360startstoday

I have genetic breast cancer in my family. We get it in our late 20s/early 30s. It's never skipped a woman yet. Now. I'm 32, I've made it 5 years longer than my grandma without the diagnosis.

Is it rational for me to sit and freak out and worry about it every single day? Or should I live every day without my diagnosis happy, healthy and grateful for another day cancer free?

silentrun

That is where bias comes in Sleepie. Medicine is advancing quickly. Do everything you can to buy yourself some time then hope that before anything really bad happens new treatments are available. My stepdaughter and my best friend's son would both be dead right now if they had been born a decade earlier.

It's easy for me say because I'm not facing that situation so I'm not trying to invalidate your right to be afraid.

sleepie

That's what I am hoping SR! Or that I can avoid things at least for a decent amount of time. I have 3 fold threat of this. risk of detachment, risk of glaucoma and I have to keep an eye on my sugars to keep from going diabetic as opposed to prediabetic, because that can ruin eyesight too. I would love for some simplicity. All this means is extra Dr appointments for the rest of my life too, and I am in terror every year I have to go. Sigh. And I have had probably at least 5 extra, extra Dr. appointments due to other issues I have been having... suffice to say there are some very expensive pictures of my insides in a file somewhere. It gets hard to hope after awhile when there is so much potential for things to go really wrong.

Any way I got on the stepper for awhile and ate chard and no sugar yesterday or today and no white carbs... I am hungry and irritated now on top of it. Something has to give so I have smoked a light cig. Today.

I wish I could be one of those people who quit drinking only to smoke and eat to their heart's content. This is way too bare knuckles stress inducing for me. I'm not cut out for it.

silentrun

I would love for anyone on this board who gets to eat and/or smoke to their hearts content to speak up now. I honestly don't think they exist. I get to eat to my hearts content now but it is from a different set of food choices then sweets and processed foods. You could join us on the sugar thread if you want. Concentrating more on what you can do is better than worrying about what you can't. I eat a lot of vegis now but I also fry them in olive oil and garlic. That seems to do the trick for me.

Someone gave us a stepper type Nordic track a while ago. I have been on it and it has kicked my butt each time. That is a great workout Sleeps. The eye sight was the first thing that came to my mind when I got those fasting numbers. I may have ant burners but at least I am fully functional with glasses.

You have been making some really difficult changes lately. You must have some warrior spirit going on there.

sleepie

I'll go to the sugar thread.

I still haven't met anyone with eyes as bad as mine.

SoberCAH

We're here with you, Sleepie.

I concur with Least that you may want to seek help from a competent physician regarding your chronic anxiety.

I suspect that a good doctor can point you in the direction of relief.

Anxiety is the nasty cousin of depression.

I hope you can find some relief.

I thought that I had a couple of life-shortening issues arise a couple of years ago in connection with a physical.

I had them on my mind a good bit until I saw a couple of specialists, but I was reasonably calm under the circumstances.

Not happy, but fairly calm.

Keep us posted on your progress.

alcibiades

Not sure if the "similar suffering" stories help you (they help me for some reason to know that I'm not alone), but my best friend was working on a tank that stored chemicals to spray on corn fields, and the hose malfunctioned, chemicals shot him right in the face. He lost sight in his left eye almost immediately and every year (for the past 20 years) he loses more and more sight in his right eye. His sight is so bad now that he is probably clinically blind, can't see to use his phone anymore he has to ask Siri everything. What's amazing is that he still works, still drives (not a good idea but he still does it), and he basically decided that worry isn't going to give him his sight back, and its definitely not going to prevent him from going totally dark.

I'm just like you Sleepy, I worry constantly. I do think anxiety is one of the leading reasons why we are all here. Alcohol removes all anxiety from me (at the time of drinking, the next day I'm a nervous wreck). As others have said, I recognize my obsessive worry for what it is, a medical problem of its own, and do my best to accept that I will probably always worry in excess. Of course. you have every right to worry in your situation, but I do think its in our nature to let worry consume our lives.

The best advice I can give during those extremely fearful moments is to stay busy! Get so deeply involved with something you love that you forget about your worries. Because you can't worry if you don't have time for it, you know what I mean? I find staying busy is by far the best medicine.

OneLessLonely

I haven't posted in a very long time, but I lurk from time to time, and really wanted to say I feel you on anxiety. I've always had it. I come from a long line of anxiety in my family. It's exhausting and debilitating and joy-sucking. It's a huge reason I drank, though after awhile of course, it made my anxiety worse. Two things that really have been game changers for me were listening to the audio book The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle and reading The Worry Cure by Dr Robert Leahy. And really being open to what these authors were saying. I tried reading The Power of Now and was like blah blah blah yeah yeah yeah. But hearing him speak it out loud was mind blowing. I almost wonder if listening to The Worry Cure would have had more benefit as well. I keep meaning to re-listen to, and re-read, them because the ideas and info slip away over time, and I feel like anxiety is a lifelong thing for me, so I should be working on it consistently. Like if I were to exercise and get in great physical shape, but then not do it anymore, I'd slowly get out of shape again. And that is definitely a metaphor because I am NOT in shape. Haha. I've been in therapy and on non-addictive meds over the years but never at the same time and never therapy, meds, and sober all at the same time. So my goal is to go back to therapy and possibly try meds again while continuing therapy, now that I've been sober for awhile.
At any rate, those things have helped a little. Nothing has "cured" it. I hope you can find something to give you some relief.

sleepie

Alcibiades I am so sorry to hear of your friend. It is a good idea to stay busy. i will try and get to that point. Right now I am trying just to see a reason to get out of bed. My recent crash and burn at work is not helping. If I can find something Ilove I guess that would be good.

OneLEss thank you I will try and find those books today

Soberwolf

Sleepie I took some pics of the books I've accumulated since being here at SR in the book thread if you want to peek x

Aellyce

For me most effective in those situations is trying to tackle the problems head-on as much as possible. Not procrastinate dealing with them (that is the worst ever strategy for me and something I used to be very prone to) as that just makes the anxiety (and possibly also the problem) worse. If it's something that cannot be fixed immediately or soon, there are usually small things we can do to handle parts of it I think. For example, if it's a health issue, see the appropriate healthcare professional without delay or if there is wait time for appointments or tests, try to do something good for our health (even if "only" the mental part). Talk to people we trust and find a positive influence. Try to have a good rest if possible. Try not to let things pile up in practical reality or emotionally.

From all I know, anxiety is something that is usually managed best using methods that every person needs to try and see for themselves what works. For me the best things have been exercise, eating well, getting sleep even if not exactly regular, no procrastination, and therapy (not the CBT kind in my case but looking at the root causes in depth).

Drinking or not doing anything is the absolute worst. I just had a two week relapse with alcohol and am so happy that I did not let it go further and that I don't just sit and wait for the turmoil to disappear. Day 3, in one of my most stressful work periods of the year presumably, and I feel almost no anxiety, which really surprises me. I think it's due to a lot of focused action and less diffuse and wandering contemplation than usual for me.

alcibiades

Sleepy, think big. Think beyond big! If you could do anything, if you could go anywhere, what would you do and where would you go? Suppose there are no limits, nothing to hold you back from anything that you feel would make you happy.

You'd be surprised what you can spend your time doing if you really want to do the thing you set your mind to. It's easy to come up with reasons why one cannot do what they want, becomes second nature after time. I love this exercise because for once, the reverse is true. There's something very empowering when you allow yourself to open up the world of possibilities.

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a persistent one." Albert Einstein

sleepie

Aellyce thank you so much for your input And I am glad to hear you are on day 3! Those are good suggestions. I am doing some of them. I have one large obstacle to this though- Which is, my very probable learning disorder. I am taking more steps (again) to try and get this addressed. But the conundrum is trying to get things taken care of while operating with a sub-par piece of equipment (my slow brain). I mean I have so much to tackle here. I wrote a couple emails to shrinks specializing in ld.

Now all my life I have been putting my efforts towards trying to "fix" an unknown problem. I knew something was wrong, and figured if I just "tried harder" I would be able to get things right. I tried therapy (worked 2 jobs to afford it) and that wasn't amounting to much. I tried to get better jobs (could not handle the stress). tried working multiple jobs... again the stress. So moving on a few years, I do a little search, tests in hand and trying to see what is this un nameable "thing" that I know is holding me back. And knowing I also have a neuro disorder that predisposes me to a number of things. Over and over again, non verbal learning disorder comes up. I try and not believe it, sweep it under the rug and decide to "try harder" some more.

So I try and get a positive attitude, look to each day with hope and no negativity. Well fast forward and I have crashed and burned, again. Lost my job, lost my home, am deep in alcoholism. This is a sadly common trajectory for adults living with undiagnosed ld. Fast forward some more, I take my tests and knowledge to therapists and even speak with a neuropsychologist at length over the phone, give them my background and history and experiences and test results from highschool and so forth, IQ test too. And they say I have probably nailed it.

Now the thing is, I have never been able to make enough money to "take care" of myself, even before I was always scrambling and overworked with 2 jobs so I could go to therapy which I thought was the answer (this also seems to be common in ld), before figuring out on my own that the actual problem is ld. So I am in a weird middle ground of not having the ability (at least not as yet evidenced by my entire life) to make the money to see to this problem. The neuro psych Dr. I spoke with said I'd need further testing and all these kinds of therapies that could help. But if I am basically, because of my grey matter- only qualified for jobs that make very little, I can't really afford to go ahead and do that. It's like I need a "leg up" to get a leg up, so it's like a catch 22 here if that makes sense.

Basically I don't have the grey matter that would get me the job to afford the help my damaged grey matter needs.

And for all I know, I don't have what it takes to handle any of these issues. I have used many of the coping mechanisms people in my position do in life.

I need a mentor or someone to turn to, but I haven't any. No family- out of the question as they are probably mentally ill and very abusive. It's hard not to feel like I was singled out in life to fail. It's getting harder and harder to get up and face this anymore.

I have spent an entire lifetime "bouncing back" and picking myself and dusting myself off and trying harder and positive attituding my way through yet another blow to my life or work or job or being priced out of yet another apartment and having to move because I can't get that better job. It's very likely ld.

I mean you can see that presents a problem? This affects me socially, mentally (intense daily anxiety), emotionally, financially and just about every way conceivable.

And I feel bad. I feel bad about myself. I feel bad about nobody noticing or caring when it could have helped, that I was experiencing trouble. It even says in plain black & white on one of my standardized tests as a kid that things were not right and was of "great importance". but nobody cared. And here I am today.

I feel bad that I turned to alcohol. I feel bad that you all listen to me, give me suggestions and that I take up space here. I feel bad that I didn't figure out a way to overcome all of this. I feel bad about having an abusive family who didn't take notice or care, that I was socially ostracized and picked on by my teachers and family and that I am ld.

I'm sorry guys. I know this sounds like self pity. But this is a very, very hard way to go through life and a person can only humanly take so much and it has been a very long series of many years of "try again" and "positive attitude"... before I got here. And if over 40 years of positive attituding my way to believe I have a chance and trying harder, and working multiple jobs to have what I need in life, and never really being able to make good friends didn't work, why would I keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results? Isn't that the definition of insanity? I read that somewhere.

I didn't used to be a "downer". So I hope I didn't upset anyone here with this epic post. It's hard being on the outside and not knowing why for decades.

Delfin

I experienced a tremendous amount of anxiety when I was given my diagnosis and as I started to lose more and more of my sight. At this point I don't have functioning vision without my contacts, and I'm not assured that my contacts will work for long. What I do is I remind myself constantly of what Silentrun said about advances in medicine. I'm really counting on someone coming up with a bionic eye soon (I'll take mine in green, thank you very much. It'll be a nice change. lol) And I tell myself that I can handle whatever will come my way. You can too, Sleepie. You've already handled so much in life that you should know you can deal with whatever comes, even if it sucks. For anxiety, I find that getting out of my head is best. I try not to give myself too much time to think about these things and instead keep myself busy with things I enjoy so I don't ruminate (the enemy of the anxious person!) So, where's that bike? Can you put your pencils to paper and see if something will happen? I did Zoloft for a while too, til it stopped working...I know you have to watch your diet cause you're prediabetic, but you have to find a way to treat yourself. I personally hate too much self denial. And feel free to rant away. We're here to support each other, right?

D.

advbike

I second The Power of Now, or A new Earth, by Eckhart Tolle. Especially the audio, is excellent. A lot of anxiety comes from our thoughts, which are just thoughts.. yet they trigger very powerful emotions that can overwhelm us. Tolle helps us learn to observe the thoughts and mindless mental chatter that creates anxiety, and quiet them.

The most important concept to grasp is living in the present moment, where everything is actually fine, rather than the future, where we imagine so much misery, but that misery is just in our minds.. it hasn't even happened yet, and often will not. So we suffer needlessly. Understanding this concept really helped me.