How Do YOU Spell Anxiety?

How about

o-v-a-r-i-a-n c-a-n-c-e-r
m-e-l-a-n-o-m-a
l-u-n-g c-a-n-c-e-r
b-o-n-e c-a-n-c-e-r
b-r-a-i-n t-u-m-o-r

and most recently, b-l-a-d-d-e-r c-a-n-c-e-r

Yes, anxiety can be spelled many different ways. So why am I writing about this tonight? Because I'm struggling more than usual with my ever-present anxiety disorder that specifies itself to intense fear of fatal diseases. Over the years, I've dealt (in my mind) with all of the above- mentioned illnesses and many others. Why talk about it? Because I've found that with most taboo topics, secrecy only gives them exaggerated and undeserved power. Talking openly about such topics strips them of this power, and that is good. Very good.

I can't remember a time that I didn't worry about terminal illness. I'm sure it has been since childhood. In the early days of our marriage, I had this comprehensive health book. I would follow Gerald around the house, reading him all the symptoms of whatever illness I was sure I had, which he referred to as "the disease of the week."

Me: "Look! Look! It says exhaustion is one of the symptoms of this? I MUST have it."

Gerald: "Of course you're exhausted. We're BOTH exhausted. You haven't let either one of us sleep for the last three nights!"

Please feel free to laugh here. Because it's funny. It really is. And if we don't laugh about it, we're going to cry. Laughing is better.

With the advent of the Internet, I had the world of diseases at my fingertips. I could Google any disease I wanted and immediately find all the gory details of its symptoms. From there, it was only a matter of hours before my mind caused me to develop the exact physical symptoms I read about. It's amazing how that works. My grandma was a Christian Scientist. I am not. As most of you know, I'm a committed Latter-day Saint, and as such, I'm thankful for the care of competent physicians. Still, in this one way, the Christian Scientists are spot on. The mind/body connection is incredible. While they would maintain the body doesn't actually exist (and, therefore, cannot become sick), I would maintain that the body most certainly does exist, and that the mind has incredible power over it.

Anxiety, itself, is biological. The saying "It's all in your head" couldn't be more true. For those of us with anxiety disorders, the serotonin in our brains does not hang around long enough where it needs to. End of story.

Eventually, Gerald basically banned me from all medical sites. The only medical condition I am allowed to research is anxiety. Nothing else. Seven years ago when we first moved to Montana and lived in a dorm for four months, and my anxiety was spinning out of control (was it lung cancer that time?), I sought the help of an employee assistance mental health counselor named Joe. He was really great, more help than I could have imagined, having lived with this stuff for so long. One thing he suggested was that I not allow myself to focus on the specific illness I think I have. Instead, I'm supposed to say, "I'm struggling with my anxiety" because that is the truth.

It's not easy, but it's good advice. And I try. In recent years, I've stopped waking Gerald at night. I figure at least one of us should sleep, right? And he can't really help anyway because regardless of how many logical and rational arguments he makes to support the fact that I'm the most physically healthy person he knows, when I'm sure I have a terminal disease, nothing can dissuade me. There's nothing logical or rational about it; that's what makes it anxiety.

So tonight, I'm trying hard to stay focused on the things I know to be true, at least intellectually. One of those is that I probably don't have bladder cancer. Try as I might, though, all the "fight or flight" anxiety symptoms are in full swing. And since I choose to deal with this disorder sans medication (because I'm at least as frightened of taking medication as I am of dying of a fatal disease), I'm doing everything I know how to do to combat it in other ways: plenty of exercise, healthy diet, regular sleep schedule, and relaxation/visualization.

And blogging. :-)