Today I was late to therapy. Ack! I hate being late!! I had it in my head that my session was at 11:00, but at 10:07 I got a text from my therapist asking if I was going to be joining her online. I can’t believe I got the time wrong! It was in my calendar correctly, I just didn’t look because I thought I knew the time. We’ve done 11:00 a few times, so I guess that’s why it was in my head that way. Thank goodness for online therapy because I was logged in within two minutes of her text and didn’t miss much of my session.
It went well. I was able to talk about specific examples of when I’ve had certain cognitive distortions creep into my life. I told her that I know my anxiety has escalated since the pandemic, but I can certainly look back on my life and see where it was present all along.
I shared the story I’ve heard countless times about how terribly I did on timed math tests and any time my teachers would try to talk to me about it I’d start to cry. They took that to mean I was not understanding math and lowered my level. But when my mom came for a conference she looked at these tests and pointed out that every answer I got was correct, I just wasn’t finishing because I was working so hard on my penmanship that I wasn’t going fast. Once I was told I didn’t need to worry about getting my numbers to match the typed ones I was able to complete the test in the time allotted. So clearly my anxiety and perfectionism have been around for a very long time.
I talked about the anxiety I’ve seen in my mother and how she catastropized so many things. I gave the example of the time we went to Austin together and when the restaurant I wanted to go to only had street parking she freaked out and wanted to go back to the hotel instead of letting me look for a place to park. Rather than fight her on it, I went back to the hotel and let her avoid that trigger, which in retrospect didn’t do her any good. Instead we ate at the restaurant across the street from the hotel 3 times in one weekend because she didn’t want us to get lost. After that experience I decided never to travel with her again (which is fine with her because she doesn’t want to travel anyway).
I also talked about how my husband seems to be my opposite when it comes to anxiety. He has no problem being late (unless it’s a movie) and loves to be spontaneous where I like to have everything planned out and know what to expect. I shared about the time he and I were flying to Chicago for my cousin’s wedding. Just before our plane took off, they brought us back to the airport because (we found out later) someone had set fire to an FFA building and all flights into and out of Chicago were delayed/canceled. We ended up at the airport for 18 hours before we finally got to Chicago. And if it weren’t for my husband I absolutely would have panicked. I almost did a few times. Especially when we thought we had a new flight and when we were trying to board we were told our tickets had been canceled because the connecting flight had been but no one had told us! Anyway, he took it totally in stride and decided we’d make our own fun and did a “Tour de Terminals” all over DFW Airport trying various restaurants and taking silly pictures with the displayed art. I don’t know how he kept his cool, but thank goodness he did! And thank goodness my mom wasn’t there!!
I also told her about the unplanned trip we took that I mentioned in my last post and how it was very difficult for me to not have a plan, but ultimately it is one of my favorite trips we’ve taken. My husband purposely kept our destination a secret from me so I couldn’t plan anything (his exact words). On previous vacations I’ve had everything planned months in advance. When we went to Disney I had to know which park we’d go to each day so I could make reservations at the restaurants. But to be fair, it’s impossible to eat at the fun restaurants in Disney without a reservation!
Side note: I’m lucky that I have someone in my life that doesn’t let me completely hide from my anxiety, but also is understanding and supportive when I find myself overwhelmed. He has encouraged me to get help and has listened when I’ve explained how his actions sometimes felt less supportive and he actually changed his behavior. He has his faults, for sure, but overall I’m grateful to have him.
My therapist saw that I’ve really been taking what I’m learning and working to be more aware that feelings aren’t facts. She complimented me on how well I seem to be doing this week and noted that I appear to be finding my groove. I agree. I know that a lot of my anxiety the last few months has involved what I will do while my kids are in school and I’m home. Now that we are a few weeks in I’m finding things to fill my days and not putting too much pressure on myself to be productive 100% of the day.
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