Iwanttoheal

I could do with some practical advice here, so any and all suggestions welcome.

We talk a lot of about boundaries here and I have recently established no contact boundaries with my codie mother and alcoholic brother.

I recognised yesterday that I have no boundaries in place "inside my head". I am a worrier, have been all my life. I worry about the past, the future, what might happen, what might not happen. I live out scenarios and interactions (realistic and unrealistic) in my head.

I now recognise that this is part of an unhealthy enmeshment with significant others or with people who have the potential to "hurt" me. It is a learnt behaviour, 44 years of me trying to control others "inside my head" - absolutely crazy-making behaviour and what a waste of precious time, effort and energy.

These last four days I did lots of good things for me - I went out with my husband to a wedding celebration, I contacted an old friend and went out for a long walk with her, I went out line-dancing with a group of old friends. Fantastic, I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Then.... I self-sabotaged, I spent all of yesterday (and I mean all) worrying. I exhausted myself mentally, so much so that I made myself ill and have spent today in bed sleeping and recovering. So two days lost that could have been spent in more happy, tranquil waters.

Because I am now so much more self-aware, I recognise that I am trying to re-establish familiarity. My default state is DEPRESSION AND ANXIETY, I am not familiar with being happy, content and worry-free. If I reach these states, I will self-sabotage until I reach familiarity - WOW, what a head-job!!

So....

What I need now is advice.....

What do I do when I go into a negative thought cycle?

I am good at doing the practical things going for a walk, taking a bath, watching a film, etc

BUT.....

I CANNOT switch my thoughts OFF.

My thoughts will keep going during the walk, over the top of music, reading, watching tv.

It's almost as if I need to rewire my brain. How do I relearn to concentrate on the NOW eg the film, the book, the music and turn off my thoughts and worries. How do I get these thought boundaries in place and give myself a break.

I'm serious about this guys. I need to get this under-control or I feel I am going to undo all the good work that I have done so far.

PS Can't discuss this yet with my counsellor as I have been put on a waiting list, so any and all advice welcome.

takincareome

I suggest you sit down with some paper and write out what you're worried about. Is it the future? Is it what might happen A and what might happen B? Sometimes getting it out on paper can help, at least for me.

I'm bad to do this too. My new mantra (learned here!) is "Don't bleed 'til you're shot." It's helped me out a lot.

I also try to ask myself:
- Can I control this outcome? If yes, how, and would it be right or appropriate for me to do so? If no, then why am I obsessing over it?
- Deep breaths. Don't laugh. It helps a lot.
- Set aside some designated worry time each day. For instance, for the next hour, I'm gonna worry worry worry and get it all out. But when that hour is up, you're done. Any further worrying is going to have to wait until the next day.
- Keep a journal. It can help you track your worries.
- Exercise can help. So can prayer, if you're into that.

This is still a struggle for me, too, but the things above have been helping.

box3

What helps me if I'm feeling really overwhelmed and anxious is setting dedicated worry time. It's an exercise my therapist taught me when I was in the grip of major depression and a few anxiety disorders. Takincareome touches on this above.

I allow myself 15-30 minutes a day to worry and fret and bounce crap around my skull. Outside of this time, I have to let things go. I feel safer knowing I can revisit the worry in a controlled way at a later date. It's an internal boundary which I've found really useful.

guiab

Hi IWTH,
I know how you feel. ACOAs are in the habit of obsessing about others and how they will react or what they think or what they will do or......anything else about them. If there isn't a problem nearby, we (credit to GiveLove for this) tune our radar up and search out for a problem on the furthest horizon until we find it. In my case anxiety sometimes comes out of thin air as just a feeling of discomfort and 'not right' that makes me put off work and responsibilities. We are predisposed to sabotage our own well-being. It is hard to say what purpose this served growing up, except that it is just part of the dynamics of alcoholism in a family.
The serenity prayer is a good guide to separating the 'deal-with-able' from the 'out of my hands'.
And then there are the 3 A's - awareness, acceptance, and action.
1) We try to be aware of the worries as they appear in our heads, and this can be difficult as worry can operate an autopilot, or appear randomly like those darn 'update software' popups that I cannot get rid of.
2) we accept that we can do OR not do something about the worry here today. It is one or the other. I sometimes see myself handing it over to a higher power and pledging not to take it back until invited to do so.
3) action. If we can do something, we do it. Sometimes in a single problem there are parts where we can take an action but there are other parts where we can't control another's reaction. That is part of acceptance.
The other suggestions here are so very good, especially the worry time. I think you can make progress with this worry. There is no quick fix and it does take effort to make progress. Just remember, as we all do, that WE DESERVE WELL-BEING.

Iwanttoheal

Ain't this the truth. What I also do is if there isn't a legitimate problem to worry about; I will revisit old, resolved issues or I will invent new ones that might, just possibly occur. It's just learned, ingrained behaviour - old habits die hard as they say.


I guess the purpose of constant worry when we were growing up was being in a state of constant alertness, always being on the look-out for the next drama or crisis that we would have to deal with or suffer the consequences of (pain). Thus we became conditioned to live with worry, anxiety, pain and fear.

I guess I am constantly trying to recreate the chaos, uncertainty, worry, anxiety, pain and fear of my childhood - yip that makes sense.

You would think it would be so easy - stay away from things that cause you harm. You manage to finally achieve that physically only to find that you have to do battle with yourself all over again to try to achieve an emotional distance. And... hey, guess what.... the emotional battle is harder than the physical battle.

I am moving forward, working very hard, taking responsibility for myself from this point in my life onwards but I tell you what, my parents have A LOT to answer for - a cr*p childhood plus an adulthood battling with depression and anxiety. And they think children adapt and survive, yes we do but the cost is very high.

TheGirlInside

[QUOTE=Iwanttoheal;2370299]You would think it would be so easy - stay away from things that cause you harm. You manage to finally achieve that physically only to find that you have to do battle with yourself all over again to try to achieve an emotional distance. And... hey, guess what.... the emotional battle is harder than the physical battle.QUOTE]


I taught myself my 'own' definition of addiction: wanting something even when you know that it is bad for me, or being drawn to it because it is bad for me.

My advice (not that it differs much from the others') is to get it out. As dumb as this may sound, beating up on pillows and screaming into them (so as not to bother the neighbors or give them reason to call the police), and blaming them (assigned a particular role) for my pain and suffering...that "raw emotion" experience...actually helped me. It was like I had to really let the pain out, in its rawest form, even with exaggeration and nonsense...just letting the monster out of its cage, so to speak, so you can deal with the intellectual aspects.

Also, don't get down on yourself if you are not doing it fast enough or progressing to a certain degree...it will ebb and flow, some days will be good, some not so good, but as they say in AA, "I wouldn't trade the worse day [in recovery] for the best one [sick]."

It's not where you've been or done; it's not what others think of you or say you are. It's what YOU BELIEVE that matters most.

I had such a hard time believing in myself. For some reason, when I heard a preacher on TV say that I didn't have to believe in myself. I could just believe in God and let Him believe in me. For some reason I don't even undersatnd, that was such a relief!!

It's okay to be inspired by things that you (or others) don't understand!