My Dance With Panic

Looking back from here - I can see a real path to health.

Even though I didn’t always have a name for it, anxiety has always been a part of my personality. I was “the sensitive one,” or I was always being “too thin-skinned.” I grew up in a large, noisy family and while there was a lot of love there was also a lot of violence.

At least it was violence to me.

See, since I’ve grown up and spent years in trying to make sense of my life I realize that people (even people in the same family) have vastly different perspectives on things. I thought I was “just normal” – but it wasn’t until years later, after a lot of pain and suffering, that I realized I was just normal for me!! And that other people had totally different reactions and opinions of how the world works.

I am sensitive. And intuitive. I understand people and I can make a quick read of situations and often sort them out before most people realize things are off track. It’s like I have a set of finely tuned antennae! Well, as a child this led to a pretty anxious life. I was always aware of what was going to get my siblings in trouble, when my dad or mom was angry and how neighborhood rivalries were heating up.

To everyone around me it was just life. To me it was like there was a war looming – all the time. And it was up to me to prevent it.

So I spent a lifetime of taking on responsibilities that weren’t mine. Piling things on my plate, setting goals and tasks that had to be met to avert disaster. And not just disaster for me - but disaster for others, too. I got into the habit of living like this. My body and mind were set on ever-alert. And I adjusted to this as “normal.”

I grew up, had regular ups and downs in life, and graduated from college and got a job. Then I got married and had three kids in three years. And with the birth of my third daughter (when I was 30) my two teenaged step-children came to live with us full time. It was like someone turned the volume up on my anxiety to a LOUD, THROBBING maximum!! All of a sudden I was responsible for five kids, a house to run, a husband, animals, and all the rest of my family as well (parents, sibs,etc). I had to deal with an ex-wife, alcohol, high school, driving and loud rock music as well as babies learning how to walk, potty training and all the intricacies of toddler’s lives.

Oh – and did I mention that when I was pregnant with my third child my husband was diagnosed with cancer? Yep, and we spent 3 months at a hospital 2 ½ hours from home with me driving back and forth every other day. Luckily he recovered.

But one day while driving the three little ones home from some outing I had a full-blown panic attack. Totally "out of the blue." I thought I was dying of a heart attack! I pulled the car over and as more scared than I had ever been in my life. After about 10 minutes it passed. I had no idea what it was. I had never heard of Panic or Anxiety as a disorder – just as something that happened to people in certain situations. This was NOT a stressful situation so something MUST be wrong with me. Terribly, terribly wrong.

I had a Panic Attack about every day for a month and finally went to the doctor. He gave me a battery of tests and said I was fine. Healthy. I went home, not quite believing him. Then I decided I must have diabetes. Went for a whole work up on that. Nope, no diabetes. Brain tumor – that must be it. Went back and got an MRI. No, no brain tumor.

Then one night at dinner I semi-choked on a piece of bread. It scared the crap out of me. I began to obsess that I could not swallow without choking and this led to the most bizarre time period– I only ate in public places, and often at the hospital cafeteria because I was so SURE I was going to choke and I wanted people trained in the Heimlich maneuver to be nearby! Crazy!!!! I thought it was very smart on my part!

Finally, finally my doctor sat me down and explained Panic and Anxiety Disorders. We talked about all the feelings I was having – the hypersensitive mind, the racing thoughts,the irregular heartbeats, the obsession with health, the pain in my chest and head. He explained that Panic and Anxiety Disorders are unique to the person, that they manifest in different ways but that there is nothing physically wrong with me – that I am truly healthy and okay. He prescribed Xanax for when it got out of hand, and suggested that I start therapy. When I look back at me at age 31 I am amazed at what I was dealing with! At the time, I really sincerely believed it was all "normal."

I found a terrific therapist. Over the next 8 years I had two other therapists as well. Things change and I learned that changing therapists is NOT a failure, but a continued advocacy on behalf of my recovery! Each one helped me with a different hurdle – I learned how I had taught myself to be on alert, how I had a learned response to stimuli and how to change my thinking. I learned about meditation and yoga and breathing exercises. I learned about Carl Jung and his approach to dreams and to the psyche – how each of us has our own path of individuation: becoming the individual we are meant to be. How suffering often starts us on the path. My years of studying Jungian psychology, and working with Jungian analysts has been rich, profound and beautiful. But it didn't "cure" me and I found myself with the symptoms of Clinical Depression.

At this point my therapist really recommended I try an anti-depressant. I resisted but eventually, because I trusted him, tried Effexor. Amazingly, it lifted the symptoms of depression and helped me find a sense of hope and possibility.

I also began going to workshops on Jungian topics - and I had the chance to learn about my own creativity. I began painting and drawing. I read books. My world sort of “opened up.” I became a nature person – taking walks, watching birds, growing flowers. I felt connected to the world. I felt a part of things. These are activities that were not looked down on in my home, but it just seemed there was never enough time to encourage anyone to sit still, to watch, to wonder or to create.

After 2 ½ years we decided I should try to wean off the Effexor – I did it super slow and never had a single side effect. I was willing to stay on it if I needed to, but somehow we had put together a program of recovery that allowed me to stay free of Depression.

I added massage therapy and acupuncture and found some great ways to support myself with compassion and care. I take care of my physical needs and recognize them as signals that I need to pay attention. For instance, my massage therapist helped me see that tensing up when I drive, and holding my hands the way I do contributes to the stiff and sore feeling I get in my left chest muscles, And all this time I thought it was my heart. These seeming simple and straightforward actions on my part had a real impact.

It has been YEARS since I’ve had a full blown Panic Attack. Sure, I get some generalized Anxiety and I do have a healthy respect for my fears and obsessions– I know they are there, But I do not feed them. I do not focus on them. Instead I keep my eyes on the possibilities and on the abundance in the world. I know that I can live a full and rich and rewarding life. I take a lot of classes, read a lot of books. I laugh a lot.

It has been a spiritual journey that started out because of crippling physical symptoms. Now I feel like my life is balanced and strong. I have learned about Panic and Anxiety. I understand it’s power and know that I don’t seek to be “cured” as much as I continue to be healed of the symptoms.

Reaching out to others helps me to stay focused on the positive and healing path. I continue to learn how to take care of myself, while also staying connected to others. I am not alone. I do not need to isolate and worry. If I find those things creeping into my day, I log on and share with someone. In my real life I pick up the phone and call someone. I go outside and take a walk. I draw. I paint. I sing. I dance.

This is my one life. I am determined to live it to the fullest.

The Max I Know

(spoiler alerts as to the movie, but this is not a movie review)
Went to the movies to see the new Spike Jonze film, and was quite taken with the story adaptation as well as the beautiful costumes and the luscious scenery. If you don’t know the story, young Max is confronted with lots of changes in his life as his sister is growing up and getting new friends, and his mom is overworked and at the same time negotiating the dicey waters of dating while mothering.

Max is a creative and precious looking child, with an active imagination and a wonderfully buoyant lack of inhibitions. He dresses in a wolf suit, creates an igloo in the front yard, makes massive forts in his room and has islands of stacked books to protect himself, and his invited guests, from the lava flows.

But reality intrudes – dinner, adults, school, manners and worries. Max responds with energy and growls. Things escalate and he runs out the front door, through the neighbor’s yards, over a dilapidated fence and scrambles down a hill to the edge of the water. There he finds an abandoned boat and his real adventure begins.

The transition from reality to fantasy is tough on an adult. As I sat in the theater of course I thought of all the dangers that could befall a small boy in a beat-up boat on the water in a scary part of the world – New Jersey. But Max steers the boat, over a broad sea, through the night and a day and a night again to an island. Rough seas, rocky shore, thrashing waves, yet he’s able to steer the boat into shallow enough water that he can hop out and pull it to safety on the sand.

He sees a fire up on a promontory and he climbs up. It’s not an easy climb, and the shifting camera angles show the precariousness of his situation. Again, as an adult I can see the dangers and they would paralyze me, but Max simply stays alert and keeps going. Jonze perfectly captures the special kind of kid-courage that so many people have before age 10.

What Max finds is amazing. Large, powerful creatures with protruding noses, horns, sharp claws and vaguely familiar outlines. Supernaturally strong these creatures, The Wild Things, live in a community that is everything Max ever wanted. They have cleverly built huts or forts as homes, they have fires and they get to do whatever they want. They smash things, and bore holes and they can explore all day anywhere they want to go. And best of all they sleep all together in a real pile.

When Max arrives, there is a problem. It seems that one of their number is mad. I mean really, really mad. And because he’s mad he is smashing everyone’s hut. When a feeling of anger, or is it sadness, sweeps over him the monster smashes another fort. The others stand by and watch. The angry one becomes more and more isolated, and finally says “no one understands and no one cares so I’ll just be by myself” and this strikes a chord with Max. He leaps out of the bushes and joins in the destruction.

Without going into any more details of the movie I’ll just say that Max and Carol (played by James Gandolfini) and the other Wild Things bond, and build a communal fort, and go through some relationship changes that are pretty nuanced for a group of monsters and a small boy. They organize with Max as King and they have a terrific dirt-clod fight.

But in the end, Max decides to go home. And he sails back across the sea. And there are real emotions connected to this, and yet also smooth sailing and the movie comes to a close. And there is a satisfying click or thunk at the end as everything settles back into a place that is recognizable as home, family and “okayness.”

The thing that really struck me, that spurred me to sit down and write about it, is not so much the creativity and talent of Spike Jonze…but rather I know a Max. Really. A young man named Max. And I know that he has felt some of the same tumultuous emotions as the boy in the film. The Max that I know has also had difficulty with relationship and family changes, he has had great difficulty expressing himself and has often lost his temper and roared. I’m sure, although he’s never told me, that he has highly detailed inner worlds, peopled with wild things and these worlds collide and often find their way back with him as he tries to “come home.”

But Max, the Max I know, is not a cute little kid with a creative imagination. He is a 37 year old man with schizophrenia. He also has an older sister, and parents who divorced when he was young. He has a great love for his mother, but about fifteen years ago she could no longer deal with the strains and the pressures of his physicality and his illness. So he came to live with his father. And that’s how I met him. So there they are, two guys, living together doing the best they can. And Max, he has some serious issues with navigating life’s rocky shores.

He has a very wooly beard and long, scraggly hair. He’s not fond of baths or showers. He doesn’t like to clip his nails. He has a fondness for camouflage and other army cast off clothing, with all the pockets bulging. What’s in the pockets? Rocks. Feathers. String. A CD player. A can of Dr. Pepper. Bits of glass. Small books. Max smells bad. His eyes dart around and he doesn’t have a clear idea of all those assumed personal-space boundaries we’re all so fond of. In fact he’ll walk right up to me and stick his hand out and start talking about the last visit he had with his mom in Oregon while pumping my hand vigorously up and down and then immediately launch into a series of rapid-fire questions about the rings of Saturn and the craters of the moon.

I’ve learned to just float along with Max, and nod and smile and poke a word in edgewise every now and then. Abruptly he will turn and move on to someone else, or he’ll fling himself on the ground to look for bugs.

In a 9 year old it’s adorable, cute and charming. In a 37 year old it is awkward and, to many, scary.

I know Max is not dangerous. I know he loves his dad and his mom and in fact, I’m pretty sure he loves me too. He enjoys calling people on his birthday to tell us it is his birthday and give us the chance to wish him many happy returns of the day. I mean, how can you not like that? I don’t have to worry about hurting his feelings because I’ve forgotten his birthday – he decided it is HIS birthday so he calls and lets me know. There is a beautiful kind of personal responsibility in there somewhere.

But at the end of the movie I’m left with a deep sadness. Cute little Max in the movie makes it home, has some soup and a piece of chocolate cake and he probably grows up to be a successful children’s book author. Good story. Good movie. We’re all comfortable. Enjoyed the trip to Where The Wild Things Are.

But the Max I know? There doesn’t seem to be a boat ride “home.” He is a citizen of that world and at the same time he is also a citizen of ours. He cannot work, he has no health care, and he scares the shit out of people that he meets. He is of age and sometimes he just takes off and he will be gone for weeks at a time…living on the streets, eating out of dumpsters, sleeping in dangerous open spaces. His dad worries. His dad’s friends worry. But the world – it is a place of rocks, thrashing waves and strange creatures.

So far, he has found his way back to his dad’s house. Sometimes that’s after a few nights in jail, just for being Max. No charges, no crimes, just a scary dude who roars and is a bit dirty and smelly. He’s a wild thing right here in our midst. And, one thing that Carol says, in James Gandolfini’s inimitable voice, comes back to haunt me as I ponder this: “the island is shrinking … its going from forests to rocks to sand then to dust… I don’t know what comes after dust.”

As Max’s dad gets older, and so does Max, I think to myself the island is shrinking.

The Garden Grows pt. 2

The garden is officially thriving! We got the seedlings in the ground about a week ago, and with our current cold snap the little buggers seem to be settling in for a great winter growth-fest.

We have four different lettuces, carrots (both orange and purple) and a variety of herbs including sage, rosemary, marjoram, parsley, mint and lemongrass. I recently discovered Lemon Basil and am hoping to get some of those in as well.

In the other area we have Cabbage, Kale, Chard, Collards. I'm not sure when the Broccoli is going in, but soon. Now that we have the basic plots organized and planted, we can fill in with the experiments.

I want some of those little baby fingerling potatoes.

So far the birds seem to love the garden - I imagine there are quite a few bugs and worms that have been turned up with all the tilling and planting. We haven't seen any rabbits or deer yet. I bet they are just waiting for the lettuce to get a little more robust. I have to say it does my heart good to look out the window and see the possibilities of fruits of our labor. Every time I take another Aleve I remind myself of that.

Offline - and I survived!

I've been at a conference in Ocala, FL for two and a half days and I was actually so busy, and so focused, that I stayed offline.

For two and a half days (well, I had a little tiny bite of Geezer posting) and actually I survived.

I'm not sure, but I think being offline for 2 1/2 days is something like being out of touch for 9 months in real life. Or something like that.

I just got home, gotta check some emails and some blogs and unpack and go to bed.

More anon.

Die Walkure

We have a real penchant for Wagner's Ring Cycle. Whenever we can, we find a performance of it somewhere and go there -- spending a week reveling in music, drama, timeless archetypes and rubbing elbows with fellow crazies.

This past summer we took our three daughters to Seattle to partake of The Seattle Opera Company's version of Der Ring des Niebelingen. It was fantastic! I mean, really. Fantastic!

And if you know anything about the Ring you probably know about Die Walkure : or The Valkyrie. Those 9 warrior daughters of Wotan who fly about the skies on winged horses singing Hojotojo and making fabulous music with "their" overture.

Imagine our delight when our eldest daughter presented us with these three drawings upon our return home!

Sometimes I wish I could take credit for the creativity and absolute fabulousness of my kids. Other times I just revel in their existence!

Homeland Security At Work.

I got an email yesterday from a colleague of my husband... who is a lawyer in New York, and quite politically conservative. In fact, I'd have to say that we're about on opposite ends of the spectrum ... although I do think I'm more reasonable than he is, but that's just me.

Anyway, he sent me this link to an article in the Washington Times. I don't know, but I think this is a pretty conservative "paper" ... is it even a real paper? So I looked it up... hmmm, it was started by The Rev. Sun Myung Moon. I remember him! This will probably not turn into one of my trusted sites ... but I gave the article a look anyway.

Turns out it is a discussion about an elderly couple in Texas who were busted by Homeland Security for ... growing orchids. And the man, George Norris, actually served two years in jail for not having proper documentation... for his orchids.

"The outrage. The nerve. How dare they?" These are the kinds of allegations leveled at the Obama Administration through this articles journey around the Internet. "Look at what Obama is doing" that's how the email found it's way to me.

If, however, you actually read the article you find that this arrest and imprisonment took place in 2004. Yeah. 2004. Right smack in the middle of the Administration of George W. Bush. And Dick Cheney.

I continue to be amazed at the irony and the lack of appreciation of said irony in the use of Bush-era tactics and procedures to attack Obama. I mean, there are plenty of things Obama is (not) doing that I can argue with -- FISA, Executive Privilege, Health Care.

I have no interest in hero-worship or some fantasy of perfection in our current President. But I do find it kind of funny (not ha-ha) that the twisted logic of some of these Conservatives I know, seems kind of sinister in that they play right to the ignorance and gullibility of their fellows.

Probably ought to file this in "Whatever" ... but the idea that Homeland Security was (or is?) out there doing this crap is ominous, and creepy. So I think I'll file it under Cheney.

Beautiful Lawson

This beautiful, talented young woman died recently ... and our hearts are still broken.

I watched her grow up. Not within the deeply grieving inner circle that is her large and loving family ... but as someone whose child knew her, and we had her over to our house many times, and we shared many hours together at barns and horse shows around the Southeast.

She was always cheerful, one of those people that makes you smile just to look at. She had an infectious sense of humor, and a naturally sunny disposition. This came in handy when dealing with horses - I would watch my daughter bubble over with frustration and anger ... and invariably Lawson would interject something funny, some understanding commiseration and always some encouragement.

The politics of horses flowed over her (and her mother) with ease and so they were friends to everyone, enemy to none.

Her death was a shock ... is a shock ... and we still reel from it when it inevitably crosses our minds and hearts throughout the day.

I recently looked at the page on our local paper and was absolutely DISGUSTED by the comments left .... good god, what a heartless bunch of yahoos that have access to a computer.

I just wanted to include this picture, and to make a space for this incredibly beautiful and sweet young woman to be remembered.