Shadows and Worry

These past few months have not ceased to amaze me… Even though I’ve learned a lot about myself, I’m still struggling to understand, process and implement all the things I need in order to be a better version of me.  And to be honest, I think part of the reason why is fear.  Fear of change, fear of the unknown and a huge fear of failure…again.

I’ve failed a lot… they cling to me like a shadow I can’t get rid of!

Yes I have some successes, and I’m not negating that I have five beautiful kids that I wouldn’t trade for anything in this life.  I finally have a business, career and partners that I am extremely proud of (although it took many failures to get here…another post sometime)… but I still have the constant stresses, anxiety, fear, depression and worry.

I spent a good part of my weekend (when I was supposed to spend it with my kids), in the emergency room worried I was having a heart attack…. now, being a health care provider myself, I am usually pretty in tune with how the body works, so I don’t rush to the doctor or hospital for just anything.  For a couple of weeks, things just felt ‘off’.  I’ve had trouble sleeping for months, but was beginning to experience symptoms that I tried to pass off as lack of sleep, but I began to worry.  Over the course of the days that followed, my stress and anxiety worsened as my fear of my increasing symptoms began to become overwhelming….seriously concerning High Blood Pressure, chest tightness and pain, laboured breathing, headaches, dizziness, and a disconnected feeling I still can’t describe!  My shadow grew and felt like it was consuming me.

As I sat in the emergency room being told by several doctors that all my tests for my heart were negative (thank God), I began to worry that it was something else… This couldn’t be all from stress?!?

Years of internalizing emotions, years of stress and anxiety, years of trying to cope by myself while trying to watch out for others had finally caught up to me….but I don’t know how to deal with this now.

I’ve been checking my blood pressure a couple times a day to see if there is a change, but it’s still been very high, compounding my anxiety, keeping my mind in a shadow.

so now enter Worry…  like a thief, stealing my day and consuming my thoughts for the past few days.  I can’t shake the feeling that any minute something else could happen, and what about tomorrow, what about next week, month, year…

Our days are full of questions, doubts, anxieties and worries.  We all have the desire to wonder about what is around life’s corner.  I truly believe that even those that preach about “living in the moment”, have some thoughts and worry about the future.  It’s a part of our human nature to question and to doubt and to worry.  Its the fear of the unknown that captivates our desire to search for answers… and even though I know that I have no clue what will happen tomorrow, or what will happen when I close my laptop and say goodbye to the beautiful Starbucks staff and walk out the door tonight, I will try to hold on to the fact that the sun will rise tomorrow. I will still have the same worries and the same anxieties, I can’t see that changing anytime soon, but what good does it do to focus on the worry.

One thought I do have about how to deal with this mess I have inside my head, and the mess that might be in yours as well…change your focus.  Worry is something we all face everyday, but if we focus on the shadows that follow us, we will remain lost and worried… A beautiful Switchfoot song, “the Shadow proves the Sunshine” plays in my mind…funny coincidence (or not), I pulled out the album (Nothing is Sound) that has this song on it about a week before all this new physical scare started, and my Dad also randomly made mention of it… so I think my new focus will be to acknowledge the stress, doubts, fears and anxieties, but instead of allowing the worry to consume and steal my day, I will try to focus on the fact that the shadows prove that there is sunshine.  That although life is hard and there is plenty to worry about, there is also plenty to be thankful for, that this is a part of life, but I don’t need to let it be the focus of my day.  Some days all I can say is “I’m breathing” and maybe that is enough…

I don’t have the answer to this one… I think this post brings more questions then answers.  But I will try to remember that the shadows are there, but they prove that the sun is also shinning and I’m still alive…so that’s something!

Hang on friends… there is hope in our journey’s, our worries are strong and linger like shadows, but lets try and focus on the sun and hopefully have some brighter days!

text 7058682616 if your shadows are too much and you can’t seem to find the light…I’d love to chat and help…I’m in the middle of the shadows myself and trying to find my own sunshine.

Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.

Corrie ten Boom