Oh My! This is horrible!

[Agnes09]

I grew up in a very critical home and have always struggled with anxiety and low self-esteem. I then married a very critical man who occasionally used his fists to express his disappointment in me. The day my 6 y/o called me stupid "cause daddy says so" was the day I took 3 children, and no belongings, to the park and never went back home. I got tough and nothing was going to put me down again, especially my own negative self-talk. I put myself though uni, raised the 3, whose father refused to see or support, met a wonderful man and welcomed a new baby into our home. Things weren't always easy and sometimes anxiety would get in my way, but we were tough and we found a way around, over or though all obstacles. Life was good.

The bushfires came and we lost everything, our home, some good friends and our ability to live with anxiety. But we were tough and most importantly together, and with help we got back on our feet and found a way though most problems. The anxiety was the worst problem because now the whole family was suffering and who has time to calmly deal with their own anxiety when one child refuses to go to school because they think you will die if they leave you, and another child starts self-medicating illegally. Time for professional help, and it did help. It took a while but life was good again.

At the age of 50 I decided to became a nurse. I loved every moment of school and had the makings of a good nurse until my final placement, where I had a critical educator who made life difficult for all his students. I couldn't deal with anxiety anymore. I messed up all my interviews and so stayed in my job as a carer for a year, until I finally got the courage to sign up as an agency nurse. The 2 shifts I've had have been marred by extreme thirst, nervous poo, blurry vision, nausea and palpitations. The palpitations aren't new but the other symptoms are. This all means I'm working slow and can't think straight. I'm too scared to talk the senior nurses, they're getting frustrated which only makes my anxiety worse. I feel so stupid and don't know what to do. I can't take another shift but I don't want to quit nursing.

How did things get so bad?

I saw my GP today. He has diagnosed me with GAD and I have an appointment with a psychologist in 2 weeks time. I'm not sure what to do in the meantime because I can't take all that time off a casual job and I can't risk an anxiety attack messing up another shift.

[bindi-QLD]

Hi Agnes09,

Thanks a lot for sharing your life story, I relate to so much of it and wanted to extend a virtual hug!. I am so impressed with your strength and emotional resilience; coming from your family background, I can imagine how very tough and painful it was to leave your first husband, and then face such a significant loss going through the bushfires. Those things are hard on anyone, but for someone like you, the mental and emotional toughness required is 100 fold isn't it?

I'm getting close to 50 myself, so I can appreciate what it took for you to complete your nursing qualifications, with an anxiety issue behind it. I'm amazed actually, because when I get panic attacks, my mind gets foggy and I lose focus, so that would make further study a challenge to say the least. Anyway well done and congratulations!!

I suppose the great thing about a nursing qualification is there is a lot of flexibility to chose low-anxiety jobs? If it were me, I'd probably be looking to do one of those jobs where you're not micro-managed by someone critical, like home care or something? I've done caring jobs that were really low-stress, like just going to someone's house, feeding them, bathing, keeping them company for a while. I think if i ever did a nursing qualification, I'd love joining blue-care or some organisation like that.

Everyone's different, but I really enjoy balancing caring activities with something creative, I have a few creative hobbies that help me with that, and connect me to ppl in a `not fixing them' kind of way. And I've started to be a bit more conscientious about writing my feelings down....I start every day with : ``I feel this''' ``I wish this'''......it really helps.

Anyway great to meet you, thank you for sharing your inspiring life..

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