ANXIETY

I lost a follower.  It happens and I don't take it personally, except maybe when I write about something personal like my last post and the next time I log on, I notice I've lost a follower.  Then it might hurt just a little, tiny bit...


Several of us are writing about what happens when food and fat are no longer around to insulate us from whatever it is that the food and fat protected us from.  Draz wrote a great post about what happens when being thin doesn't "fix" our life like we thought it would. For me I've noticed that one of the functions my disordered eating used to serve was helping me to do with anxiety and now that it's gone, the anxiety has become bigger and more difficult to manage.

Like right now.  I work as a property manager and as such some of my interactions with tenants are not pleasant.  There are a few specific tasks that I must do as part of my job that I have intense anxiety about.  To the point that when I know these tasks are coming up, I become a complete mess.  In my mind everything becomes tainted by this fear of what I've got to face.  I have difficulty enjoying things I'd normally enjoy because of the worry.  These fears don't stay at work either.  They creep into my regular life.  They interfere with my sleep.  I obsess about them.  I pray that I won't have to do it.


The tasks are conflict-related tasks: times when I have to deal with someone face-to-face (or on the phone) in a conflict situation.  The worst stress comes from time when I have to go to court with people.  I'm usually okay with the evictions that I must process through the courts.  I do those every couple of months or so and they don't normally evoke any major response from me.  The ones that freak me out are money disputes with people that go through small claims court.  The actual process isn't that big of deal, but the lead-up to the experience causes me to be riddled with anxiety and stress.  I have a court case scheduled with a former tenant (and alcoholic who is actively drinking) for August 29th.  I feel like the rest of my summer is ruined because I have to do this.  Usually my co-worker (and sister) would go with me and her presence is very calming to me, but she has to go to court with her ex-husband that day so I'll be on my own. 

I know that it will work out.  I think that the courts are usually pretty fair.  Intellectually I know that everything will be okay.  It isn't personal.  Even if I lose, the world will keep spinning.  But this horrible fear still runs loose in my head.  It has influenced everything in my life since I learned of the court case on Monday.  It isn't a rational response.  I now have no outlet for the anxiety that I once would have coped with by overeating.  And when I feel like that, I start feeling like I'm all on my own.  Like I have no one to turn to for help in life.  These emotions clouded the post I wrote the other day in which I talked about my relationship with my kids' dad.  Because I am feeling overwhelmed, my attitude in the post was that there were no redeeming qualities in our relationship which probably isn't accurate.  It was just the way I was feeling at the moment that I wrote the words.  It was influenced by this horrible feeling of dread and anxiety that is clouding my mind right now.

In a perfect world, I'd probably seek medical help for this anxiety, but I don't have health insurance so that would require careful planning.  I would need to save money for the office visit and the prescription.  It would probably be October before I had the funds and that would be too late.  This only comes up a few times a year with the court stuff.  I also have limited situations that are more common,  but also happen spontaneously so I don't have to worry about them for weeks. I have the same anxiety when a tenant comes in pissed off about a maintenance issue or a problem with their neighbor, but I don't have to think about it over several days.  They come in, we talk, the situation gets resolved.  Pretty much any conflict can invoke this reaction, even conflicts with my fella (or with my daughter's soccer team, another one of the fun things I have going on right now).  Often I just bury my head in the sand and try to ignore whatever is going on, but the fear still runs rampant in my mind.

Oh, yeah, my youngest daughter also has LICE (eek!) (well, hopefully not anymore), my fella is only working one day this week, I am up a bit on the scale, I just realized when I was planning to go camping next weekend for probably the last trip of the year, I also have an opportunity to make some money so now I have to decide what I'd rather do, and I have to work alone for the next two days.  I also have some fun things coming in the next couple days so I hope I can get out of this funk.

On a completely unrelated topic, I wish I had a cool tag-line to end all my posts like, "Now you have the skinny!" so I wouldn't have to think of a nice way to wrap up my post without just trailing off like I tend to do.