Eco anxiety in Perth

[Bookgirl]

Hi, we are in the middle of a horrible heatwave here and its causing me a lot of anxiety thinking about the future and generally just stressing out about it all.  Just seems so insurmountable and i feel overwhelmed.  My 15 year old son gets angry at me for being pessimistic but its hard to be optimistic when its over 40 degrees for a long time.  I just feel like i am sinking right now.

[Bookgirl]

I got a book out of the local library about handling anxiety in anxious times. Unfortunately i failed in handling my anxiety today by reading the news, having a panic attack and coming home.  The book says to reframe your thinking to say that today shouldn't be the same as yesterday. As i look at the page it says "like it or not, this is the new version of your life. Wishing it were otherwise does nothing but cause you pain". This is very true for me. Everything is causing me pain and I HATE IT.  It states that only i can make myself feel better. Its a choice. I know that but this is the hardest thing i have ever ever done.

[Eagle Ray]

Hi Bookgirl,

What I have learned is when we experience strong anxiety it is not always a case of just switching mindsets. Personally I've had to work through my body first and find a place of calm there, and then my mind has a chance of coming online in a calmer way. I have been helped quite a bit with Peter Levine's Somatic Experiencing approach which is geared towards trauma but he has used it with people with chronic anxiety as well. I'm not sure whether to recommend his books or not as they do describe some people's traumatic experiences in them and I don't want to add to your anxiety load, but his approach is actually gentle and titrated so as not to overwhelm people.

I guess what I'm saying is it might help to approach your anxiety somatically. Anxiety is awful as it highjacks our limbic system (emotional and fear parts of the brain) which takes over from the prefrontal cortex. This is actually a natural survival response but with chronic anxiety we are stuck in fight-or-flight and/or freeze. These states are purposeful if we are being hunted by a sabre tooth tiger. However, for humans living in the modern world we are reacting to all sorts of things including the news which are not actually threatening our immediate survival but our body responds as if they are. I find it helps to understand the anxiety as our body's natural way of trying to protect us. Even just having that understanding I find can help alleviate the anxiety a bit.

I do not agree with the statement, "like it or not, this is the new version of your life. Wishing it were otherwise does nothing but cause you pain". I'm not sure if I completely understand the context it's being used in there, but I think it is possible for the body to restore to a kind of homeostasis, and as the body eases so does the mind.

Probably Peter Levine's most comprehensive book on this topic is In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness which perhaps may be helpful. In my experience, at least anyway, I have found I cannot solve problems with thinking by doing more thinking. One thing my psychologist has often asked me when I am talking about things at a cognitive level is "where do you feel that in your body?" That makes me stop and just feel. Sometimes even just acknowledging the feeling releases it. Often grief, tears or other emotions come up. Often those feelings have bene relentlessly held down with thoughts and finally they can come out from the stuck place they were in in the nervous system. it can be such a relief to let them go.

I know this stuff is challenging. I have issues with chronic grief and trauma and I'm still working through those things. It can help to work with an empathetic therapist with skills in somatic awareness as the process of co-regulation with another human can actually de-escalate the anxiety in our own nervous system. Perhaps your psych may know something about such approaches?

Anyway, those are some thoughts. I hope they may help, even a little. Sending you reassurance 🤗

[Bookgirl]

Having a bad day today.  Haven't been sleeping well.  When i was 18 i had psychosis and i remember wanting to smack my head against the wall because i just wanted the constantly ruminating thoughts to stop. Its hard when you are down a hole to climb out. But i printed off some stuff about worry and it has some strategies in it that my psych told me about so will try and do that. Feel exhausted and teary all the time.  I know it sounds like i am not trying to help myself but i do genuinely want to feel better. I despair sometimes because i am a smart, capable woman but one thought can bring me to my knees for weeks. I did do some intense therapy once where i had to tell the therapist where i felt the anxiety in my body and the idea was to get rid of it all at the end of the session. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn't. I think i am better than i was but its still so hard sometimes.  

[Eagle Ray]

Dear Bookgirl,

I can hear how much you are really trying to heal. One thing a wise person shared with me once is the idea that healing is about receptivity. By that he meant opening your heart and letting some light and loving feelings in. Often we are so guarded against emotional pain our bodies are constricted, so it’s like the reverse of that where you open up, feel expansion within your heart and then it’s like the light can come in. Does that resonate for you at all? I just thought it may help.

I thought you might like to know I walked in the bushland across the road from me this afternoon and I could feel dampness rising out of the vegetation and the air had that fresh smell as if the plants were releasing oxygen. There were two quendas in the undergrowth and the kangaroos were back after I hadn’t seen them for a few weeks. There is a beautiful moon out now which you may be able to see if the sky is clear where you are.

Take good care of yourself and rest well tonight xx

[Bookgirl]

I have been trying to have a worry time to write down things and try to keep the worrying at other times to a minimum.  Its supposed to rain over the weekend and i worry it won't happen. I am in such a cycle now it is so hard to break.  It is like a spiral. You get down to the bottom and you sit there miserable trying to get back to the light. That is how it feels sometimes.  On the positive side the mornings and nights are colder. I love the cold. Have always hated the heat to to have more is awful but it is what is it is. Been a hard week. Going to have a glass of wine and try and chill. and pray it rains!

[Eagle Ray]

Dear Bookgirl, I hope you can feel better with the coming rain. It does look like it will rain for you this time. We have had several bursts of solid rain here tonight. It's quite still so the rain just came straight down. It's nice to hear the sound of water dripping off the trees and plants outside.

Have a lovely weekend xx

[Bookgirl]

Hi we did get rain and it has rained on and off all day. This is how my mind works though. 

Last night: should have rained but was only 50/50 chance. Worries about it raining tomorrow or not. Then it rains. Go outside and look at it. Feel happy for a bit.  Hear rain at night. Happy for a bit.

This morning: Bet it doesn't rain at all today. Rains on and off. Worries about tomorrow not raining but next week it will get hot again when its officially winter even though the weather report says it will be raining.

Can't trust the weather report but checked it several times yesterday because it seems to change hour by hour and i NEED to know what it will be even though its often wrong.

This afternoon: Despite the rain still worry and feel exahausted.

Just wish i could be hopeful but its so ingrained to not be and because of all the negative media we are constantly bombarded with.  But i am trying :).  Am trying desparately not to look at the weather today because it just feeds my OCD worry.  Haven't so far today. Am going to try my best.

[Eagle Ray]

Hi Bookgirl,

Thank you for sharing your experience. I can understand it is really challenging. The weather always has that element of unpredictability to it too which doesn't help when you are looking for certainty. I know it must be very exhausting.

I have a friend with OCD and was just reflecting on what she has told me about her life. When she was small she went through a situation that made her feel very insecure, like her world was going to go out of control. That didn't actually happen but the experience of fearing it would happen seems to have stayed with her. So she now has a need to have as much control as possible of certain things which is like her way of trying to feel safe.

I don't know if this is a helpful thought for you or not, but I wonder if locating where the OCD may have started when working with your psychologist may be helpful? Sometimes I think if we can locate the beginning of a pattern in our life we can understand it and then begin to realise that maybe we don't need the survival mechanisms we felt we did then. I know I have behaviours that come from early life experiences and it isn't easy to just switch them off. I am having to slowly learn to trust that I'm not in imminent danger from certain things.

I think it's good to celebrate every small win you have. So if you managed to get through the day without looking at the weather you can feel good about it. But also it's important not to be hard on yourself if you do. I feel, at least in my own experience with my own behaviour patterns, it's a case of being able to be reassuring to yourself, to find a comforting inner parent so to speak who lets you know that you are ok and you don't need to try so hard to control things. I find this is an incremental process and I keep trying to practise returning to that inner self-reassurance.

I hope maybe you have been able to do some nice things on your weekend. Take care,

ER

[Bookgirl]

I hate the way my mind works.  It doesn't rain. I worry. It rains. I worry. It gets colder. I worry. Its not cold enough for the average. I worry. I am really trying to put the strategies in place that my psych suggested yesterday.  But of course i fell off the wagon yesterday and today. Googled June average temp now brooding because next week is over it even though BOM says will be a warmer than usual winter.  I tell myself these are just thoughts i am having and to just move on but its such a hard skill to develop when i am so hard wired the other way.  I hate myself for being like this. If i wasn't brooding about the weather, it would be about war. I already started to move over to that when we had so much rain.  I just wish i could turn off my brain. I am so exhausted from it all. Even when i have good things happening like i took my mum out for her birthday on the weekend to a cafe, i kept thinking that it was too hot. My friends are planning for retirement and holidays and i think what's the point of that? Will there even be a future to worry about? Hate myself for not being able to improve.

[Bookgirl]

Stupidly looked at the news where it says it was 52 degrees in India. It is absolutely terrifying to me that this is happening and i just want to go to bed and not get up again right now.