Something different
They say variety's the spice of life, so the other day just to shake things up a bit and try to break through those brutalist walls of routine and monotony, I thought it would be a good idea to have a panic attack at Walmart.
In hindsight, it was actually a very bad idea. So bad, that I'm considering filing an emotional distress lawsuit against whoever coined that bullshit varietyspice phrase, just as soon as I can identify who exactly that person is. It's their fault I poured too much anxiety on the breakfast burrito of life. Any tips are appreciated.
Anyway, as far as panic attacks go, this recent Walmart episode was relatively manageable, mainly because I've had so many before that I've figured out how to deal with them, and how to bring myself back down from redlining.
The first one was pretty terrifying, though.
Have you ever been driving a car down the highway and when you tried to slow down you realized the accelerator was stuck to the floor, and it was gonna take a whole lot longer to stop than you expected? I'm not sure if the newfangled vehicles Santa's pulling out of his bag these days ever ship with that bug, but with older cars it could sometimes happen. The options on such occasion were 1) reach under the gas pedal with your foot and pull back on it till it popped up, or 2) drop into neutral and try to get to a stop on the shoulder without any braking assistance from the engine. Either way, if you couldn't keep a clear head and solve the problem at 70mph in a few seconds then you would probably just crash and die.
That's more or less what your first panic attack feels like.
I hardly ever have panic attacks anymore, thanks be to all the gods, but a few years ago they were hitting me a couple times a week or so.
I didn't even know what was going on. I thought it was just some kind of dumb unlucky extension of the depression I was already coping with by drinking myself into oblivion every night. After all, it's much easier to handle difficult emotions when you're unconscious.
And then I dated a girl who knew what it was, and gave it a name for me. She's long gone now, of course, just like all the others, but I'll never forget her. Sometimes all it takes is one tiny little detail for you to remember someone forever.
I don't really know where I'm going with this post. But I do know that I'm trying to be more gentle with myself with respect to expecting everything I create to be indisputable perfection. I'll never hit publish again if I try to live up to that. I'd probably just have another panic attack.
Time to go. I'm running late for therapy, and I don't want to miss my favorite hour of the entire week.
HELL YEAH
That's an achievement 😁
Good luck with defeating the monsters. And yes, breathing is the key
Thanks. It was fated to happen, I didn't even notice till after I hit publish :)
I WANT A FUCKING JELLYFISH LAMP GOD DAMMIT.
Places like department stores are extremely overstimulating, and I'm really not surprised to hear they have panic attacks at Walmart, now, since you can get just about anything else there.
Argghhh, everyone does and feels things differently BUT I will say that what has helped me most with my anxiety is to just feel, let feelings exist, and acknowledge and appreciate them even if I have to remind them that they are part of a way of existing that no longer serves me. Sometimes that takes away their power.
I bet those jellyfish are good listeners.
They are. I was up all night last night talking to them. Your local Walmart probably sells them. If not I can mail you one.
Thanks for the tips :)
Seeing if my local Walmart has one would require entering my local Walmart and likely sharing in your panic attack experience (how empathetic of me!), but I can see if my local World Monopoly Product and Delivery Service has one. I told my cat about it and she wants one for Christmas, even though she's Buddhist.
Edit:
Oh, AND! I tend to deflect when people offer to do nice things; a habit I am working on overcoming. Thanks for the offer to send jellyfish. Very sweet of you!
Interesting. I picked up the habit of deflection when I was a kid. It's only recently that I'm starting to allow myself to accept compliments. I probably spent a third of my last therapy session just talking about that.
Best of luck on the jellyfish hunt!
One of my best friends had a panic attack while we were living together. Never had one myself but y'alls descriptions of the experience sounds eerily similar to doing too much adderall, and that's not an enjoyable experience. You ever shot at anybody during a panic attack?
I've never been on adderall but I used to work with a line cook who was. He was fucking fast, man.
Only the pig who was trying to arrest me for "excited delirium."
Just kidding, that's a joke.
That description is spot-on. That first one man, it throws your whole existence upside down. The rest suck too of course, but that first one is the worst. One of the things that irks me about panic attacks is that you can be in a great place for a long time and think you are done with them, and then randomly bam! The assholes come back. But like you said, you know what to do, so it isn't a big deal.
We've all got our ways and ideas and methods. I do the silence thing. I like eastern philosophies. Listening to that sweet, sweet silence instead of all the other crap going on in my head.
Yay for lights. The best part of the dark season. In regard to crooked pictures, they are great. My favorite pictures are with crooked horizons. Beach pictures with all their smoothness and muted colors so tame and then (like an asshole panic attack) bam! The horizon is diagonal. I vote to ignore photography standards. :)
Yeah… they really aren't nice about it, are they?
And I agree, it's fun to bend the photography rules a bit now and then. Horizons don't always need to be horizontal :)