go down there again because I cannot accept that I cannot walk down road and buy a hot filled roll. If I accept that then I feel I will start to develop a defeatist view that everything is beyond my reach. I guess I just have to balance pushing with being sensible, ie keep trying and walk away if its getting too much rather than allow myself to be thrown about about in the mental maelstrom like a rag doll. If I look through my old posts I will see this has happened before and happier times came later so I just have to weather the storm for now until calm returns.

Cold

For over a week now we having being fighting the growing urge to turn on the heating despite the cold. Not that it is the Antarctic or we cannot afford to have it on any more than anyone else but just on principal. The power companies are a sore point. It is obvious price fixing in which they are holding a nation upside down and shaking out the last of their small change. I have been determined not to give them a penny more than needed. The regulators won't do anything and the government can't do anything. Like with everything else in the UK we are in a sorry state.

My hands have been driving my brain insane with a constant torrent of obsessiveness over colour, sensations and anything else I can get stuck in that old mental spin cycle. Completely irrational and caused by the cold temperatures as I well know but not so easy to stop. Its like a stuck record that gradually grows to irk the hell out of you but you just can't lift the needle. I go through these periods again and again. But still I wouldn't turn the heating on and neither would my wife who is as dogged as me on the matter.

But tonight we finally gave in. The house was just so cold that any movement brought about a whip of cold air and the kids were feeling it too. God it felt great. It made we wonder how we never turned it on sooner but then I had a mental image of the electricity meter spinning away in a blur and some fat cat counting more coins. After a couple of hours we turned the heating back off again with the kids tucked in bed asleep under the covers.

Of course there are people living on the streets who know who what real cold weather feels like through no fault of their own in some cases. There are people who can't afford to feed their children and/or themselves. There are people with a whole host of problems bigger than this but I can't help getting it off my chest. I just get infuriated when I think about what these power giants are getting away with. Its the type of issue that in years gone by would have been the catalyst for a revolution.

Lastly can I just say something about the pic. Of course its a red man at the traffic lights. The phallic addition I didn't notice until later- I didn't add that. Something I would have done as a kid but I have grown out of that stage, possibly. 

Salt and Sauce

"Salt and sauce" I replied in a fluster.

The man behind the counter froze. Maybe the whole chip shop froze. There were a good few people in it, despite what the photo suggests, and as is always the case with hungry humans waiting for their food they were for the most part lost in the their own little worlds staring into nothingness. The left side is fried food- chips, pizza (yes- fried pizza), burgers, sausage, white pudding, black pudding, haggis, fish, etc. The right side is ice cream. Strange combination. And through the back of the right side is are tables- I think. But when I went in there were a few people or maybe it was the narrowness or paranoia. This seemed to wake them up as heads turned in my direction. A sense of deja vu came over me. For the second time in a few days I was getting food and had clumsily made myself the centre of attraction when all I wanted to do was skulk silently in the shadows.

The man behind the counter looked at the bottle of salt in his hand then the bottle of vinegar in his other hand and finally at me. I repeated his actions in reverse. How many times we did this I don't know but it felt like a few and every time I looked at him he looked stunned and speechless. It wasn't the response he was expecting and as a result didn't know how to react. It took time but suddenly I realised my error.

"I mean salt and vinegar" I quickly blurted out.

This brought a smile to his face and a wave of relief as he was able to get on to the job of sprinkling the chips I had ordered. It is a practice he constantly does without thinking like an automaton and by making him think I had stopped in in his tracks. Quite possibly he would have had a meltdown if I hadn't recovered my whits and I'd have had to run out the shop to tiny explosions and wires being catapulted in all directions. But all was OK.

"I don't get out much" I tried to explain.

He didn't hear me. He was now in his own little world smiling to himself and no doubt imagining telling friends later about the strange guy: "I had vinegar in one hand, salt in the other and he asks for salt and sauce" he tells the others shaking his head with a smile as he does so. Such is the monotony of repetitive occupation that it is the littlest changes that have the biggest effect.

It is a strange phenomena in Scotland. I was born in the West where I lived briefly then brought up in the East but now found myself back in the West again. Chip shops in the West provide salt and vinegar whereas in the East they provide salt and sauce- either tomato or brown (not like you get from the supermarket but a watered down version). How that originated I don't know but that is the way it is. Like those other zombies I'd placed my order of two bags of chips and was caught short when asked a further question. I wasn't expected that. I thought it was ask, pay, get and walk. It has been so long since I was in a chip shop I had missed out a step and been rattled by it so much that I blurted out memories of youth.

It was though a good night and a nice change. I decided to go for a drive last night and the family came along as usually. Hunger took me to a chip shop a couple of miles out. It was all about something new. We passed lots of them along the way but I wanted to go to this one and I never told my wife until we got there. I was planning on having something more but seem to have lost a five pound note somewhere so had to settle for chips. With the kids in the car outside the shop my wife and I went in where I was to do the ordering and paying. We then drove back with our prize and the kids had their 'supper' of Chippy Chips. It was nice- daddy driving and daddy buying the chips.

The unusual thing about this place is that although it is a chip shop it is more renowned locally for it's ice cream. Had it been a warm summer night I would have bought the girls one of those but its far from that at the moment. Maybe one night though as a treat. And as I got ready to tuck in to my chips as home I noticed a boast on the box which you can see if you enlarge the image:

'World Record Holders: 12406 fish suppers in 1 day'

All those fish and chips in one day and I'll bet no one asked for sauce. The man behind the counter may have been thinking back as he smiled.