Dealing with fatigue

Fatigue has finally caught up with me and am shattered. Managing in a short space of time to double my biggest walks has left its mark. I woke this morning at six feeling awful with my body buzzing and weak from fatigue. Unlike tiredness fatigue at its worse won't allow for sleep so its been a long day.

This is the time I have to be wise, or try to be. It has been so long since I exercised that I cannot tell if this is normal and I need to be feeling this bad in the short term to let my body improve in the long term. Or am I running into a brick wall? Just don't know but I do know I am shattered and struggling today to walk any kind of distance.

So as I said its time to be wise and time to accept. I can keep trying to go out but not pushing past the point into fatigue. Its in the making that decision to go where the most important habit is built as reluctance leads to anticipatory anxiety, or apprehension as most call it, building that negative habit further. The fatigue though has taken a lot longer than expected which is why it has come out of the blue in my mind because for a period I was waiting for it, expecting it, but it never came and so I presumed I was starting to get on top of it.

The irony is I don't think it was caused physically. I don't think the bigger distances are why I am now extremely fatigued. It is though the reason why even short walks are fatiguing me now. It has I think come from anxiety and panic. On Monday I agreed to meet one of my wife's friends halfway to the school as she was bringing the girls home and had to be somewhere else. No distance to walk in this current period but she was late. So I had to wait in a busy park buzzing with kids just out of school and happier for it, drunk on the joy of release from captivity. I found a bench and with my son waited. And the panic increased. Panic from having to stay there and knowing I was panicking and knowing I had to fight the flight response and try to get home on top of it. Eventually I was home with the kids and relieved but that is when the fatigue started to build.

What it also does, a panic attack, is fill the body with adrenaline. This in turn makes the mind anxious and introspective leading to more panic. And that is what has been happening. More panic, more fatigue. Its like a snowball effect.

As much as it feels like I need rest and take it easy it is actually not that at all. Its the anxiety. I need to deal with that and the physical side will take care of itself. Easier said than done but that is what I must do. So as fatigued as I am I keep pushing. Although my walks have taken a hit this week as I find it harder and harder to push they are still even at this stage better than any previous year for the week before this year. That is with 3 days of walking still to go.

My wife bumped into a woman last night who we know but have not seen in a while and who works in the health service and has some CBT practitioners working under her. After asking how I was doing she offered to get some help if I wanted. I am not sure. Any time there has been help from the outside its ended up putting me back the way but at the same time maybe I need a push a long and someone to talk to directly. So still not sure on that one. Will give it some thought.

Still managing to get out to places and into shops for short spells. If I can get on top of this fatigue the next thing is trying to sit in somewhere. I have it planned out. Start with the cafe in the local supermarket. As well as sitting in they do take away so the plan is to get a tea to take away and sit down with it. This way I can try to stay but if I cannot then I can go with the take away. Would be nothing worse than getting food on a plate, putting it down and then leaving. So that is the plan and then if I can get comfortable with that move on to something that keeps me longer. My wife tells me the kids want to have a meal there one day so that would be perfect preparation. After that there is another cafe but its enclosed with no windows and that would be the next step up. Then much later the Chinese restaurant about half a mile away. Finally further afield- hopefully not another food related place or we will be stone broke.

Also still managing to get to point 8 on my graduated exposure while taking more varied routes. On Monday I was closer to point 9 than point 8 and nearly at the school gates. Its quite a leap in a short time. It seems to be working to some extent so just have to keep at it with fatigue being the main hurdle on that score too.

Much to be happy about at the moment. Nothing ever runs smoothly but if I can accept that and start to appreciate the improvement more instead of lingering on the negatives then I will be heading in the right direction. You just never know. Maybe that one day I thought would never come might be closer than I ever imagined. It just takes little victories which give impetus and confidence and an appetite for more and then a snowballing of a different variety, a better one. And though the road ahead may be hidden in the mist I am starting to believe there is a horizon behind it. And yes, I did just add that in to give some link to the pic at the top (which will come later)

Suspicious

"Suspicious". That doesn't look right- much like the photo (bloody camera lens!). Can't say why but just doesn't look right. Do you ever get that where a word doesn't look right but it is right. "Macabre" or "Naive" for example. I could list a few more but you get the point. Spelling has never been a strong point right enough. If you have read a couple of posts on this blog I am sure you already know its as good as my grammar. I remember a friend laughing one time at me putting down "presher" on scramble. I knew it didn't look right but I at the same time I couldn't at the moment think of any other way it could be spelled- or is that spelt.

Blogger doesn't help. Is the US dictionary default? I can't find any way to change it. Makes me doubt myself when I type "centre" or "realisation" or something else and get that red squiggling line under my typing telling me I have spelled (or spelt) it wrong. Makes me laugh how "blog" and "blogger" flag up as a misspelling too. Mmm..strange. It annoys me because it makes me question myself and I have a hard enough time with English as it is. Spelling is one thing. I do all the homework with the kids. The oldest came back last week with an English exercise where she had to fill in the blanks in sentances with either "Who's" or "Whose". That just about burst my head and I probably sent her in with wrong answers. Beyond me.

I am off in a tangent here. It was just when I typed the title it didn't look right and now another tangent if I may that has a tenuous link to do with suspicion and fear of authority. One of my pet hates living where I do is road crossings. No bugger seems to care- in a car. The amount of times, as I have noted more than once on here, that I have almost been run over at traffic lights is staggering. And not helped by recent ventures out in the evening where it seems the crossing don't work after tea time so in the dark I have had to play chicken with oncoming traffic in both directions. A bloody joke. The traffic lights I am talking about are fairly new and outside the old folk's home so I dare say for them to get to the supermarket safely and yet they don't work from about 6 onwards?

Anyway tonight I was coming back from the supermarket and this time right outside it had to cross a zebra crossing. Already dusk was passing into dark so basically all I could see was 3 pair of headlights coming my way. No chance I was risking it. The first car as expected flew right through. The second I had a bit more time with and was just about to cross when I realised I wasn't going to make it so had to jump back. Imagine my surprise and fury when as it passed I discovered it was a police car. Bloody arrogant twats! To be honest if I had known that prior I might have chanced it. The third car didn't look like it was going to stop but that the last minute braked and waved me over. I waved back as I always do. Why? I don't know. Its supposed to be there for predestrians.

Sidetracked more that a little so back to what I was going to say in the first place and the point of this post. I have been getting increasingly paranoid about my graduated exposure route to the point I am having to cut down the frequency walking it. But I should explain something that may be true for all agoraphobics or may not but is certainly the case with me- or at least how I feel.

Nerves, anxiety or whatever else you want to call it makes a person act differently. It can make them act in a way that some may think suspicious. Take for example if you are a security guard and someone comes into the shop looking very edgy, maybe rubbing their hands and eyes darting about then the next time you see them they are leaving at pace not long after they have come in. Suspicious? Well I suppose as its not normal. At time I used to think this standing in queues while I clawed at my neck and generally fidgeted and generally looking like someone who knew they had been up to know good and were about to get caught even though that was not the case.

I am feeling that way more and more because not only the panic makes me feel that way but because of going the same route over and over and stopping at a certain point. I go through the park and exit at a residential area and that as is far as I go. Yesterday during the day I felt a bit paranoid walking by people as I exited the park and then not long after walking back up behind them. At night I went again and self concious of this I kept slowing and stopping a good bit behind a man walking in front of me with a bag of shopping. It has to be remembered that this is virtually pitch black with a few dimly lit street lights and he must have heard the footsteps because nearing the exit he put down his shopping and turned staring back at me for about 30 seconds. Then he went on and I caught up with him at the exit and he just gave a look and walked off. And there I stood. Stood among houses on a quiet street dressed in black and a black hat on with a camera in my hand and felt it really wasn't right. I had to get away but just as I was thinking that a young girl walked past me to head through the park. The dark park. Could I walk all the way behind her? No so I had to stand on this street for a few minutes unable to go further but unable to go back. What a palava.

Today I returned there again determined now not to go in the dark to avoid these problems. I got to the park exit and took out the camera in time for a face to appear at a window staring. So I stopped. Put the camera away. Took out my statements and stood their like a fool reading them. I looked up briefly to see peering eyes staring back. So I put the words in my pocket, hung my head and walked back. The camera was a mistake- not in a residential area. Stupid mistake. Need to leave that alone until I am somewhere on my own like some times past.

So a bit of a adjusting and thinking to do. No walking there in the dark. No taking out the camera. 1984, bloody beyond a joke. Can't take the camera out but you can be run over by a police car or any other car for that matter or double park or graffiti in public or let your dog shit on the path or throw stones at passing cars or just about anything with the exception of getting your camera out in a public place. Do they think I am casing the joint? Were that so they better have a look at good street view where I can get 3D views and a aerial view of their home from the comfort of mine. I'm spouting off again.

Anyway, I think what I wanted to say was that I need to adjust. Need to do things less conspicuously. Try to be more natural. Accept that getting the camera out is not acceptable in public opinion. So the changes are at my end. And then I can be on my merry way. Walks are increasing and with that a greater freedom. Still very limited but I hope if I can keep pushing and keep working on this then I will be a natural and that should be enough to keep the eyes from peering in.

Hidden

Getting back into the CBT is certainly helping but it also has a side that is hard to contend with. You see what happens when you are not doing any kind of therapy is you try to cope with the short term. That basically involves avoidance and distraction and filling up that big closet in the mind with every worry, cramming everything in, shutting the door, locking it and throwing away the key. What you find is that doing self help in someway causes that door to swing open and everything comes spilling out. Financial worries, Atos, coping, lost years, concerns over the kids, health concerns, lifestyle concerns and a whole host of other things. Its like a counter balance for any kind of progress you make and you soon find you are up and down like a yo-yo. So its hard to gauge how you are doing. Are you improving, no change or deteriorating? In truth it changes second to second. Big highs and crashing lows.

Of course this is just part of the problem. Real life has its own present woes. Just as Atos are pressing my panic button the relations are strained to the point of bursting at home- the less said about it the better. The reality is I am alone and having to deal with things on my own but it feels like everyone still wants to put the boot in not satisfied that I have enough on my plate. I am sure people around me think I am having too easy a time of it. Believe me I know where they are coming from. They don't know what this is like. They see a guy who looks healthy enough that he should be working and instead he sits at home all day not doing anything- or as my wife says "playing games all day". Not many people know what its like to wake up and feel dread crashing in as soon as you stir and spending the rest of the day at best in restlessness and at worst peaking at points into terror while watching your life slip through your fingers and having to face the shame. Of course this is all self pity. This is the part of me I try to keep hidden. No one other than those reading my blog know this because I keep it to myself. Instead I get told how shit I make everyone else's life just by existing and must not say: I am not enjoying this much either.

Blah! Rant over. As I said an indulgence into self pity but I needed to get it out my system. This is the only place I can do that. In the real world I don't have anyone to talk to. I very rarely see my family and only see my friends on Facebook now and would never discuss any problem with them as they have their own. So this is my one place to talk about what I keep hidden even if it is only out loudly to myself. A form of therapy in itself.

Anyway, back to the CBT. It does explain that there will be a rise in anxiety as you do it so I have to account for that. Its hard to say there is any kind of positive affect. I still cannot cope with a panic attack and have had many over the past few weeks because I am pushing the boundaries harder than I ever have- another thing no one but a reader will know. In the course of doing this I also found an online article which I think is well worth a read for anyone doing CBT. It shows common errors and I can identify with them and see why I have not given it the chance it deserves. That article is entitled "10 common errors made in CBT". Very interesting read. I see myself in a lot of that. Especially the bit about expecting results without practice. That is my biggest downfall. The therapist I talked to a year ago told me the same thing: you can't expect to read a book about riding a bike and then expect to ride it without having never gotten on. Likewise you may come off and fall a few times but as long as you get back on and keep practicing it will in time become second nature.

There is though another point well made that is related to why I don't practice enough- maybe. I do find reading the same material over and over monotonous. I start to go on auto pilot and not a lot sinks in. In this article the lady talks about the importance of repetition. Panic, for me, is an automatic response. It has become with time and repetition an automatic response. So in order to replace or change that response I need repetition and to give it plenty of time in order to develop the new response. Its crucial.

I do know the importance and you would think that would be enough but is not. It should be but when you find it hard to concentrate its very difficult to keep reading the same stuff over and over again and get it to sink in. But I must. And if nothing else there is a good reason to. Doing this I have had moments in the past of clarity where it has suddenly all fallen into place. You cannot strive for these but hopefully with repetition I will get more of those.

In fact overall from this article and from re-reading the CBT books I see I have been doing a lot wrong. Normalising statements for example is something I need to get written out. The ultimate aim is to stay with panic and I tried to do that this morning but walked away very quickly. I realised then I need those normalising statements because my mind was racing so much I could not recall what I had to remember to do. These are key to staying with panic and in doing do over and over again hopefully can be recalled automatically rather than referred to. Unless I do all I am doing is re-enforcing the belief that walking away is making the panic die down and that goes right back to my first big full blown panic attack that kicked all this off.

So plenty to work with and that is what I plan to do. Normalising statements, preparation before graduated exposure, panic practice at home on key symptoms like breathing and keeping record of everything to analyse and try to work out how to improve on it. Hopefully I will have some new on that front in the coming weeks as I try to push myself further and work harder with the self help.

In the between time I flit between being on top of anxiety and being crushed under. In hope one minute, despair the next. Better I suppose that being stuck in the dark places of the mind. Need to be in the real world more I think as its in introspection that I find my demons lurking. So I try to stay outward instead of in. I do try. Its a long road ahead and the path that lies beyond remains hidden but at least I am seeing glimmers of it.

Point 8

Nah, don't worry. I won't bore you every post with thoughts on walks and graduated exposure. I just want to note when I reach I new level. Today I reached a new level. And it was worth noting. The furthest away from the home I have walked since I can remember- at the very least 5 years. That said its not much more than the previous post about graduated exposure but that is the point. Isn't it?

Honestly never thought I would get this far and again not sure firstly if I can get here again, secondly whether I can maintain that and lastly whether I can improve on it. But a week ago I reached point 7- if you don't know what I am talking about then I don't blame you but its all explained in that post last week. Not only did I get there but I managed to do it 4 days in a row. That got me thinking.

I have approached the graduated exposure the wrong way. There was no routine to it and this was because I did not want to restrict myself to this route. And nor do I need to. But what I realise now is that I have to do it every day. That is me reading things and no taking them in. That is what it says in the CBT books. You must repeat it regularly. Try daily. If you cannot do it then don't beat yourself up but at least try and keep trying. That I think is what I have been missing.

So in total before today I managed to get to point 7 on 5 ocassions in a week. That was the plan this morning. Well not the first plan. The first plan I has was to go to Greggs because I was starving and despite a queue I went in and bought some sandwiches after waiting in line. Its just as well I only had enough for the sandwiches- which were for lunchtime 3 hours later. I saw so much hot foot I wanted to eat and then there wer cream filled apple turnovers and doughnuts and all else. After that I decided to go to point 7 again if I could because I was feeling very fatigued and despite staying in the queue the anxiety doing so soon physically leaves its mark.

So off I went and as I approached point 7 I realised the ease with which I had passed point 6 and I think that spurred me on. Cutting a long story a little less long I got to point 8. Crap photo I know and the experiment to mask its inadequicies has made it look worse. The wee camera still fails but here too I was in a resedential area where taking photos is not the thing to do especially since its so close to the school. Yes so close to the school. A tenth of a mile away. Not close enough to see as its over the road and up a narrow lane but close.

For now it seems to be working and only time will tell if it does work to the full. I will only know if I can keep to the routine of trying to do this route at once a day and taking other routes the rest of the day as I please. No reason why I cannot as long as nothing non-anxiety related crops up and I say this as I feel the onset of another chest infection that I am trying to put out of mind as I push on.

What it has done though is started to give me a sense of belief. In the last past I was talking about going for a somewhere to sit with a cuppa. It was just a thought, an aspiration, but with very little belief I would do it. Even thinking about doing a little shopping at quiet times to begin with and get into another routine that way of getting out and doing things. Building slowly. Small steps lead to big journeys over time.

Hope. That is what it has done. Given me renewed hope for the first time in a long time. I also cannot forget the CBT in that regard. That with doing the practice as well as the theory is starting to make differences in my thinking. Still a long way to go and still I have these beliefs, or should I say strong doubts in myself, that hold me back but maybe each little victory however small is a little chip away at that doubt and through the merest of cracks hope is shining through. I am getting to places by walking past places I struggled to get to previously and this is leading to longer walks and more time out and hopefully an increase, however little, in fitness as well as confidence.

So good. I feel improvement and I hope in future posts to be able to report victories bigger than these that still feel small to me even though for all these years I could not do them were massive.

Can't do nuttin

 

The funfair has come to time. Time for me to venture down but the camera stayed firmly in the pocket- just in case anyone thought I was some kind of weirdo taking photos of people. Shame. I'd have liked to have catch lights at night and movement. Most nights have been wet though. I did think about doing down in the dark and taking photos from the outside at different points but not with my good camera. Won't risk the wet. The problems with my little compact camera's lens are probably down to condensation after taking it out in the rain once too often. 

I didn't go in though. Ideally I would have liked to go in and have a stroll about just for something new to do. Maybe even get a hot roll from one of the stands I could see, and smell. But £1.50 just to get in. Not surprised to see not many people frequenting the place. They set up on Thursday night and are still here but will probably back up today as the schools go back tomorrow. But a bit much just to get into the place. If I were to take the kids down that would be £6 for us just to enter the tiny little ash park. I saw a little slide with a sign saying £2 a slide. Jeez-oh. A real mistake. Just over a mile away is a theme park which is obviously better and free to enter so I don't know why they thought it was a good idea.

Even if it had been free I know something and that is that it would have been a quick stroll. Maybe not even more than a minute. That is why I grudge paying for a short jaunt. I walked around it which was enough. The thing is I am walking further at the moment and noticing a change in problem. The emphasis has always been very much on where I cannot reach. Now that I am reaching the problem is staying there. Now it would seem doing nothing is harder that doing something.

How times change. Thinking back at my scorn it is ironic that I should be this way. I have a good friend I have not seen in many years. In our twenties we used to go to the pub at the weekend. It used to do my head in. Every time I was supposed to meet him I was left sitting on my own for up to half an hour. Some nights I would actually leave the pub and go down to his house to find him still sitting there. It annoyed me as I thought it was ignorant. And it didn't click when one night I didn't leave until half an hour after I said I would meet him and on the 15 minute walk to the pub I found him coming my way to meet me. It never occurred to me that not once on the hundred on times we had gone for a drink had I ever went into the pub to find him sitting there. It was only when I drove him to the hospital so he could use the cashline in there one night and he asked if I would come in with him that I realised it was actually a problem. It was a problem I just couldn't fathom. I refused saying I'd sit with the car running and he wasn't going to go in- did eventually. Turns out he couldn't stand being in places alone. To me that was not logical. How hard is it? How difficult to sit somewhere on your own as opposed to with someone else? What is the difference?

Some years later. I saw it again. I was having a drink (seems I was never out a pub) with my sister in law and her now husband. I went to the toilet and came back to find her agitated. She said she had just been about to leave. Her husband had gone off to withdraw some cash and because I was at the toilet that left her on her own in a pub. Even though she knew it would not be for long she could not stand it and got so agitated she really was on the point of leaving. Again I couldn't understand it. Again I asked myself: how hard is it? It made me think of my friend. In actual fact I have seen it a few times in my life. But I never thought I would be one of them.

I have been getting around a lot more and a lot further and I have wanted to make full use of it and push it if I can. My next objective is to find somewhere to go where I can stay for a while. There is though not much around the vaccinity. There are a few benches but not much fun on a wet day. There is the library but that would involve firstly joining which I am not ready for. There are no pubs nearby. :) There is a recreation centre that serves food which might be worth a try but its enclosed and dark and really not sure about that. There is though also the supermarket which has its own cafe. That is more appealing even if it is further. Its right at the entrance and therefore exit. Big windows make it bright. Yes more appealing.

So I went and I stood inside. There were about 4 pensioners spaced about looking up at me as you would when someone walks in. The tea, coffee and pay area was up the back. I stood and I looked. And I stayed staying and looking for about a minute and could feel the jitters starting and the restlessness kicking in. In my mind I knew I couldn't get something never mind then sit down with it for a bit. Already the fight or flight was kicking in and flight was the option being pushed. Run, run, get away, escape. That strong urge is hard to fight. Just couldn't do it so I turned and walked out.

Why? The questions I asked of those people I now have to ask myself. What is so difficult about sitting down in one place and doing nothing? How hard is it? Its not hard, is it? Why can't I do it? It frustrates the life out me so much I am determined to do it. I must do it. Sick of being beaten down by this. Its not even difficult. Well not for others. I just can't get my head around why I cannot just sit there without panicking.

OK. I guess I do know. When I sit that is when the mind starts to race. That is when contemplation turns to introspection and turns to panic. When I come to a stand still my mind starts to calculate where I am in relation to home and it always seems huge so alarm bells start ringing that I will not be able to make it home and must try to get there as soon as I can before the panic gets too bad. 

I just can't do nuttin'. But I must learn to. With this realisation I have adopted a new role model thanks to the kids' endless run of TV programs. His name is Patrick.

For those who don't know this guy is Patrick Star, the self proclaimed expert in doing nothing. He is a master in the immobile arts. That is my goal- my wife would probably say I am already there. This though is different. Its from one of the Sponge Bob episode's where his cousin Stanley is trying to learn to do nothing...

• SpongeBob: Err... Maybe you're not scientist material. But don't you worry. I bet Patrick can help you! He's a genius! [at Patrick's house] And so, Mr. Star, that's why we came to you.
• Patrick: Looking for your calling, huh? [examines Stanley] Hmmm... So, what are you good at?
• Stanley: Nothing.
• Patrick: Nothing at all?
• Stanley: Yep.
• Patrick: Interesting. Let's see how good you are at nothing.
• SpongeBob: That's perfect! Patrick can do nothing better than anyone! [whispers in Stanley's ear] You'll be learning from the master!
• Patrick: Come with me. First, sit down on this chair. Clear your mind. Empty it off all thoughts... until you're doing... absolutely... nothing. [does nothing]
• Stanley: Clear my mind. Do nothing. [focuses on Stanley's difficulty to do nothing] I can't do it!
• Patrick: You're not worthy for instruction in the immobile arts. Leave my presence!
• Stanley: Can I try?
• Patrick: No! Not a word!
• Stanley: I can't even do nothing right.

I wish they had cartoons like that in my day. Not just Spongebob but so many great humerous cartoons for kids like Phineas and Ferb, Jake and Finn, Gumball, Flapjack, Chowder and so many more. Here I am cousin Stanley. I am unable to master the art of immobility to the point where I look burst with saliva dripping down my mouth. Well not to that point. But just to the point of being able to sit vacantly. Never thought I would be aspiring to be a cartoon character but there you have it.

Point 7

It looks like the lens on my wee compact is gradually giving up. I've tried cleaning it but as you can see one side of the lens is blurring. The weather is too unpredictable to take out my CSC so I might have to resort to the phone.

I've posted a few times over the years about graduated exposure whether it be mentioned in the passing or the focal point of the post. Mainly I have posted about how it doesn't work, for me, as well as why it doesn't work, again for me, but also saying it does have a benefit in my case. That benefit is keeping my "safety zone" as big as possible. When I do not do it then that invisible barrier keeping me from branching out contracts to the point where over time I will be stuck indoors just like I was at the end of 2006 to the start of 2007.
Even though I have spoken about it before I guess its best to briefly explain what it is. Its a form of exposure for agoraphobia, as well as other things, where you push a little further always getting more used to be slightly further away from home until eventually you reach your goal. So you start with your start point, the home, and end with the destination. In between you break the journey from A to B into 10 parts leaving you with 10 points and you first try to journey to point 1. With repetition, and therefore exposure, in time you get to point 1, get comfortable being there and can start moving on to point 2. Easy, in theory.

My problem with it has always been my own situation. This is geared purely towards panic and anxiety. Its a purely mental thing. 100% fight or flight. My own situation is more complicated than that which led me believe it was a futile exercise after many attempts. If I was dealing only with fight or flight then I could see the merit and could really push this thing. But I am not. I am dealing with fatigue too which blurs the lines and makes it harder to understand what is going on and what to do about it.

I say its complicated and here is why. I am told and have read in a few sources that this fatigue is caused by the anxiety. So it is hard to gauge what to deal with when I get to the point where I feel I need to go home. Its a real paradox. A real chicken or egg. I walk away from home. As I walk I get anxious but can keep on to of it to a degree. But with every step I take away from home I am getting more anxious. What am I anxious about? Not where I am going to but my physical ability to make it back home. The anxiety causes me to fatigue and at the same time its the fatigue that I am anxious about. And I just can't seem to break this cycle nor find a way around it.

What I wanted to do was talk about yesterday which was a perfect example and I am still trying to get my head around it. Still asking myself why. Firstly let me say I decided at the start of last year to do this graduated exposure properly and stick to it to see if there was any improvement. Despite picking up and dropping for many years before 2012 the goal is always the same- to the school and nursery. So broken down into 10 points below is the map of my area.

As I said I started this in 2012. Each point is 0.05 miles apart. If you go you must come back so they are effectively 0.1 miles between. 10 points, 1 mile. Not much for anyone else. Is for me. Below is my chart for 2012.

As you can see it did sort of work to a point, week 45 in fact, but even then it was not a smooth stepping up as its supposed to be. The numbers are the total of times I got to that point- bare in mind this is for all my walks and the reason there are so many only to point 1 is that a lot of walks like going to the shops only pass that point. But not smooth and that is always the disheartening thing because you never feel when you get to a point that you can return there problem free. There are a few times where I got to a point once and was not able to get there until 3-4 weeks later- weeks 11, 26 and 29 for example. This is the problem. It is not consistent but now I look at it I also see that up until week 45 I did at least always get there again which is the pain thing no matter how long it took.

Week 45 is another reason its not so linear. Week 45 I had a problem that was not to do with anxiety. These happen. Could be a bug or something else. You can't avoid these. But that was one week and then I really struggled to get back to where I was after then.

Looking at the chart should illustrate it requires patience. It took 3 weeks to reach point 3, 7 to reach point 4, 21 to reach point 5 and 34 weeks to reach point 6. Always taking more time in between. Over half a year to get to just point 6 and nothing further for the rest of the year.

At the top is point 7. Its past point 7 actually looking back and so close to point 8. So close it seems absurd that I didn't just walk there. Why didn't I just walk there? That is what I keep asking myself. Why the panic? Oh the irony. Its there. I look at the photo and it looks straight forward. Why not?

What was I thinking? I was at that point and I was pulled homeward. Again it was not that I could not go any further. My perception before the experience is I imagine what other people who have not experienced think agoraphobia is: a person goes to a point and can go no further. Its not that I cannot go any further. I know now and knew at that point I could easily walk to point 8 and beyond. What was stopping me doing it was the pull home. That is a surface level thought, a call to action. Beneath it deeper in the subconscious is the real fear and that is that I cannot physically make it home the further I go. I will be stranded. Its hard to get back home in panic. Harder the further from home you are and I was reminded the day before.

This is the point. I cannot get home. Rationalise: have I ever had an instance where I could not make it home. Answer: no. So rationally there is nothing to fear but its not enough. This is the fear. This is what keeps me going on. If I am immobilised in panic unable to get home what then. My fear is it will not calm ease until I can get home and in a state of panic that is extremely difficult as I have said. This is contradictory to what the text books say. They say if you stay with it then it will pass. How do you stay with it? Do I just stand there shaking and struggling for breath hoping they were right? The belief in that moment is not there.

This, above, was the day before as tracked by a mobile app. If you compare it to the graduated exposure map you will see I am nearly at point 8. Again I couldn't reach it. It would have taken less than 10 seconds to reach it. Again the same fear driving me back that to go beyond would mean a struggle to get back home. Now I should also point something else out here. In the past I have felt that same fear holding me back from points 3 to 7. That would say that maybe I am wrong and the graduated exposure is working.

Now here is the thing. I took the route exactly as mapped out in the Graduated Exposure map above. Felt I could physically go no further- not even that tiny distance. On the way back I took a different root at point 5 and walked by the ash park. Instead of turning right to go home I went down the street as far as I could go, going north on the map above. That is distance I walked there would have taken me to point 10. So why could I go that distance in that area and not when I reached point 8. Is it apprehension? I had no set point going down the street and so there was no apprehension to get to where I got.

 Image care of Google Street View

This is the path I find myself eventually on and I go right down to the bottom. Its been a long time since I was down there. The last time was when I was stopped by the police for taking photos. Since then I have found it hard to return- close a few times but I used to be able to go beyond it.

 Image care of Google Street View

But it was a mistake. Travelling north is actually travelling down. Its a very steep decline, which hopefully the above image illustrates up to the vanishing point, and as I turned to go home the road ahead rose to the heavens and physically it was more difficult heading homewards. Before I was even a quarter of the way up that street panic that was already rising went full blown and I was reminded then what really keeps me from pushing on because its one of the most horrible frightening experiences I have ever experienced in my life. Not the first time when walking. Over recent years most notably these have happened when I have pushed myself beyond what I feel are my limits like when I went down to Bothwell Bridge and went down to the Clyde. Yes despite the strong fear I wouldn't manage to I did eventually get home those times and did those times but the experience in doing so is not one I am quick to want to repeat. You really have to experience it to know how frightening it is.

This time as I said was no different. I found myself looking at a long way home I just could not see myself making. All uphill. And I couldn't breathe. I felt I was suffocating. No matter how hard I tried to take a deep breath it felt like a shallow whisp and I was bordering on hyperventilation. At the same time my legs were like jelly and I was looking up the incline at the long road again thinking: I am not going to make it. The alarm bells were deafening. I wanted to just lie down but knew I had to go on because I had to get as near to home as I could. Energy was sapping out of me. Still I could not catch a breathe. At this point I tried to remember the CBT: Take a deep breath if you need to but don't use it as a safety mechanism. I could not take a deep breath. What else? Stay mindful. I couldn't. The colour, the sounds and the textures didn't hold much sway when I felt I was about to stop breathing. What else? Anchor on the stomach and notice the tension there and then release the tension. Correct. The stomach was so tensed up it was knotted and this is what was causing the breathing problems. Try as I might though I could not release the tension. It was like my subconscious has a stronger will and was keeping it like a tight fist.

And this went on and on and I was panicking more and more. It was a freezing cold day but despite this I felt the need to take my gloves off and then unzip my jacket and then take off my hat and I think if I had been further from home I might have arrived there in just my socks- that would have created mass panic for anyone in the vicinity. I did get home. In fact I didn't go home. I walked past home and sat on a wall to compose myself before I went back. It took a few minutes but eventually I calmed. So again I did get home despite fearing I would not and even from sitting on the wall I walked another small distance seeing if I could push myself again.

Once more though I would like to quickly go back to that walk from yesterday and my eternal question: is it anxiety or fatigue. I could not get to point 8. To get to point 8 and home is 0.8 miles. To get to point 10, the nursery, and back is 1 mile. Yet I walked more than a mile. Does that answer it?

All of this has been playing on my mind. I try to make sense of it all. I take on one hand what the experts say and on the other hand my experiences and try to match them up to find some clarity. From it all I have came to a conclusion that I have maybe been avoiding because I don't want to admit it. That is that I just don't have the courage. That is hard for me to accept. I have all my life been a strong character and prided myself in that so its hard to accept weakness and vulnerability. But that is the truth. I know what I must do but cannot find the strength inside to do it. What I must do is what they said I need to do and that is push myself into panic as I have done many times but this time not walk away. I need to stay with it. I need to let it pass. I need to discover from experience that it will do me no harm and gradually lose my fear of it. Only by doing this will it start to wane because it is my fear of it keeping the fire alive. It frustrates and saddens me that I cannot find the courage to do this. Years have passed and I am still stuck. This is no life. So I have to ask myself how long I am willing to sit back and take it. How long? Years passed cannot be recaptured but life ahead is ticking by. I am now 41 years old. Can I stay scared and let this dominate me forever? Then another part of me asks what will happen if they are wrong and I find myself pushed over the edge and only find regret thereafter. But then again is that any worse that letting my life pass by?

CBT

Looks like its time to get the CBT out again that I have been neglecting for some time. As I type it has just gotten very dark even though its just after noon. The most audible is the driving wind which is even drowning out the sound of the Wii as my son plays away after nursery this morning. Now the rain is battering the pane again. I have been out and its not nice. That wind is like ice and the force of it makes breathing difficult when heading into it. And to top it all off GPS has stopped working on my phone meaning my walk was not even logged.

This though is the hardest time I have experienced for a while. The waters are still rough and choppy. So hard because evidently I have been doing much better without realising it. It just came out the blue. That last post was the start of it and it continues. So I look back at my notes and find it has happened before. It happened in September 2011, out the blue. It stayed for a long time. These notes are important. It quickly let me know what I was experiencing. Its continual panic cycles. It ebbs and flows. When the rush comes though it shudders through me. I feel cold and jittery like buggery and am filled with a fear I cannot locate but just know is there. Each  rush is the point of intensity and then it slowly eases to the point where an hour later I am starting to feel better and then whoosh: another rush. Not nice. My body feels so full of adrenaline and this fuels more rushes. That cold climbing through my veins and the body coming out in a sweat.

I talked to the therapist about this at the time. It actually wasn't the first time. The first time was in April 2011 when I was forced to do the school run up to 3 times a day and was putting myself into panic time after time just gritting my teeth to get through and just about holding on to my sanity. Since then it seems to rear up every time. How it kicks off varies but enough to say mounting anxieties lead to panic. After that point though it is always the same, I am told. After that point of panic I live in fear of the next and it is this fear that slow drips adrenaline inevitably bringing another panic. As a wise old woman once said the way to cure panic is not to stop panic attacks coming but not to care if they do. It is the caring, it is the fearing, that keeps them coming. And this is what I have gotten myself into again. There is no fixed time to it passing. It will only pass when I get my head around it and that is why I have the CBT at hand again to work my way through it and get it all clear in my head again.

This is my own cycle. I do the CBT. It helps. So I stop using it because I am no longer having the same problems (but neither am I anywhere near recovery) and then in time it comes back. This time I must try to stick with it.

Everyone has their own opinion on CBT just as they do with medication when it comes to the treatment of anxiety disorder. What I have found over my time is never re-judge anything until you have tried it yourself. Only then will you know what works best or at least feels right. The thing is everyone reacts different. For some people medication is all the need and good luck to them but it doesn't work for me and I have no desire to start experimenting again. Someone I know of via my wife's family was agoraphobic for years but is now free to walk about thanks to her course of Prozac. For others its Diazapam. Others get by with anti-depressents. For some even beta blockers do the trick. Nothing has worked for me. Diazapam worked best out of the lot but the GP refused to prescribe it because of its addictive qualities. And I am OK with that. To be honest I have never liked taking pills of any sort. I hate the point of no return once taken and this probably comes from bad reactions to things such as paracetamol in the past. So I am quite happy to try going down the non-medicated route.

That does not leave many choices. There are plenty of self help guides claiming to be the only cure and bragging of fantastic success rates but none of that means anything if you try it and it just doesn't work. More so if you do it and come to the conclusion is a bag of brown stuff- how can you stick to something you do not believe in? When it came to CBT I never had any faith in it based on others opinions. A few people I spoke to said either it did not work for them or it only worked for a short spell. Even when I did the ACT workbook the authors said CBT didn't have a long term affect and they are CBT practitioners themselves. But I found CBT workbooks I wanted to try based on lots of positive feedback from real people- not pictures on a webpage with quotes. A few of these people I was even able to talk to to guage their experiences and it was all positive. And on finally getting the workbooks I have to admit they have worked better than anything else I have tried.

These workbooks are more than CBT. They include mindfulness makes a lot of sense to me given how introspective I have become and how I see this is having a negative impact on things- especially when people visit. Through these books I have had some good insights and little flickers of things clicking into place. A great feeling however fleeting. But as I said in time I usually put them to one side because the anxiety at home at least is not as bad and I get bored with the repetitiveness of reading the same things over and over to the point it is not sinking in.

More than even that though I have to say why these workbooks work is in their presentation. They are not pages upon pages of theory and this and that. The are simplistic and straight to the point. They are very easy to read and the illustrations which look childish on first viewing actually help points stick. Even my wife was able to read through the first book and get a clearer understanding of my problem.

This time though I want to stick with it. I don't want to just use it to get out of this bad place at the moment but try to make it work longer term. I have to hold up my hands and say I did not feel confident enough to try the exercises which are recommeded. The author is very contactable and helpful but I have not contacted him since promising to do the exercises and never getting around to doing it. This time I will. This spell aside other things have been improving and if I can add to that and drive on to a higher level then it might just be the break I need.

Mind of madness

Its just after tea time in this cold flat. The kids are on various electronic devices in their own little worlds. My wife is playing a game on her laptop, in her own little world. And I am entrenched, unfortunately, in my own little dark world. Typing does not feel right. I am so jittery that the fingers feel twitchy, the arms twitichy too. Concentrating is diffcult with an omonous threat hiding beneath the black cloud shrouding my mind.

It happened 3 months ago and I noted then it had happened 3 months before that point and now 3 months on it has happened again. Makes me wonder whether its a cycle. I am at least thankful that it happens so infrequently because it really knocks me for six.

Its been a while since I have had wine because it doesn't seem to agree with me. In my part of the world people talk of "the fear" in relation to a bad hangover. Its a horrible feeling that everyone who has ever had a rough morning from too many excesses the night before can relate to. Its a feeling of impending doom that you cannot put your finger on and makes you feel very shaky. In actual fact its a mild panic attack but doesn't become panic disorder as it is not irrational and people can see its because of how they have made themselves feel and goes when the hangover goes.

I didn't have a hangover but I did have a bottle of wine last night because I was alone watching the kids and had a relaxing Friday night. As I said the first time for a while and this morning I remembered why. I felt two things: fragile and vulnerable. This increased into high anxiety shortly after getting up when the kids started to play up and added noise, crying and fighting to it. All avoidable, all will be avoided in future. But no hangover and I knew I had to accept it, let it pass.

But then something happened. Something that has happened. Something not nice. Its very hard to explain or even understand but I will try my best to. It happened 4 hours ago and lasted at peak no more than a minute or two but even now leaves me shaken. Something I first remember experiencing pre-anxiety when I had a bad flu bout for over 4 weeks in 2003. Like a fever and it never happened again for some years after.

I was sitting and no doubt lost in thought inside myself when something started to come to mind. Something really familiar but which I could not clearly grasp. I was filled with a sense of deja vu yet at the same time whatever it was was completely foreign. There is something about it. Something I have experienced before. Like its been buried under the surface and has suddenly reared but was buried for so long that I vaguely remember it but cannot place. Maybe in dreams. Maybe a recurring nightmare I never recall on waking. But as I move closer to it I get that feeling that I do know it and the closer I get the more terrirified I become.

There are images and there is sound. There is a tune on a loop but its slowed right down. Its familiar and I can't help feeling its from a computer game. Really slow, unbearably slow. Then these faces come into my mind and that is when I cannot help myself as I move closer. As much as I can feel terror growing and as much as I know full well in that moment that it would be in my best interests to mentally get the hell out of there I move closer determined to see what it is. Its like its luring me in and I follow.

Its just out of reach so I apologise for the lack of clarity. Its hard to explain. But at the point I feel I am just about there and can just about place it so can then note it and analyse it later I come over really cold and start coming out in a sweat. The mind goes into overdrive and panic is full blown. In that moment it feels like something has mentally snapped. It feels like I have been pushing on the wall and its cracked. In that moment I am fully in the mind of madness and its terrifying. Again though I cannot describe specifically what "it" is. It just is.

The feeling of being frozen all over and coming out in sweats its not nice. Its alarming and panic esculates. The unreality floods in and I am disconnected with those around me. I need to escape from everyone. I get up and go out the room and realise I cannot run from it and I really need to sit down so return back to where I was. The moment is over but I feel I am still in it because I am in a full blown panic attack where nothing feels real and I feel I have lost it.

As I said I am affected a long time after. There is a threat. There is a sense of impending doom. The reality is that I am full of adrenaline. I am so jittery and when I sit calmly and look I can feel the adrenaline making my limbs buzz. That is why I am jittery. And the reason its going on so long is the sense of impending doom is anticipatory anxiety because I feel fragile and vulnerable to another episode.

Even the moment itself is really just panic. In fact if I am honest its really "just a sensation". It bothers me to say that because it feels anything other than something so simple in that moment of terror. But that is what it is. Its all explained in the books. There are various mental manifestations in relation to anxiety and deja vu is one of them. In fact here is the official list according to some body who feel they know:

MIND
Deja Vu, a feeling like you've done or experienced something before
Desensitisation, depersonalization
Fear of going crazy
Fear of losing control
Fear of impending doom
Feelings of unreality
Frequent feeling of being overwhelmed, or that there is just too much to handle or do..
Having difficulty concentrating.
Obsession about sensations or getting better
Repetitive thinking or incessant ‘mind chatter’
Underlying anxiety, apprehension, or fear
You often feel you are carrying the world on your shoulders

All in there as you can see. Panic can be a scary thing. It leaves you full of doubts. I am full of doubts at the moment. Am I mad? The reality is I am not but that is the thing, its difficult to convince the anxious mind of anything.

So its just panic. Just a sensation. Just some thoughts. Scary as hell though.

The bottle of wine last night I think brought this on but the truth is that its hard to diagnose a trigger and equally futile as knowing the cause makes no difference to sorting the problem. It could just as easily be the fact I am getting out more at the moment and pushing myself to the verge of panic daily without going full blown if I can avoid it. This is like a slow drip of adrenaline which builds over time as I have experienced in the past.

But what has not helped is that I have not done the CBT for a good while. Because I am getting out more I feel I am on the up so no longer need to work on the anxiety. This is of course wrong. Once the panic comes like today it really knocks the stuffing out.

So more problems that could be avoided. I have to work hard. As much as I struggle to convince myself at the moment this will pass and it will pass fairly quickly even though I feel as if its a permanent state. Its hard to believe anything else when my mind is still racing and my body shaking with the jitters. Raw fear. But it will pass and when it does I must get to work on this.

I also have to face those things I have been putting off. On Monday I need to fill out that AtoS form and send it back before the 11th. I also need to write a letter to the credit card company in the hope of at the very least as a loyal customer of over 20 years getting that 30% interest rate reduced that they have been bleeding me dry with for 15 years- don't want to even contemplate how much interest I have paid in that time. Other things need addressing too. I can no longer bury my head in the sand. 

The time is now...