My anxiety has a voice. It’s only very recently I’ve realised that it’s the voice of chronic anxiety (although I hate labels like that). It’s a negative voice by default constantly popping up in all kinds of scenarios warning me of some impending doom. But I don’t think it (meaning the voice) or me are intrinscially ‘negative’ and I think it’s unfair and inaccurate to label it as “being a negative person” or having “negative self talk”. It’s a protection mechanism – the anxiety is trying to protect me (or you) from something or warn me. But, paradoxically, rather than keeping me (or you) safe, it does the diametric opposite and creates debilitating non-action within me, or sends stress hormones and tension coursing through my body and a heart rate to match. That’s a fight or flight stress response to something imaginary. Not healthy. And if I don’t watch it, the chemical soup could kill me off.
Here’s how my anxiety usually shows up: it’s a battle cry, the voice of impending doom expecting the worst in any given situation and immediately begins to prepare me for worst case scenarios and worse case conversations. Someone’s out to get you; someone hates you; someone wants to ruin your life. That is its modus operandi for self-preservation but it’s more like me hitting the self-destruct button. The anxiety usually manifests as imaginary arguments and imaginary altercations and I literally conjure up an argument or altercation with someone imaginary or living that might never happen, spiralling me into a self-defensive stupor. It’s a mental movie that I’ll play, rehearsing what I’m going to say to prepare myself for the impending attack that might never happen. This has been happening for years but it’s only now I realise that it’s the voice of chronic anxiety. For instance, I was driving to my friend’s casual venue on Saturday afternoon, tucked away in the lovely English countryside, on a gorgeous sunny afternoon, when I got consumed by The Voice that said “he’s got a group attending for a casual birthday event”, (me) “yes I know but he said it’s okay his venue wasn’t booked off for a private event so open to punters” (The Voice) “but what if you can’t park where you normally do at the top because you drive up and it’s blocked off and you’ll look like a twit trying to turn the car around??” and “what if you get accosted by one of the party who don’t want strangers there and has a go at you for gate-crashing someone’s birthday” (me) “I’ll say my friend invited me I’ve known him for a few years and he told me it wasn’t booked off for a private event…..” (The Voice has now morphed into a stranger that I’m having an argument with about gate crashing their birthday party). And with the imaginary person I’ll begin to defend myself in the mental movie. It’s a kill joy. And it’s happening every day all the time. This will turn into War and Peace if I write about every single time I do that although I may start to document it more. I did do it last Friday in the car going to hand a big fat bundle of paperwork into court and having a mental-movie argument with the surly, uncongenial cow bag I’ve met there before who told me last time that I “don’t need a counter appointment to hand in paperwork” and quizzing me if I’ve “made an appointment” and “you can drop it off in the drop box at reception” and with all these retorts I was mounting my defence. I didn’t meet her after all that. It was a nice bloke called Kevin.
Is that what you call fighting with yourself? I prepare myself to go on the battlefield, when there’s no battle in sight. I do this *a lot* in all types of situations, preparing myself for a fight, expecting that I’m going to be attacked in some way. It’s hyper-vigilance. It’s survival mode on steroids.
I know The Voice was exacerbated in personal situations and professional environments when I’ve found myself unexpectedly ambushed by a hater in a verbal attack, be it face to face but usually via text or email, being picked apart and left feeling unsupported. Even now I avoid reading messages and checking emails, thinking that an attack might be lurking within them, often for days I won’t open messages or emails feeling I’ll be unable to cope. It’s like that with email isn’t it: you open it and it smacks you right in the face that visceral jolt and shudder, the lead-ballooon type sinking feeling like you’ve been punched but without the actual pain. A chemical rush in ripples and waves starts at your head and washes over you ending in your gut region. That’s the actual feeling of a verbal attack, written or face to face. Having had too much of that time and again has anchored the anxiety firmly in my psyche.
Is the trick to become friends with The Voice? Say Hi to it? Tell it that you know it’s there but I don’t need its help right now? You know, validate it, stroke it like a kitten and then say we’ll play later?
I’ve been particularly attuned to the The Voice for some time but just thought I was being ‘negative’; I never realised that I’m ‘suffering’ with chronic anxiety and I don’t actaully know when it became an official affliction or whether it’s being growing over the years with the layers of trauma. The thing is trauma and any associated grief is cumulative – and it’s a cumulatively negative load. I’ve had unhealed childhood trauma stuffed into the shadows of my psyche, living with CPTSD rendering my nervous system handicapped with the inability to function correctly as it was shot to pieces; in addition to that, slather on layers of life traumas, big and small, and it becomes a negative heavy load to ‘carry’. And I believe (this is only my belief) is that these cumulative traumas morph into a pain body and the voice of that pain body is anxiety. The Voice. It’s not that ‘you’re negative’; you’re carrying layers that need to be addressed (that haven’t been yet) and something within wants to protect you. Anxiety is like a battle cry from a knight in shining armour who leaves you with your sword drawn and scared shitless on an empty battlefield. It’s the smoke alarm that never goes off; the light house that’s lit all day long. It wants you to feel safe or is trying to save you (from the possible impending doom). And after the stress and tension has disspated and real life hasn’t brought you any doom, I wonder what the fuck I was worried about…
If baring my soul to you (and the world) has moved or touched a part of you in any way, then your support would be very welcome. To help me on this healing journey, perhaps you’d like to buy me a coffee (although mines a tea) via the link below:
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