100 miles

Before the start of the month I set myself a target: to walk 100 miles. And I did it. I know to anyone else it doesn't sound much. Recently for example when I have been on Facebook there has been a spate of people running and cycling for charity. Colossal amounts in one go. It puts walking 100 miles in a month well in the shade. Instinctively so do I. That is how people with anxiety disorder think. They do not hold up an "achievement" against what went before in their own life but always compare to others- the normals. And it never matches up. How could it?

So this is something I have been trying to change, mentally. Its important to do so. If I don't then what will happen is I will start to think I am getting nowhere and become reluctant when the time comes to try getting out and doing the CBT. So it is important not to compare with others but compare to your own life. Two years ago the most I walked in a week was 7.5 miles so even if I managed that for consecutive weeks, which I didn't, it would have taken 16 weeks to do 100 miles. In actual fact over the whole of 2011 I managed only 153 miles over the entire year. This year I have walked 650 miles so far. Its quite a jump.

These things though never run smoothly. In the second last week I developed a problem which flares up from time to time and is not worth going into but suffice it to say it stopped me in my tracks. For a number of days I was in a lot of pain and for a few days it was too painful to walk. At that stage I thought: typical. Its not the first time its happened. I was resigned to failure. But it passed and I pushed extra hard to get it done. So from that point of view its only right that I congratulate myself. Lets face it I am the only one who will. When I told my wife I had walked 100 miles she said: in a week? No, a month. That took the shine off it straight away.

After completing this I set another goal: 250 miles by the end of the year- not in a week. Of course my old complaint is fatigue. Fatigue gets really bad at times. Strangely its not as bad when I am actually walking but afterwards I am sometimes struggling to keep my eyes open. When I spoke to the therapist he told me I should be taking power naps, 40 minutes, each day to combat this. The trouble is I have tried and for me it doesn't work as my mind just keeps whizzing too fast as I lie making sleep impossible. All it leads to is growing agitation until finally I can take it no more and have to get up.

Something else that the therapist said rings true though. He said he had experienced this with his own anxiety  disorder which he has now recovered from and what he described rang true about it being more than tiredness and more like an inner strain. He asked: do you ever have a period where the fatigue is really bad and sudden it lifts. This does happen. Of late I have developed a theory on this. I don't think physically something changes unless its mentally driven. I think its another tiring mental loop. I think I feel fatigue and I constantly tell myself I am so fatigued and I cannot stand it and this wears me down making me even more fatigued and so making me think more and more about and so the cycle goes on. And that is probably why he told me that the best thing to do is accept it not matter how bad it feels. Just accept it and let it be and don't spend every moment focusing on it. So this is something I have been trying to do but its not the easiest thing when its constantly there. I guess another reason to try mindfulness.

But I keep plodding along and trying to keep pushing myself on in the hope things will improve and if I give myself some time to look back I see they have improved however small.

Confucius- "The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones."

Small steps leading to new roads and further from home, longer out in the world. On this score I certainly cannot complain. Just a big bit more patience required and continue to work hard on the CBT and starting to take more leaps into the dark. Like progress its a small bit by bit building of confidence too to take on new challenges and build on each new world that comes into being. Its a better place for sure.