Cat Skinner Club

A Recipe for Tackling Anxiety

Oh Spring, you crazy bitch. We’re barely a week into your tumultuous frenzy and already I feel like I’m losing my mind. Of course it doesn’t help that my book is in the hands of beta readers (mostly strangers!), and the reality of purging, packing and moving a household of six people is looming. Am I unsettled? Yes. Anxious? Oh gods yes. Am I drowning in a sea of unknowns? Uh-huh. So what can I do to make sure the next few months aren’t a living hell for everyone near and dear to me? Here’s my recipe for tackling anxiety.

Structure. Lots and lots of it. Just before the end of my work day, I write up a schedule for the next day, complete with a time slot for each item on the to-do list. This isn’t rigid, but if I don’t do it, I lose myself to the Interwebs as I try to quiet my swirling brain. Then I get eff-all done, and feelings of worthlessness start to creep in. I’m not type A, honestly. I’m a B plus at most.

Vitamins/Nutrition. This crazy-making time of uncertainty and change can lead me down that path to the badlands of my mind. One of the easiest ways to combat that spiral is by taking care of what I put in my body, and remembering my supplements. Eating an LCHF (low carb, high fat) diet, helps me feel better, sleep better and perform better. I fight the urge to just let it slip, and try to be mindful because I know how easy it is to start feeling lousy.

Substance Avoidance. One glass of wine or a small cocktail in the evening, sure, but not every night and no evenings out to party. Right now I’m looking at a worrisome time that spans several months, so it’s likely that I will imbibe a bit. I hope it is anyway, because sometimes it’s fun to go out for a few drinks, listen to music, enjoy good food. In these kinds of times, however, I try to take it easy. Nothing triggers those shitty feelings like making my liver have to work too hard or messing up my brain chemistry.

Self-Care. This one is super important, hence the title. When I feel like I’ve lost control of life (yes, I DO realize I never really had it to begin with, but I sure like to pretend.) my instinct is to clean house, work like a maniac and just do things that make me feel like I’m getting something, anything accomplished. Even now, I have an hour to kill and I’m technically working. At the end of each work day, I’m going to try to relax. I say ‘try’ because I’m frankly not very good at this. But I’ll splash about for an hour or so in the tub and just try to enjoy what it means to piss off from responsibility. I need to make a point to do this a little bit each day. Something that’s just for fun.

Gratitude. You know how your problems feel enormous until you pop over to the BBC site? Then you’re like “Holy shit, who cares if I have to pack up my whole house over the next few months?” The world is full of people moving through hell. Does that change how much our circumstances affect us? Briefly, and for fleeting moments. If I can take time each day to think of all the things that are going right (my book is in the hands of my final round of betas! I get to organize and purge and start fresh in a new home! I can afford to find a new home!) it really truly helps me to keep things in perspective. Especially when I’m taking care in all the other ways I’ve mentioned. I don’t say this to be a self-righteous or preachy twat. I’m just telling you what works for me. I assume you care, because you’ve read this far.

Sleep. The need for adequate sleep is no joke, and science can back me up here. I slept like a boss last night. I even had a dream that I was the newest member of the X-Men team. I woke up feeling like I could take on the universe, and it’s totally worth going to bed at 9:30 to recreate this approach to Monday mornings. I’m even reading real, live books to fall asleep.

What are your go-to methods of dealing with anxiety and uncertainty? I’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

 

 

Resistance Is Fertile

There’s a thing I do in relationships which has been making relationships of all kinds incredibly difficult for most of my life. I take everything very, very personally. I can’t hear emotional criticism without falling deep into a black hole of self loathing, where the only thing that makes sense is leaving the relationship to spare everyone the awful reality of me. As I type this, from a well-rested, un-triggered and objective perspective this sentiment is totally ridiculous, but in those bleak moments it feels very, very real. On Tuesday, therapy day, I arrived at a new reality where I finally learned that resistance is fertile.

I sat in our therapist’s office with both of my partners and listened to feedback directly linked to my parenting shortcomings and for the first time I was able to talk myself down from the ledge. As I teetered on the lip of that black well of self loathing my inner voice said “hey, don’t do that. You’ve made some mistakes, some big ones, but you’re working really hard, and growing and all of the wonderful change you are making will be bigger and more memorable than any pain you’ve caused because you’re waking up now, and that is awesome.”

It wasn’t easy. I don’t want to mislead anyone here. As I realized my inner narrative was shifting, sounding so cheerily unlike me, my gut was to scoff at this, to dismiss it as cheesy and foolish but somehow I pushed through. I don’t know how I did it. I resisted the urge to go to that bleak place, and a bounty of open listening and present attention was waiting. Instead of having a shitty post-therapy day I enjoyed a yummy lunch with my partners at our favorite Mexican restaurant, and then got some good work done.

Here’s what I’ve been doing, and I think my success is thanks to these combined efforts:

Taking my vitamins regularly

Making careful, less carb-intense food choices and ‘treating’ myself with fruit and good chocolate instead of whatever crap I can grab from the candy shelf. (In our new house, the candy shelf will be eliminated.)

Exercising every day with at least twenty minutes of yoga

Going to bed earlier to make sure I can get eight hours of sleep and still wake up at 5:30 for my quiet, meditative yoga time

Tackling home organizing projects

Approaching work and money with care and organization

Taking self-imposed time outs when I need to, adjusting plans to reflect my level of anxiety (I love you, and I’ll see you soon, when I am more able to be present in your company!)

My internal/emotional process is finally slowing down, especially when I am triggered. There is time and space to be objective, and more empathetic. I can take better care of myself, and those around me. I’m resisting the old normal, and even in the moments when I slip, when I can’t catch myself before falling into negative behavior, I can bounce back more quickly and make apologies and amends with humility and grace.

I am good. I am a child of the Universe. I can change and grow and be deserving of the abundance of love in my life, and so can you.

 

How Being Fluid Got Me Off My Ass

Happy Monday Lovers!

Today I want to chat about how being fluid got me off my ass this weekend.

It’s time for another true confession. I’m a control freak. This is one of the big issues I try to recognize and move through every single day. There was a time when my need to have everything go exactly the way I wanted it to was so all-encompassing that it would fill me with frustration and anxiety when even the tiniest of things would fall out of place. I’m sure you can imagine how fun I was to be around, especially with the added unpredictability of my newly acquired young step daughters.

Now, when a wrench gets thrown into the works, which is actually a daily occurrence in my world, I am able to pause, breathe and relax into the change, redirecting and re-evaluating what my needs and the needs of the day require. Most of the time.

For example, Sarah cut my hair at home. She’s done incredible work on the kids’ heads, but I will freely admit I’m a hair diva. I bond for life with a good hair dresser, but I want to be as frugal as we can be now. I wasn’t sure I was up for the risks involved with letting someone I love, who has learned hair dressing on the internet, come at me with a pair of scissors, but I finally relented and let her have a go. I have very thick, weirdly wavy hair. It’s kind of a beast to tame, but I think Sarah’s first go was pretty darned good. It wasn’t salon perfect though, and I could see the difference, which drove me nuts. And subsequently drove other people nuts because I wouldn’t stop talking about it. We tried to fix it, but it still wasn’t right. What did I do? Saturday night, two tequila in, I tried to fix it myself. Secretly, in the bathroom. No surprise, it didn’t work. What happened was a huge lesson in ‘leave well enough alone’. Now, drastic measures would be required to repair the damage I’d done.

Past me would have cried. I would have been furious with myself for being so impulsive and stupid. I would have tried to blame Sarah for not getting the hair cut right in the first place. (See? I told you I could be an asshole!) Instead, I laughed, had a shower and then when Nekky came to bed, I shared the disaster of my hair with him and prepared him for the reality of my pending short hair. Then I turned to You Tube and found an amazing tutorial of the hair cut I would need to fix my lid. In the morning, I dragged Sarah upstairs, (after she’d had breakfast of course) and asked her to help. We took it slow, we followed directions, we made a few modifications because I currently have bangs. It was fun, and even when I feared we had cut too much bang, and that I looked like a medieval squire, I continued to breathe. Then I dried and styled my hair, and it was just fine. It’s better than fine, even. Sarah is a fiercely talented lady. I’m still not convinced that my bangs aren’t a bit too gigantic, but I’m going to stop obsessing about it, because there are more important things in the world than my hair.

My need to control my physical body has been illuminated through this hair saga. From where I stand now, I can see why I need to exert myself so extremely sometimes – everything from hair obsession all the way to the need to conquer my anxiety and depression by feeding myself shitty food that I’m convinced makes me feel better. This need for control is likely attached to the trauma I’m working through. I can do something to my body that has an immediate and gratifying effect. I do feel better. But then I feel worse. Not just physically worse, either. Guilt and shame come flooding in, regret over too many cookies. Yesterday, rather than sitting and ruminating, I engaged in physical actions that made me feel good. I was already in a great mood, and the weather was glorious, so I’m sure that helped shift from staying in my head to being in my body and pushing through. It’s not always easy to put things in motion, so I’m going to make a little list of those activities to refer to them when I need them again. You can use them too if you like!

Physical Activities that I Can Immediately Access to Feel Better

Housekeeping – major spring organizing and purging, and major elbow-grease required scrubbing

Shifting plans to spend more time with the kids

An hour long walk in the woods with Noah

Pretty decent food choices all day long

A DIY manicure – I never do this kind of thing, but it felt so nice to just focus on making my hands look good

Yoga – though it became more like Aussie Rules Yoga as Noah tried to climb on me and turn me into both a bridge and a tunnel

Early bed time – not sure this would have been a choice, but I was so sleepy from all the fresh air and exercise that I tucked in with Noah and was asleep before I could even consider some bed time reading

Early wake up for more Yoga – I’m feeling really tired now, but I’m hoping I can adjust to this because I love how much time it leaves me with in the morning.

Why this particular rambling today? I guess I’m trying to let you know that if you can relax through change, try to hold on to the positive, and just keep breathing, you’ll see at least one great lesson. On the surface, I thought the lesson was “Don’t try to cut your own hair after drinking tequila” which is not without merit, but I see now that there was a deeper opportunity there. I could connect to a bigger issue and actually experience the ways I could make changes.

What hiccup in your current life has thrown you for a loop? What is the surface lesson there? What do you think the deeper lesson(s) could be? How can you do something today to embrace that lesson and make at lest one positive change?

Let us know your own physical tricks for dealing with your own little idiosyncrasies in the comments below.

Oh, and here are the hair tutorials Sarah followed:

Nine Lives

I’m a lion, I’m a cat, and I’m a fire dragon. I credit these things for my ability to mostly bounce back from whatever life might toss in my direction. I’m good with things like hope, most of the time.

Today, I feel like I’m on the precipice again. Looking up, and looking way, way down. If I step off, I’m sure to plummet, but there’s always the possibility that somewhere down there, through the fog and haze, is a fluffy clearing where I will land softly and beautifully, and triumphant.

How does one gather the nerve to step off the ledge, over and over again? Even with a perfect record of brilliantly executed landings, or just a few minor bumps and scrapes, there is always the possibility that the next plunge might be your last. It’s possible that the fall will be so bad, there’s no bouncing back, and you’ll never again get the chance to consider pushing off with your toes.

I’m so tired. Deeply tired, down to my very core. I look into the mirror, into the eyes of a woman I know very well, and neither one of us can tell me how much strength is left there.

Ask my mom – if I am not good at something, I get overwhelmed with frustration and anger. I didn’t know this, but as a child, she’d have to intercept and cease activities so that I wouldn’t spiral into the pit of despair. All this time I’d thought she was just really impatient with me. Now, as an adult, if I can’t do something well I lose interest, shut down, or just get angry with myself. I’m eyeballing affairs of the heart right now with the same wary look I give to mathematical equations.

This time I’ve given it my all. I’ve emptied all my pockets and laid everything out on the table. I’ve opened up my heart wider than I even imagined it’s rusty hinges would allow. I’ve loved with every cell in my body.

The desire to jump off the cliff is not enough. Love is not enough. You need trust, and faith, and communication, and security. I need to know that if I’m going to jump, there’s a safe landing at the bottom. That there will always be a safe landing. My helmet and my knee pads are completely useless if there is not.

In fact, it’s probably smarter to just walk away from the ledge if you have no idea what’s at the bottom.

Will all these hands catch me?

No! Vember

Picture 1

I had a bad day at work. Here’s one thing to know about Leos; we’re great at success and terrible at failure.

I had a bad sleep last night. Three people DO NOT fit in a Queen sized bed, no matter how much they like each other. I’m getting night sweats like you wouldn’t believe, and I’m in the middle so there’s no place to go. This was the second night in a row of bad sleep.

I’ve had the blahs for about a week, which is so unusual with a full moon. Usually I’m bubbly and creative and filled with energy.

This morning I packed my overnight things and my computer, deciding that my bad mood and I were going to seek refuge at the Fortress of Solitude where I have not slept since August. I don’t have words to talk about what I’m feeling, and my new family does not need an Eyore moping around our apartment. My poor partners were surprised by this, but made a real effort to give me space.

As the bad day at work wore on I started to imagine myself alone in my former apartment, now piled with boxes and costumes that desperately need sorting, and this began to feel pathetic.

My family headed to their old suburb today to get the girls their H1N1 vaccine, and are having dinner with their old neighbours. This only added to my misery, and I began to feel sorry for myself for being left out. I’m not sure what kind of crazy person feels left out of getting a giant needle, but there you have it.

Then, at 1:45 I had a reality check.

I’m allowed to have growing pains, and I’m allowed to be under the weather sometimes. Even if it’s an extended period like the month of November. (I hate you November).  I can accept that, and since my moodiness mostly manifests in a more somber Schnoo, I think my partners are fine with this too. What I can’t deal with is not understanding exactly what’s wrong with me, and so I attempted to figure this out on my crisp bike ride home:

1.)    Residual pain and anxiety surrounding fertility and the trauma of a miscarriage

2.)    Displacement – although my partners make an effort every day to make me feel at home in their apartment, which though currently a bit cluttered is actually really gorgeous, it is not my home. More importantly, it is not OUR home. In “conventional” relationships it’s hard enough to move into someone else’s space. Try to imagine, if you will, living in a space where you have no room for most of your personal possessions, and where you are surrounded by larger-than-life reminders of a whole world that happened before you were around.  I don’t know exactly why this should bother me, but it does. Maybe because this seriously unique relationship is so new I sometimes feel threatened by the strength of all of the history my partners have together. They share over a decade together and two gorgeous children. I’ve arrived with some feathers and sequins. And some serious baggage. When I’m in a funk, I think of the one and only time I got fired from a job – they had to make cutbacks and I was the new girl, so I was the first to go.

3.)    Fear. Wow. I said it. Another thing to know about Leos; we don’t admit to this very often. I’m afraid of EVERYTHING that isn’t related to work right now. My recent relationship history has taught me many lessons – many lasting life lessons. I cannot settle into a comfortable groove that lasts more than a week or so because I am terrified. Of what, you ask? Let’s see; betrayal, imbalance between the three of us creating a world of heartache, not giving enough, my own feelings of jealousy that sometimes arise, that I will be left behind, that something horrible will happen when my boyfriend talks to his parents about us, that these two beautiful little girls will grow to resent me because adding me into their family will come with some stigma, that I’ll always feel like I’ve latched on to someone else’s fully-realized life, that one or both of my partners will no longer find me attractive, that one or both of my partners will get tired of me, or tired of our circumstances. Wait. That’s it. I’m afraid that someone is going to decide this whole thing is a bad idea. Oh my god. I have abandonment fear. I’m afraid of being left behind, and so I am examining every single fissure with a fine lens to find excuses to be unsettled, because settling in means that I am vulnerable to shock and surprise when the bottom drops out of my nest. Holy god, I’ve become one of those people.

4.)    I don’t have a four right now. I think that numbers 1 through 3 are more than enough.

When I was a little girl, my mother used to always tell me how impatient I was. This hasn’t gone away, and in fact, might be one of my biggest issues. I don’t trust process, or time, but I think I’d better resolve this because ONLY with process and time will I be able to see that I have little to fear from this relationship. I mean. we’re talking about finding OUR place together in the New Year. That’s only months away! And grumbling about missing my old apartment is only a reflection of my control issues. I don’t feel like I’m in control of my home environment. I realize it should be a shared control, but I also realize I’m subject to the occasional foible. Since I’ve started working from home, I’ve dealt with a broken dryer and a mountain of laundry, and have now started taking on organizing the place one room at a time. When I walked my bike into this place tonight, and turned on the lights, loaded the dishwasher, grabbed a perfectly crisp McIntosh apple and sat down to write this, I felt completely at home. What’s more, I also felt loved, and like there will continue to be light at the end of the tunnel, as long as I’m choosing to look ahead towards it, rather than down, or backwards from where I came.

Backwards from where I came. That’s it too. I know on some unconscious level choosing a relationship that is ENTIRELY different from any that has come before in my life was a way to protect myself on some levels. I also believe it’s a product of my own personal evolution. This is a classic case of easier said than done, but I have to make a promise to myself to start each and every day recognizing that these two people are new, and are in no way, shape, or form comparable to the people who have caused me pain in the past.  We three are all making huge compromises to make this work because WE LOVE EACH OTHER. Loving people should be so much simpler, no?

And so, here is a list of things that will buoy me up and get me over this late autumn hump:

Crafts with the girls in preparation for our home made Christmas tree
McIntosh apples
Crisp bike rides
My girlfriends and their babies
Weekend farmer’s markets and then cooking dinner with my family
Creating the Les Coquettes holiday show
Bubble baths!
Organizing OUR home
TV – renting a stellar HBO series and watching it curled up on the sofa with my tribe and a glass of red wine. I’m craving Deadwood, which neither of them have seen
The winter fair at the girls’ school. I’m actually making crafts for this!
Dinner with my family – my bio family AND my new family all under one roof
Letters to and from Alexandra
Pumpkin curry
The gym (I don’t know how I came to like this, but I really, really do)
Writing, writing, writing (I feel better already!)

I think that’s a good start. I’m sure there’s more, and feel free to send suggestions. I refuse to let a month on the calendar overcome me. I’m a lion for heaven’s sake.

If you’re reading this, it’s because I’ve had a long, lovely talk with my partners. I think I owe it to them to explain why I attempted to run away from home before I share it with the rest of the cyber universe.