The Architect of Anxiety

I am the freaking Gaudi of anxiety.

In dealing with aching decades of anxiety, I have developed a marvelous repertoire of coping mechanisms; from small, obsessive habits (like repeating phrases endlessly as though they would avert the projected impending disaster) to forming intensely close, codependent bonds with one person at a time, pacifying my scared little ego's need for unconditional constant companionship.

I carried around a block of wood for a year, knocking on it every time I feel the need to. I had an order with which to dress myself, to eat gum, to have my back rubbed.
I had rituals where I would mill about my room busily preparing myself for a panic attack- I would get 2 1/2 liter bottles of water and line them up beside an industrial size bottle of extra extra strength tums, dentyne shiver gum, vicks cough drops, calvin and hobbes comics, pens, a book, k'nex toys and a bag to vomit in (which i only did twice in my life and never due to anxiety. I still have yet to throw up in a toilet this decade because it feels "too real". Knock on wood.) Finally, with all these things in place and just the way I wanted them, I could relax. Let go. Let it take over for a time, but only after I had established I was still the boss.

I half realized slowly over the years (though it has really just dawned on me now and this is why I'm writing it down) that in preparing myself to surrender to anxiety I actually made it so very much worse. People with anxiety shouldn't be architects. They shouldn't design these massive labrynths. Instead, what ends up happening is you build yourself a prison. By masking the symptoms of a panic attack all these years, I mainly succeeded in strengthening my compulsive need to control something, anything.

People with anxiety should not be architects building prisons. We should be MacGuyvers, cleverly espcaping hairy situations with a ballpoint pen and a stalk of broccoli and a dildo. Or whatever. We should be immersing ourselves in the experiences that define a life well and fully lived and should a problem arise, we should navigate through the rocky waves of the mind to stiller waters in a boat made of plastic wrap and apple cores. Or whatever.

Every day that lapses I am more ready to tear down these useless walls I built.