Coping with anxiety and fear of being in trouble

Hey there @peps . Sounds like the "thought stacking" phenomena is going on. I could be wrong but I'm seeing thoughts in a kind of stack-like formation.

I'm going to try apply my own lived experience and say a key spell-breaker of thought stacking is honest emotion. Pretty sure, one of the things happening, is the amygdala tries to speed up when it's better off slowing down. That way way it can clear the emotional inbox one emotion at a time.

For me that usually involves vocalizing. Sometimes in words but certainly not always.

Hey @peps sounds like it's a rough time for you right now. Can be so anxiety-inducing to feel like there's something really bad waiting for you when you get back to work! And then having other memories resurface as well, it's all quite a lot to be feeling hey. I'll list some stuff that has helped me in the past, maybe something will help.

• Deep breathing exercises - my go-to is 4-7-8 (breathe in for four counts, hold for 7, out for 8, you can do like 3-5-6 if that's easier), especially after I learned that our heart rate actually increases slightly when we inhale, and decreases slightly when we exhale. So making the inhale shorter and exhale longer will actually physically lower your heart rate!
• Change your environment - sometimes if I'm in a low place, just moving into a different room or going to a different place can help shake some feelings. Even just changing the lighting and putting on music can help.
• Grounding - especially helpful when memories and flashbacks are being extra intrusive. You can use a sensory exercise (find all the red things you can see, or see how many different sounds you can distinguish), do a body scan, or hold onto some ice cubes and really focus on that cold sensation.
• Remind myself that worrying about a thing won't change its outcome. Can be super hard at times, but it's a form of compartmentalisation that focuses on only attending to negative things when you can actually do something to change them.
• Call a friend - Sometimes it helps to talk things through, and sometimes you can ask them to help distract you!
• Do something creative - colouring in, little DIY crafts, scribbles and doodles; usually doing creative stuff occupies my mind just enough that I am not thinking about much else.
• Dance - literally one of my favourite forms of self-care. It combines exercise, creativity, and sweet tunes! I also often visualise shaking off the negative vibes whilst I flail myself about in my kitchen haha.

I hope this helps. I'm happy to sit with you a bit too, if you wanna chat about anything 💜

Hi @peps !

For me, when traumatic thoughts pop up, I link it to something trivial so as to train my brain to associate the traumatic thought with something light.

The more the thought comes, the more I park a pink ice-cream mr whippy van in the middle of the thought. This then changes the direction of the initial thought.

this skill sounds really stupid, but with practice, it really comes in handy. I learnt it from my psychologist, but it was I who came up with the pink ice cream van. Your version of the ‘van’ might be different such a scene from a movie, a hug from someone, your pet.

Let me know if you decide to give it a go.

Hi @BPDSurvivor @Jynx @wellwellwellnez ,

Thank you for all the helpful ideas I have tried to use a few of them which has helped a little. @BPDSurvivor I used your ice cream van idea when I was anxiously on my way to work. I found it really helpful to just get a bit of relief from the thoughts for a minute. I'm still really anxious about the mistake I made but I'm trying to remind myself I didn't do it on purpose and I can learn from it. Hoping it gets better with time, hoping the trauma memories are going to reduce. I don't know why but I also seem to remember the negative experiences more than the positive.

Peps

I'm glad you tried the ice-cream van technique @peps . The more you do it, the more your brain learns that these thoughts are not threats.

As for having more negative than positive thoughts, it reminds us you are human! Through evolution has made us that way so as to survive. Without anxiety and these negative thoughts, we wouldn't survive and predators would soon take us away. Unfortunately, that part of evolution hasn't changed as we enter into the modern world - and hence can be problematic.

So really, everything you are experiencing is VERY normal.