The blog post I've been meaning to write
Sep. 16th, 2016 09:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
missroseroseIt's been a weird couple of months.
Contrary to my hopes, the anxiety roller coaster continues. Sometimes I'm fine, content with my place in the world and the sheer good luck I've had to have the life that I do. Sometimes I'm...not depressed, although in some ways it resembles depression. Scattered. Inward-turned. Uninterested in making social plans (although usually if someone invites me, I have a good time). Unable to talk to people as easily as I usually can. Sullen. Brooding.
Some weeks ago, a Facebook acquaintance pointed me at the connection between panic attacks and hypoglycemia. Short version, adrenaline is a sort of ugly hack (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
thewronghands's on-the-nose description) when your blood sugar is low; not only does the resulting rush warn you that something's not right with your body, but it also signals your liver to release its emergency-stored glucose, which brings your blood sugar levels back up temporarily. Kinda neat biologically, but not particularly pleasant to experience.
Since discovering this, I've been making a concerted effort to be extra careful with my food intake, keeping simple carbs to a minimum and eating lots of protein and whole grains. It's helped some; certainly my incidences of adrenaline-fueled acute anxiety attacks are down. But, strangely, there are times when I get the mental effects of such attacks (obsessive thoughts, feeling of impending doom, withdrawn and sullen affect) despite lacking the actual adrenal involvement. It's almost like my body's conditioned to respond that way to stress now, despite my knowing that it's not a good coping strategy. (Which would jibe with Brian's observation that at times it looks like I'm intentionally looking for things to be anxious about.) Frustrating.
I'm not sure what to do about this. My profound (and, I think, justified) aversion to our screwed-up physical and mental healthcare system has kept me from seeing a doctor about any of this so far, but if I can't figure out a way to get myself more stable, that may be the next step. Writing or talking about it helps, but that's tougher when I'm in the middle of an episode, since one of the most obvious symptoms is how I suddenly lose interest in either. Breathing and mindfulness exercises may help in the moment. Past that...well, we'll see. One thing I noticed about massage school and yoga both was how, while I was actively learning new things, anxiety attacks were rare. With that partially in mind, I signed up for CorePower's teacher training for this fall. (I still have the same reservations about their corporate culture and business model that I did before, but it wouldn't hurt to have an additional less-physically-intense income stream to supplement massage, and the knowledge crossover and reinforcement is a very real plus, and the community involvement and journaling it'll require both seem likely to be beneficial. And it's not like I have to stick with CorePower exclusively - I'm looking at working for them as a starting point rather than an end goal.)
As an aside, I was recently laughing in rueful recognition atthewronghands's description of physical fitness as a constantly moving target; as my life has gotten busier and my yoga attendance has dropped, I've gained back a good ten pounds compared to my peak fitness there. Uncomfortably, I'm beginning to realize mental health is much the same. I mean, I thought I had this whole anxiety thing sorted out, and it turns out, nope, that was just temporary. I guess I could be frustrated about that, but I'm going to try and think of it as an opportunity to expand my toolkit instead. Just as soon as I'm done reading this article about the election and how we're all doomed.
Contrary to my hopes, the anxiety roller coaster continues. Sometimes I'm fine, content with my place in the world and the sheer good luck I've had to have the life that I do. Sometimes I'm...not depressed, although in some ways it resembles depression. Scattered. Inward-turned. Uninterested in making social plans (although usually if someone invites me, I have a good time). Unable to talk to people as easily as I usually can. Sullen. Brooding.
Some weeks ago, a Facebook acquaintance pointed me at the connection between panic attacks and hypoglycemia. Short version, adrenaline is a sort of ugly hack (
thewronghands's on-the-nose description) when your blood sugar is low; not only does the resulting rush warn you that something's not right with your body, but it also signals your liver to release its emergency-stored glucose, which brings your blood sugar levels back up temporarily. Kinda neat biologically, but not particularly pleasant to experience.Since discovering this, I've been making a concerted effort to be extra careful with my food intake, keeping simple carbs to a minimum and eating lots of protein and whole grains. It's helped some; certainly my incidences of adrenaline-fueled acute anxiety attacks are down. But, strangely, there are times when I get the mental effects of such attacks (obsessive thoughts, feeling of impending doom, withdrawn and sullen affect) despite lacking the actual adrenal involvement. It's almost like my body's conditioned to respond that way to stress now, despite my knowing that it's not a good coping strategy. (Which would jibe with Brian's observation that at times it looks like I'm intentionally looking for things to be anxious about.) Frustrating.
I'm not sure what to do about this. My profound (and, I think, justified) aversion to our screwed-up physical and mental healthcare system has kept me from seeing a doctor about any of this so far, but if I can't figure out a way to get myself more stable, that may be the next step. Writing or talking about it helps, but that's tougher when I'm in the middle of an episode, since one of the most obvious symptoms is how I suddenly lose interest in either. Breathing and mindfulness exercises may help in the moment. Past that...well, we'll see. One thing I noticed about massage school and yoga both was how, while I was actively learning new things, anxiety attacks were rare. With that partially in mind, I signed up for CorePower's teacher training for this fall. (I still have the same reservations about their corporate culture and business model that I did before, but it wouldn't hurt to have an additional less-physically-intense income stream to supplement massage, and the knowledge crossover and reinforcement is a very real plus, and the community involvement and journaling it'll require both seem likely to be beneficial. And it's not like I have to stick with CorePower exclusively - I'm looking at working for them as a starting point rather than an end goal.)
As an aside, I was recently laughing in rueful recognition at
thewronghands's description of physical fitness as a constantly moving target; as my life has gotten busier and my yoga attendance has dropped, I've gained back a good ten pounds compared to my peak fitness there. Uncomfortably, I'm beginning to realize mental health is much the same. I mean, I thought I had this whole anxiety thing sorted out, and it turns out, nope, that was just temporary. I guess I could be frustrated about that, but I'm going to try and think of it as an opportunity to expand my toolkit instead. Just as soon as I'm done reading this article about the election and how we're all doomed.
