A crossroad

A crossroad. A place of choices. For most which way to go. For the agoraphobic whether to go or to head back. Usually, for me at least, the latter. And this morning was no different. Its point 5 on my 10 point graduated exposure list meaning I am halfway there. Halfway where? Halfway to the school and nursery. I got there for the first time this year on Friday, then yesterday and then this morning. If you follow that path down past my wife and to the most distance visible child you will see a lone tree on the left. That is point 6. Visibly not far away, why can't I get there? Looks so easy. Follow that path down and it turns to the left and just a little further is point 7. Further up that path out of sight is point 8. Outside the school is point 9 and in the school is the last point.

Although as I said point 6 looks so easy to get to if I was to take a photo from any point then the next one looks easy to get to. The agoraphobic mind doesn't work that way, or at least my own does not. It does not think forward but instead thinks back to where it has come from- how far from home. Yes getting to point 6 is easy and in fact given that I am halfway then I could physically get all the way to the school since I walk all the walk. But again its all about going back. Yes I could get to the school but by then I would be both physically and mentally unable to get home. Every step I take forward is another step I have to walk back to get home.

For me and for others its not simple agoraphobia as some would perceive. Most agoraphobia occurs on a solely mental level. But I know others like myself where it is both a mental and physical problem. The biggest problem though and the one that brings the most confusion and frustration is not knowing which is the catalyst. We know they go hand in hand. We know one does not exist without the other. But we don't know which one is the cause and which is the effect. I get to this point and mentally I am being pulled back. Panic is rising. Fight or flight is kicking in and the whole purpose of that is to obviously take action, there is no action to be taken, or escape quickly. This is what the majority of agoraphobics experience. This is what most self help guides refer to. You have to look at the likes of Dr Claire Weekes to discover that this is not always the case. As well as panicking I am by that point physically drained. I feel like I have walked 5 miles rather than a quarter of a mile and have another 5 miles now to walk back instead of another quarter of a mile.

Everything is amplified. That is why walking any further brings fears about getting further from home and having a harder journey home because each step is a step further away. Anyone who has not experienced this won't understand it because its only steps not miles. Fair enough. But you get to a point where you feel you physically cannot get back home which in itself increases panic. For a moment if you forget the photo above. Imagine it like being knee deep in thick mud. Imagine walking quarter of a mile through it and by that point starting to become physically shattered as well as scared as to whether you can back it back to the way to perceived safety- the only place for sure you know you will be OK. If you imagine that then it may be easier to imagine in that situation why its tough then to keep taking hard drudging steps away from the place of safety even if the destination is very near in eye shot.

If someone came out of a coma after 6 months could they start walk miles straight away? I have to accept for the last 5 years I have not had much exercise. I have tried to exercise but each time never got far between the fatigue and anxiety. I am out of condition. I cannot just automatically walk what other people can walk. I need to accept that. I need to accept that may be a temporary state that know pushing will change and the only way I will find out whether it is temporary is by slowly building stamina. Or trying to at least. The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones- you are right Confucius.

Does graduated exposure work? I guess its more of a question of whether it works for me. I intend to find out. If it does truely work and I give it a fair crack and it doesn't work for me then I guess finally I will know what is cause and what is effect. On that matter I have another experiment lined up which is more graduated exposure but requires the car which is currently out of action. If I get stuck at a point when will I know via repetition whether it is the physical or mental holding me back? I think that answer will be found if and when I get there.

But back to the crossroad. Today I had a different choice and it came out of the blue. Was not expecting it. A kind of epiphany like I had a few weeks back watching the family go on and as I turned for home I suddenly felt I could walk to the school. It didn't seem as daunting for a moment, a beautiful moment I could not hold on to. It was no longer frightening.

Today I found I had a choice. I expected like the previous twice in the past few days to have the overwhelming urge to set back off home. It was not there. I had the choice to go forward toward point 6. The park suddenly looked smaller and I felt more able to walk it. I walked forward a bit without a thought of the return. Then I stopped. There was another choice. To my great regret I took that instead.

I have a note of my best single walks, best day of walking and best week of walking for 2009 to the present. In fact I have a note of every walk I have done in that time- obsessive I know. The best walks all came in 2009, next 2010, then 2011 and finally this year. A real worrying trend. If I have mentioned this before I apologise. I write so much in different places I forget what and where I have written things. I know I mentioned this briefly in the last post. After the first quarter of this year I was starting to get very worried about what the walks were telling me. In terms of week totals there was a 2 mile drop each year and in May of this year it had dropped over 3 mile of the previous year. It set off alarm bells. Where was this going? Would I be down to a mile a week next year and where after that if at all?

Thankfully as the year has progressed I have slowly increased my walking. Then last week I smashed all my previous best totals for all previous years with regards to distance in a day and in a week. All that was left was distance over a single walk. I was getting greedy and challenged myself to try to beat these this week.

And that was the other choice. As I said I started to move forward from the crossroad and stopped. I dropped the choice to go forward in favour of the choice to attempt beating a record. I knew from my walk the day before if I walked to point 5, head home, went around the block and then went a fifth of a mile away from home and finally returned home I would beat a record. Little did I realise, just a few hours ago, what a mistake I was making. I did. Yahoo me! Biggest walk for 2 years, since the first half of 2010. But no. I pushed myself physically way beyond what I am capable of doing at the moment for some stupid fictitious prize. I have got caught up in record breaking and in doing so deviated from the plan that has served me well up until last week when I went gung-ho.

So from that choice I picked up my prize. From that choice I declined to take a moment of clarity to see where it would take me. From that choice I am wasted for at least the rest of today and agitated to hell because I am drained. I feel like some being has stuck a straw in me until they have sucked every last ounce of energy leaving a grey dried up shell. This will in fact affect me for days. It was the wrong choice. Once again I see that after the choice was made.

So now I see. Now the records are put on the back burner. This week for the first time I will be glad to see a drop in the walks back to what they were 2 or 3 weeks ago. I will be happy to see my single walking distance fall by half and the same with the daily and weekly totals. Happy with that if I can give my body a chance to recover and catch up. A period hopefully awaits where I can walk within myself so to speak. I have take a wrong choice at the crossroad. Instead of my mindful walking which has gradually see me improve I have swapped it for mindlessly running through brick walls quickly and tensed up just to get from A to B. Short term gains with no long term benefits. As I said I can see that and so return now to trying to make the most of my walks and give the graduated exposure a chance and trying to enjoy the walks rather than achieve something through gritted teeth.

The journey continues but I feel now I am on the right road. Where I took a wrong turn at the crossroad this morning I have stepped back and taken the path I know is right. Only time will tell but it feels right this time. More moments of clarity like the one I had today, without striving for them, and I will grow ever more sure that this is the right path.