Dismantling

I had my first panic attack in an airport. My husband and I were returning from a glorious vacation and had a few hours to kill in the Florida airport. I remember sitting in front of large panel of windows, facing the planes landing and taking off, and thinking that soon we’d be boarding one to go home. The feeling started at the top of my head: dread, panic, and fear, slowly spreading down my face, upper body, and dropping like a ball into my stomach. Instantly I felt nauseous. I doubled over in pain. I tried laying down. I tried walking around. My mind and heart were racing, as if they were in competition with each other. I couldn’t think clearly, my mind turning to irrational thoughts such as, “Can we just stay here, and not go home?” And the worst one of all, “I would be fine if the plane crashed.”

My second panic attack happened a few weeks later. I was walking down a hallway in my house, and a thought triggered a fear, and I doubled over as if someone had punched me in the stomach. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I hunched over for a few seconds (which felt like an eternity), attempting to take a full breath. When I stood up my stomach felt like a hopelessly tangled ball of yarn. Heart racing, shallow breathing, stomach churning. “What is wrong with me? Why can I not get a grip?” It felt foreign and invasive, and I felt helpless. It lasted a few hours. Or days. Turning into weeks. I lost sleep. I was distracted in my daily life, unable to focus when someone was talking to me. Unable to complete simple tasks. Going through the motions. Surviving. Who is this person?

I’m usually fairly put together. Friends joke about my calendar - color coded and detailed to a fault. I like life to be like my calendar - neat and ordered and clean and predictable. I’m able to juggle many things at once. I’m good at remembering details. I make to-do lists and I check them off. I can handle stress - I was a teacher and I am a mom and am used to doing lots of things and doing them pretty well. I was good at life.

 

Until one day, I wasn’t. It was all just too much.

I have since talked to other people who describe similar experiences, albeit with some differences. Some feel it in their head, some in their shoulders or back, some in their stomach. Some people get a migraine and have to go to bed. Some people, like me, feel it in their stomach and cannot eat. Sometimes there are real life triggers that can be pointed to as a cause. Sometimes there are not. Sometimes it’s the anticipation of an event, a conversation, or an expectation. Sometimes there is no reason at all.

And I hate that. I hate that more than anything else - because if I know ahead of time, then I can prepare for it. I can create a plan. I can line up solutions. I can predict outcomes. I can manage. Ha. The joke was on me. I couldn’t control this.

One day I couldn’t even get out of bed. I lay there staring at nothing. I had zero motivation to get up and do anything. If you know me, this is so not like me. I usually spring out of bed before my alarm, ready to conquer the day. And I couldn’t. I could. Not. Do. It.

 The stomach aches, the racing heart, the fuzzy thinking: it was an outward physical representation of all that was going wrong mentally and emotionally and spiritually inside of me.

 Cue the Bible verses and songs and motivational speeches. The “5 Steps to Overcoming Anxiety” articles. The recommendations and self-help books. Been there, done that. And that is the crazy maker about anxiety. You can KNOW what to do, know the right answers, and still be overcome. You can do all the things, and still feel totally helpless.

I had my scriptures on a ring clip: “I have not given you a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love and of a sound mind.”(2 Timothy 1:7) Okay, I have been given a sound mind. So where is it? Why can’t I grab hold of it?

“Cast all your anxiety on him, for He cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:7) How exactly does one “cast” anxiety? I know He cares, I definitely know that. But how does that help me through a panic attack?

 I had Christian songs on repeat. Songs about no longer being a slave to fear, about being in the eye of a storm and still trusting, about His hand being strong to save. Amazing words. True words. And yet...I could listen to a song, believe it with all my heart, and there would still be that pit in my stomach.

 I read the books. I read the articles. I made a plan. Exercise more. Make sure I drink enough water. Do yoga. Go on dates nights. Start seeing a counselor. I even went to my doctor and got a prescription. Check. Check. Check.

But it wasn’t enough. I was not enough. I will never be enough.

And what happened was a slow and steady dismantling of Katie. A dismantling of my carefully planned, well thought out, color coded life. An undoing of all my preconceived ideas and preformed judgments. If I couldn’t hack it, then who could?

 All those times I had watched other people struggle, and made up my mind about how I would handle it … All those times I had judged someone for the way they could or couldn’t solve a problem … All those times I prided myself for having it together …. All those times I thought I could do it better ….OUT THE WINDOW.

Because now that's me. I’m the one feeling humiliated, ashamed, crazy, out of control, weak, and helpless. I’m the one who can’t get a grip. I’m the one who tried the step-by step plan and couldn’t make it past step one. And as pride and judgment and control were being stripped away, God in His mercy, began filling in those gaps with compassion and understanding and empathy.

 I always say, “You don’t know it until you live it." I’ve lived a lot of life over the past few years, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this: I am not enough and I am not alone.

There are many others down in the pit. Others who have battled anxiety, or are still battling it. Others who need medication to get through the dailyness of life. Others who are afraid. Others who don’t have it all together. And it’s not so lonely in the pit, when you know there are others who are living it, who are living through it, and who say, “I get it.”

 Sometimes, the world is too much with us. (thank you William Wordsworth) The world is too much for us. And it doesn’t make us bad, or wrong, or shameful. It means we have come to the end of our  carefully crafted plans, and in so doing, we have come to the end of ourselves. And down there, in the darkness, we find light -- God’s Light of compassion, acceptance, and deep, deep love. The psalmist says,”…if I make my bed in the depths, You are there...even in the darkness I cannot hide from you.” Psalm 139:8, 12

We may feel alone, but the truth is, we are not alone.

To the young mama who is plumb worn out, exhausted from sleepless nights and toddlers’ endless tantrums … You are not alone.

To the older woman, who is caring for her elderly mother, making decisions about in-home care and hospice and things she never thought she’d have to … You are not alone.

To the college student, wrestling with new found independence mingled with a longing for the familiar, struggling with identity and faith … You are not alone.

To the middle-aged woman who found a lump, and had an MRI, and is facing an uncertain and scary future of treatment and disease … You are not alone.

 To the any aged woman or man who is facing divorce, or abortion, or estranged relationships, betrayal, or a mental illness, or chronic pain, or fill in the blank …. You are not alone.

 I still battle anxiety. I have lots of tools I know I can use and an amazing counselor and incredible friends and family who support me, but it hasn’t gone away. It might never. I guess I’m okay with that -- even though I hate it -- because it’s a reminder. A reminder that God is with me here. It’s a reminder that there are so many people battling so many things -- and the first stop in the journey is compassion. And it’s a reminder that I am not enough - I need God, and I need others, and it is exactly in my weakness that I find strength.