Pushing myself out

[Wyominganxiety]

I still feel pretty cruddy with this cold but I have decided I'm going to get out of my house today even though my anxiety is high and my head is stuffy I don't think sitting here day after day is doing me any good! So I'm going to volunteer at my church for a couple hours, hope it's a good decision

[Beevee]

Great decisionand the right attitude. Make your life bigger than anxiiety. Do stuff as if you weren’t feeling cruddy and anxious and just be ok with whatever you think and feel.

[Wyominganxiety in reply to Beevee]

I did it!! Never even felt anxiety had a good time!! 😁

[Beevee in reply to Wyominganxiety]

The confidence you earn in doing those things stays with you, even though there may be times when you think or feel you aren’t making progress. If you live your life and take the anxiety with you, your mind and body are quietly getting on with recovery.

[Dahl]

Well done 😊. I could easily not go out unless I really have to and the longer I avoid the outside world the bigger it gets. So unless I'm deliberately giving myself a planned day off from absolutely everything I always have a journey outside, even if it's just a walk around.

[Wyominganxiety in reply to Dahl]

My fiance wants me to go with him to south Dakota today it's about a 2 hour drive and it's a big city I'm not sure I'm up for that yet.

[Dahl in reply to Wyominganxiety]

OK so you're not sure you can manage a journey of 2 hours. I suppose the thing to establish is if you were say 45 minutes into this journey would you be able to say 'please take me back home' or is it the case that once you start off you are stuck until the journey is completed. The belief that you can turn around if you need to is more reassuring than thinking you're stuck once you set off.

[Wyominganxiety in reply to Dahl]

I would be stuck he wouldn't make me go in anywhere with him if I didn't want to but what's the point of going to sit in the car? He keeps saying I won't know how my medication is working if I never try to do what I couldn't before... which is true but I'm already making myself sick at just the thought of trying

[Dahl in reply to Wyominganxiety]

I cannot answer this dilemma for you by surely the whole point of managing your recovery is to nudge yourself to do things when you feel confident that you can manage them and making certain that you can return to a safe place if you need to. It does sound like once you've committed yourself to this journey you cannot make a U-turn if you need to. Do what you feel safe and comfortable with 😊

[Beevee in reply to Dahl]

Recovery is about going to those places you fear the most and feeling everything and letting it all wash over you. Don’t wait until you think you can manage it. It’s not distance you travel which stops you going it’s what you feel that you fear the most. Learn how to cope with the symptoms and it won’t matter if it’s two miles down the road or twice around the world.

[Dahl in reply to Beevee]

I can agree with pushing myself and jumping in the deep end when this is my choice and my choice alone but I don't need anyone to give me a push. I admire your leap out of an airplane attitude to anxiety but I don't believe it's the only way to do things. I've progressed well moving at a pace that I'm comfortable with. But the important part of these posts is choosing to do something or being pushed by someone else.

[Beevee in reply to Dahl]

I understand. I had no choice. My anxiety was there the moment I woke, to the moment I fell asleep for a good while. That’s where my attitude came from.

[Dahl in reply to Beevee]

So your situation was sink or swim. Well done for coming through. I believe if I'm holding back too much life will throw a crisis at me and make me jump anyway. But I've always found that if another person is nagging or pushing me or trying to manipulate me I'll definitely dig my heels in and I won't budge. So I always emphasize to others the importance of being the only one to choose what they try to do. It's difficult when friends and loved ones mean well and think they're helping and it's up to the anxiety sufferers to say what helps them and what isn't helping and the people supporting them should then respect these boundaries.

[Wyominganxiety]

I think there is good thought to push yourself to a point but I also think that anxiety and people with it are delicate. I'm not going to push myself to hard or to fast and risk going backwards with everything no matter how small that I have accomplished. I'm taking baby steps but they are steps it's at my pace I might be getting passed up by people but life isn't a race..

[Dahl in reply to Wyominganxiety]

Well said 😊 This is YOUR journey to recovery, undertake it at your own pace.

[Wyominganxiety in reply to Dahl]

Thank you! 😁