Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Anxiety & Triggers

If you suffer from Anxiety, Depression, Bipolar Disorder or any other kind of mental illness, don't feel guilty.  It's genetic and that's it.  Pure and simple.  It's hereditary. 

There are things that can trigger the onset of anxiety, depression, and mental illness in general.  Things such as your environment, thought patterns and life style to name a few.  If you suffer from one of these hurdles in life, most likely someone else in your family has also struggled, too.  It's hereditary and that gene could have been passed down to you from a parent, grand-parent or even great-grandparent. 
Since everyone is unique and deals with life differently, your journey will be different and yours alone.  It's not a death sentence, but more about self-discovery and how we are fearfully and wonderfully made. 
On my own road to recovery, I've learned some valuable Coping Skills along the way.  In sharing them, I hope that they can benefit you as well.
Healthy boundaries is one of my Coping Skills.  After years of practice, I have finally been able to make healthy boundaries for myself without feeling guilty.  Boundaries from talking, seeing, texting, facebooking (is that a word?) or visiting certain people that need something from me or are just plain too toxic for me at the time.  Some of them mean no harm, others may unintentionally do harm without realizing it. It can be a friend, stranger, organization, job or family. If I'm not in a healthy place, I've realized I will be of no good to them either.  A single text can spiral me into a severe panic attack or anxiety attack.
I have also realized that tracking my daily activities on a chart every day helps me pinpoint my triggers.  Triggers that can cause anxiety and worry, depression or mania from my Bipolar Disorder or even trigger my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
My triggers can be anything from over stimulation from being around too many people for long periods of time or the opposite - not enough time around other people.  Most of all, it's the little things that can trigger me.  So, I keep track of who I've texted and received texts from, who I talk to on the phone or see in person, what I ate, how much i slept and if it was broken up sleep, what TV shows I watched or movies I watched, etc.  It sounds trivial, but it really does help.  When I'm suffering from severe anxiety, sounds and light bother me the most.  The hum of a light fixture, the light from the computer.  Little things can cause a lot of anxiety sometimes.
Another one of my triggers was responding, by texting, to a couple of individuals too much.  In my mind, I thought if I texted them back, it wasn't as toxic as seeing them or talking to them on the phone.  For me, it was just as toxic.  Now, I don't respond unless I am in a healthy place mentally, emotionally and it doesn't take away from my family or another important event at the time.  I felt soooooo guilty at first, but realized it was a must.  That alone took out A LOT of my anxiety.
Another anxiety for me is shopping with other women.  Since I'm still in recovery from being a "People Pleaser", I found it extremely difficult to be myself completely without worrying about if my friends (s) was enjoying their self at the mall. Ugh.  I know, it's crazy but it brought on real anxiety for me!
I could go on and on about how commercials or certain movies trigger me, but I think those are more obvious and I wanted to emphasize the importance of how little triggers can cause great damage.  I found out that when I was aware of the little triggers, the larger ones were not as often.
I'll share more on worry, anxiety and panic attacks later this week. 
I Hope that some of these coping skills help some of you with practical things that you can do for yourself to maybe alleviate some of the stress in your life. 
I'll be sharing more coping skills later this week.  Thanks for coming on this journey with me!


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