Anxiety Within the Person with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
July 11, 2006 by laura
Filed under Diseases & Conditions
Something interesting happened last night. I live in a house with an alarm system. For whatever reason, the alarm kept going off, with the light next to the trouble button flashing. Everything was fine, but I couldn’t get the alarm to turn off. After about 2 hours, it finally stopped. That is, until someone tripped the alarm again…..and so we were back to square one. I know that I was safe, and that there was no intruder. However, that didn’t stop my mind from going to places where it shouldn’t go.
I could hear the “beep beep beep” through the covers, that I had pulled up over my head. I tried concentrating on my breathing, but the more I focused on it, the shallower and more labored it got. The more energy I spent trying to ignore the alarm, the harder it got to avoid it. The only way I got to sleep, was that I just passed out from the exhaustion from worrying. You may ask how I am feeling today ~although I suspect you know the answer. I am very very tired, I have huge black circles under my eyes, I had absolutely no focus, and I make just about everyone around me tired.
Anxiety is the cause of today’s exhaustion. I worried about something that I couldn’t fix, until I was physically unable to worry about it any longer. Although that didn’t stop me from waking up several times, to check the alarm situation. I know that anxiety is something that almost everyone deals with. Certainly its something that PWC’s know well. More than a few of us were misdiagnosed with a panic or anxiety disorder, before getting the proper prognosis.
I found a really interesting chart on the CFIDS.org website, comparing CFIDS to anxiety disorders.
Click here to view the chart and read the article.
Feel free to let me know how you deal with issues of anxiety. I certainly need some help in this area.
UGH! I feel your pain. Re: the alarm, could the backup battery be dying? We had the same thing happen to us. Call the alarm company; they’ll be able to tell you how to replace the battery.
Re: anxiety. I was not an anxious person before CFIDS, but an increase in anxiety coincides with exacerbation of other symptoms for me. My first line of defense is my husband, who I can count on to soothe and calm me by listening and then reassuring me, even talking me through deep breathing if necessary. If a person doesn’t have a partner, then a friend could do the same, over the phone.
My other coping mechanism is talking to myself. I will ask myself “what if?” so I can play out the scenario. For example, I would ask myself what if the alarm won’t stop, what if there is someone in the house, etc. Playing out the options in my head helps identify whether there is any action to be taken, and also makes the problem look more manageable.
I reached a point a few years ago where I asked myself, do I want this kind of worry in my life? I made a conscious decision not to let myself worry excessively, and that has really helped.
Jennie
Jennie, you were totally right about the alarm situation….somehow that didnt make the anxiety go away. in fact brought on whole new ones.
Those are really great tips about battling anxiety. Usually I try to think things logically, write them down…whatever needs to be done to get it out of my head. But on the rare occasion, I get sucked into the “story”, and can’t seem to find a way out.
Anyway, this cause (alarm) is easily fixed, so everything should be back to normal today.
thanks for your suggestions.
Morning Laura, it has been a few days since I have read your blogs. I was busy one day, and then paid for it the next, and then the next day after that, I got so exhausted and my body was aching all over. I feel a bit better today, but still taking it easy.
As for handling anxiety, let me tell you how I handled my mother’s death, wake and funeral. It might sound strange, but I removed myself from being there and from all feelings. In other words, I was there in person, but my mind, and sould was somewhere else. Of course I look like the cold one, the one without feelings, but I had to do this to get through everything. I was also very sick with a terrible cold which had already lasted several weeks, so I knew the cold would get worse if I just feel apart there. Once everything was over with, I went home, the services were in Massachusetts I live in NH, and then I allowed myself to feel. Yes, I got sicker in a few days, after letting myself become me again, but it was something I expected and I could handle. It has taken me several months to get myself back to where I feel like the real me, but it is the way I handle things now. Karen
Karen, I am really glad to hear that you are feeling a bit better….taking it easy, helps a lot.
The way you handled the stress and anxiety which was related to your mother’s death doesn’t sound strange at all. Actually it makes a lot of sense. It is how “we” cope. It isn’t the healthiest way of course….or so I am told. But it certainly does feel like the only choice to us. I totally know what it feels like to have to hold things in, until I feel an appropriate moment arrives to let it out, its not always possible though.
I took a course a few months ago about Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction. It is about meditation and “being present”. It has certainly helped with my stress reduction…although the alarm thing that happened was well….alarming, and for whatever reason, I wasnt able to apply the things that I learned. Basically its about acknowledging the now, that there is no past and no future, there is only the present. It seems to be helping me, at least on day to day stuff…but nothing terribly stressful has happened since then.
Thank you for sharing your story.
~Laura
Hi, when I was fatigued, I was also anxious. I saw a psychotherapist for 8 years, which helped the anxiety quite a bit as I learned more about coping with life’s challenges. But psychotherapy did not stop the fatigue. I found the solution to the fatigue through the 3LS Wellness Program. As I practiced and my health condition improved, I noticed that I had had a constant level of anxiety that was just melting away. So improving my health alone was enough to resolve much of the anxiety. Now, I have neither fatigue nor anxiety.
If you would like to learn more about the 3LS Wellness Program, it is described in the book “Recapture Your Health” by Walt Stoll, MD and Jan DeCourtney, CMT. Dr. Stoll is a retired holistic physician and Jan is a massage therapist. The program is easy to follow and very effective for fatigue conditions.
I empathize with your situation and hope that you can find your path of healing. Best wishes to you.
Jan,
I am so excited to learn that you found a way to effectively deal with your situation. That is excellent news. I love hearing things like this.
For the most part, i deal pretty well with anxious situations…definitely the meditation has been helping me. I find it interesting now, how I deal when it just sneaks up on me…and I somehow forget to use what I know. I definitely know that it will get better, as long as I keep practicing.
Thanks for the suggestion of the book….I will look into getting a copy on my next shopping spree.
Thanks again!!!
Laura