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How are you doing?  This is such an usual time and I’ve been struggling.  It comes and it goes – as does my productivity and what I’m able to do.

This whole situation has triggered anxiety that I forgot that I had.  When I was younger I’d stay awake for hours stressing about money.  It was so awful because I’d go to bed at 9 pm and would think about it until 1 or 2 in the morning. 

This happened in my early 20’s. After a couple of years, I was able to tell myself that there wasn’t much I could do especially at night to pay my bills so after a few months I was able to go to sleep easier.

I forgot about that until recently.

Now my anxiety is back.  I have days that I’m perfectly fine all day and then at night, I cannot sleep. 

Anxiety Intensifies The Worry

Even though I’m self-isolating and only go out for essentials – last Saturday I decided to get takeout.  It was out of the normal for me since all of this started and my anxiety reared its ugly head and it messed with my head.  Not only did it mess with my head but either I had a cold last week or my anxiety manifested symptoms.

Either way it sucked. 

Whenever this happened I’d have to keep telling myself that I was fine. During the day I’m okay because I can distract myself with projects but at night it is completely different. 

Last week the cold symptoms I was feeling were intensified at night because there’s not much else I could think about and that led me down the rabbit hole of, “I’ve got the virus.”

When these thoughts are stuck in my head I can’t sleep for most of the night. That means I sleep in and I’m unable to do my work before my son gets up.

I’ve been letting this pattern get out of hand. I’ll literally wait for exhaustion to take over so that I can get some sleep. A few nights ago I decided that if I was going to be awake I would get up and work. I don’t usually like working at night because it isn’t my most productive time of the day but neither is a day with no sleep. 🙂

So that is what I did and I was able to get two or three hours of work done.

Anxiety Is Different For Everyone

Anxiety runs in my family and I know people who have anxiety but I never fully understood the extend that it could affect you. I’ve been doing tons of research over the last few days because I have no idea what I should be keeping an eye out for.

There is a lot. I could add them all here but the thing is that just because it is making my chest hurt and is playing with my head to make me think I’m experiencing all the virus symptoms I’ve read about – that doesn’t mean it’ll do the same thing to you.

Anxiety for you could look completely different.

Talking To People Has Helped

Thankfully I have people that I can talk to about how I’m feeling. They don’t make me feel crazy and they will talk to me until the anxiety subsides.

When I get really worked up this seems to be one of the ways I’m able to calm down – when I have others to talk to that can help me see clearly and talk me through it.

Last night one of my friends got on the phone and she approached the anxiety a different way and that helped me. We’ve been getting really bad pollen in our area and even people who don’t have allergies are being affected – so what I’m experiencing could be that as well.

I’m still working through all of my emotions and feelings that come with what is happening right now and is definitely a work in progress.

~April

P.S. If you have any suggestions or tips, please let me know in the comments below.

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