A few weeks ago I had some really stressful and distressing
situations crop up in my life. Like not the usual, run of the mill
too-many-things type stress, but the blind-sighted, there was no way I could have
prepared for this, really-serious type stress. They were all separate,
unrelated situations but unfortunately they all happened at the same time.
Added to that, they happened at a time when I was on two different types of
antibiotics for two separate infections, and I also had a fair bit of the
ordinary type of stress going on as well with a busy period of work, study and
other personal commitments.
I handled the situations as well as I could, and for the
most part they had good outcomes. The thing was though, it didn’t stop there. Several
other upsetting situations cropped up, and it got to the point where I was
actually laughing at how many ridiculous things had happened in such a short
space of time. But because my resources were already low from dealing with the
first lot of issues, I was finding it harder to find the spoons to deal with
stuff effectively. And of course chronic illness is never a fan of stress so
health problems soon joined the party. Increased disease activity in the form
of weight loss, tremors, falls and pain were all now becoming sources of
stress, as well as being caused by it.
I resolved as many of the situations as I could, and did my
best to organise work and study to be more manageable. Unfortunately, none of
this made as much of a difference as I would have liked. For a lot of the
things I was dealing with, there weren’t simple solutions, and even when there
were, my emotions were often still left raw afterwards. The worst thing though
has been that my sleep disorder has been really out of control lately. Like
REALLY out of control. I’ve had multiple nights where I’ve woken up screaming,
and several times where I’ve injured myself, fallen or “blood pressured” myself
trying to run away from night terrors. After having a particularly bad night
where I fell several times and had to use my medical alarm, and then having an
utterly hideous night terror which I couldn’t wake up from just a few night
later, I’ve reached the point where I straight out feel afraid to sleep or even
go to bed.
I’ve been feeling for the last couple of weeks like my life
has just gotten too overwhelming, and I’ve been quietly reeling in panic trying
to figure out what to do (naturally all while keeping up the outwardly calm
on-top-of-everything appearance.) But then I realised, this isn’t about the
upsetting situations anymore, nor is about work, study or any of the other
things I’ve been attaching it to. At this point, I think I’m just stressed from
being stressed. My fight or flight response has been triggered so many times
recently, I’ve stopped allowing myself to relax in between and am constantly on
high alert. My threshold for stress has also been lowered, so I’m getting
triggered more easily anyway. The night terrors are a product of that, and the
only way I’m going to be able to resolve them is to calm the f*ck down.
Of course that is easier said than done, but I have managed
to find a few things that seem to be helping.I’m someone who tends to isolate myself when I’m feeling
overwhelmed. I know this isn’t good for me, but I also just haven’t been
feeling up to socialising all that much. I’ve been getting around this by
making myself go to more shows, panel discussions, poetry readings and things
like that – events where you don’t really have to talk to people, just go and
listen. Of course Wellington being the type of place it is, just about
everything I’ve gone to, I’ve run into at least one person I know and ended up
talking to them, but that’s probably has been a good thing in and of
itself. I’ve also started going to
weekly drop-in meditation classes, practicing relaxation exercises at home
along with calming activities like knitting, and I’ve gone back to slow reading club. All things that help me relax and hopefully, with time, will start to
calm my system and let it know it’s okay to let go of the flight or fight mode.
In terms of the sleep, I’ve been trying strategies such as moving into my spare
room instead of my own bed, and telling myself that I’m not going to sleep,
just reading in bed so I don’t get as anxious about it.
I think the fact that I’ve realised this is about stress
itself rather than any specific problem has helped a little in itself, as it’s
stopped me trying to fix things that aren’t broken. At this point I can’t
change any of what’s happened, I can only try to change my reactions to it. So
for now, my sleep is still a problem. I’m still having vivid dreams and night
terrors, and still scared of going to bed – it’s midnight and I’m writing this
and talking to overseas friends online to avoid it! But I know that with time
this will all settle down, I just have to not let it become another source of
stress in the meantime.
Thanks for reading,
Little Miss Autoimmune
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