Feelings that aren’t feelings.

If I made a cloud diagram of my Google searches in the past couple of weeks, this would be the results (imagine a cloud):

Insomnia, palpitations, weight gain, weight loss, emotional eating, insomnia and itching, anxiety and itching, nervous ticks…etc.

WHAT the hell? I was fine, and all of a sudden I break down. One of my best friends from Louisiana came to visit me and as soon as he got here my nervous system wen to pieces. I am a master jigsaw-puzzler and I could not figure it out. I couldn’t put the pieces back together. 

Ever since his vista I’ve been slightly out of breath, not enough to worry me but enough to annoy me and worry me about a deeper cause. I’ve been scared of crowded places, which is a pretty big deal when you live in Manhattan, and I’ve been staying home more often than not. 

I even think my weird depression is affecting my dog. Stevie has been sleeping longer hours, and he has been eating less. 

The problem is that I’m not quite sure what feelings are causing this. Yes, I’m lonely. Yes, it’s the 3 year anniversary of my bachelorettehood. Yes, I’m unemployed and can’t figure out what the hell I want to do with my life. 

Well, maybe I have a reason to be sad. Several reasons. 

Why I’m scared to exit social media.

 

I remember when Myspace was a thing, way before we started customizing our own pages so much that our viewer’s  internet connection slowed down. I was guilty for having the pointer that carried a star trail behind it. I was also guilty for the GIF that probably provided you with a virus. 

 

My Timeline on Facebook gets worse everyday. I have an average of 11 political posts, 8 Christian posts, 7 baby posts, and 3 hair salon posts. that’s just today, not including the beard posts, the anti-thigh gap posts, and the cute animal posts which amount to around 30. 

I’ve been a member of Facebook for quite a while. In fact, I remember having to provide a scholastic e-mail address in order to join the website. Now it’s a shit show. People are posting pictures of cats, status updates about their ever changing weight, and videos of people pouring cold water on their heads. 

 

Why am I so scared of getting rid of my Facebook profile? I’ll make a list. 

 

• I’ve been with Facebook since the beginning of time:  I was with FB when they had to have had a .EDU e-mail. I was with FB when I was working my first job. I was with FB when I was an unexpected freshman in college. 
• I’ve moved around so much that I consider FB my connection to my past: I contact old friends through the site. I contact international family members through the platform. FB acts as a digital photo album of which I lack the physical representation.

Anyway, the site is great, but not everyone needs a voice.

Best,

Me.

 

 

Waiting on the Call: Part Deux

Just a quick update for anyone who read my last post. I got the job! The call came through and, even though I dropped my phone on the concrete upon answering and had to call them back, they offered me a position.

I’m on cloud 16.

And the picture of my dog is to celebrate the occasion with cuteness.

Waiting on the Call

The bar where I was working closed a little over a month ago. At first I thought it would be easy to find another job because of my experience, but after ten botched interviews I began to see things differently and lose hope. 

I started going to interviews with a negative mindset, thinking there was no way in hell I was going to get that job because if I hadn’t been offered a position already then why should they? And just a couple of weeks ago, I stopped going to interviews altogether. I would still send resumes out and set up interviews over the phone, but after setting the appointment I would yelp the location and imagine they wouldn’t hire me. The restaurant was too nice, the bar was too popular, the other bartenders were much taller, my mixology knowledge wasn’t perfect enough. I found every excuse to not go to an interview.

Yesterday I stepped out of my comfort zone and applied to a start-up company that had nothing to do with bar tending. Two hours after I submitted my application I got a phone call and a phone interview, which I nailed. The woman who interviewed me asked if, although it was very short notice, I would go to a group interview that was taking place in two hours because she really wanted to meet me.

The prospect of a group interview was harrowing to me, but I went anyway. I felt right about, like my chakras had aligned or my energy took a shift for the positive all of a sudden.

I nailed the group interview and now I’m experiencing the worst part of the job application process: waiting. They told me they would call by Thursday, and even though it’s only Wednesday I’m starting to lose hope. I really want this job and against my better judgement I got my hopes up. It feels very much like when you have a crush on someone and you keep checking your phone to see if they texted or called, or e-mailed, or face booked, or tweeted, or even sent you a smoke signal.

AHHH! I really want to hear from these people!

The Stigma of Being Single

I can still remember my first heartbreak. I was living in Spain and attending kindergarten. I remember that first day when my parents dropped my off and the teachers closed the gate, separating me from the only people I’d ever know. I jumped onto the bars of the gate and started screaming and crying, like a very angry, blonde monkey. One of the teachers had to coax me down and almost drag me to the classroom.

It took a couple of weeks for me to go into the building willingly. The tantrum became routine: My parents would drop me off, I would latch onto the gate, and then a teacher would walk me inside after convincing me that they would be back in a few hours. Sometimes I wish I was still brave enough to throw a tantrum of that magnitude when facing something I don’t want to do.

Then I met Fernando. He was in my class and sat at my table. Sometimes I would borrow his colored pencils and he would always compliment me on my drawings. He must have had great taste because I was an awesome artist.

One day, during recess, one of the girls was explaining the concept of boyfriends and girlfriends to the group. She’s probably a huge slut now because we were only five or six. I don’t exactly remember how she described it, but I think it had something to do with kissing. Our group decided we were going to go out and get boyfriends, and I had my eye on Fernando. He was playing soccer with the boys. I found no reason to be nervous about propositioning someone at that age, so I went up to him right before the bell rang and asked him “Do you want to be my boyfriend?”

He said no. I was confused. That wasn’t how it was supposed to work. According to the girls, we were supposed to have boyfriends by the time we went back to class. There was another boy named Fernando in my grade and I figured as long as he had the same name it wouldn’t really matter. So I walked up to Fernando II, who was also playing soccer, and asked him. He told me no as well. The bell rang, and I was the only girl without a boyfriend.

Fast forward 21 years. I am still that girl who went back to class with no boyfriend. All of my friends are getting married, having children, and leading a pleasant, domestic life in suburbia. My cousins in Spain are all paired off, and even the younger ones are having children.

Every time I speak to a family member, they ask me if I have a boyfriend yet. One of my relatives even asked if maybe there was a girl in my life, but I told her that even though open to the idea I had no one. No boy, no girl, no one.

Dating is different in my world. I live on a island with millions of other people, a large portion of which are models and actors. Relatives in Spain are used to small town life where you usually end up with your high school sweetheart or end up married by the time you’re 21. Personally, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with waiting. I don’t want to settle for someone I’m not completely passionate about, and although my grandparents may never get to meet my children, they can still meet my puppy.

How I Handle Anxiety

Found this on Facebook earlier. I think it really hits the nail on the head as far as anxiety and anxiety attacks go. 

I can usually feel mine coming a mile away. I become very aware of my own heartbeat and blood pressure. They happen a lot during hangovers or when I haven’t had much to eat. They also occur if I’m dehydrated, over-caffeinated, over-stimulated, and in close quarters. I’ve had a couple on the 6 train. Those were not fun. 

The first thing that happens is I realize I’m on the verge of a panic attack. Having had more than I can count, I’m no stranger to the symptoms. My pulse changes. Either my heart rate increases or my heart beats so hard it feels like it’s in my throat. Then I begin sweating. The sweating makes me itchy and the itchiness makes me start tapping my foot or digging my nails into my stomach fat. Usually if my heart is in my throat I put my hand near my chest, like on a necklace or something, instead of my stomach. While all of this is happening, adrenaline starts pumping through me and I begin to feel like I need to get out of wherever I am. And, as many of you know, things just escalate from there.

I’ve gotten my panic attacks almost completely under control (with the hangover exception; I can’t control those very well) and I’d like to share some of my tips. They probably won’t work for everyone, but who knows?

One thing I do is reach for my phone. I have a slew of mind numbing games on it that require little to no thought but still keep me engaged. I don’t recommend high stress games, like Diner Dash or the traffic control games. But maybe Farmville or Candy Crush. I also downloaded a logic puzzle that seems to help. And word games are great too, especially the ones where you have to form words out of other words.

I’ve been told breathing exercises help, but they don’t help me. They only make me more aware of my heartbeat which makes things even worse. However, I mentally chant my little mantra I described in the post about Hypnosis which helps me regain some mental control over my own body and fight back instead of being a victim to my own adrenaline.

A not so healthy method of mine is eating. Usually something hot, like soup of  Chef Boyardee. He’s my favorite chef and reminds me of high school, a time when bills weren’t suffocating me.

If you have headphones handy, listening to some soothing music might help. Not necessarily soothing, but something that soothes you. I always put my Pandora on Janis Joplin radio, but if any Pink Floyd comes on I skip it because their music over-stimulates me. 

And if all else fails I call someone. It doesn’t matter who. Usually someone I trust, like a friend or my mother or sister. I never tell them that I’m having a panic attack because, as the image above shows, some advice just isn’t helpful. I just chat, rabidly asking about their day and their plans for the week. I soak up the information and it calms me down because they are calm as well.

Anyway, those are just some of the things I do to avoid or ease a panic attack. The best way for me to avoid them, however, is to stay away from behaviors that cause them like smoking, drinking, eating excessive sugar, or in my case watching anything remotely scary.

If anyone wants to add anything in the comments, feel free!!!

On Binge Watching TV

I can’t stand a quiet apartment. I would rather hear Lucille Bluth’s staccato laugh, Tyrion Lannister’s witty comebacks to his incestuous sister, or Frasier’s pretentious banter with Marty Crane. These characters keep me company. Unfortunately, these characters also keep me home.

On days like today, a day I like to call “a shit hangover day”, I tend to oversleep, order food from Seamless, cuddle with the dog, and watch shows that I’ve already watched. In fact, on hangover days I cannot tolerate watching something I haven’t seen before. I’ve tried, and it makes me nauseous. I would much rather spend time memorizing funny lines from Arrested Development or The Office.

As comfortable as I feel sitting on my couch and spacing out, I can never shake the feeling that it’s Saturday Night. The Last Staurday that I will ever be 25 years old. You see, next saturday is my birthday. I should be out with my friends enjoying life, enjoying the city, and enjoying my fleeting youth. But I choose to stay home instead, in the accepting company of Netflix. I don’t have to worry about putting on make-up or spending what limited funds I have. I also don’t have to worry about drinking too much and having another Shit Hangover Day tomorrow.

Therefore, tonight I will sit in a ratty old t-shirt, watch things I have already seen, and enjoy this solitude. I will also work on this new blog.

Sleep: The Comfortable, Temporary Escape

I’ve always been a sleeper. My father is a musician and a night owl. He usually woke up after lunch time and began a workday that would last until 6am. I guess I took after him because I’ve never been a morning person, at least not the way most people are. The only thing I do when the sun comes up is go to sleep. 

I’ve tried to adjust my schedule a million times. I tried resetting my clock by staying awake a whole day then going to sleep at a reasonable time. I’ve tried taking a sleeping pill at a normal hour that way I would wake up with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, my stubborn internal clock would always reset itself to it’s unusual hours after a couple of days of normalcy.

Depression has not really helped the situation. I find myself wanting to stay asleep longer to avoid dealing with the day. If I sleep, I don’t have to do chores, or talk to people, or entertain myself, or deal with any daily responsibilities. I use dreams as an escape from reality. When I close my eyes, I can be who I want. I can imagine myself as a successful individual with a lucrative career in architecture or writing. I can be married with children, or be a successful single mom who can take on the world, or I can be a desirable bachelorette living in a fun penthouse. 

When the real dreams come, they can be hit or miss. Sometimes I dream about my ex, but those dreams are never good. He is usually with someone else and taunting me emotionally. Sometimes I dream about traveling. I love to travel. I think if I was in a new country every month I would be happy for the rest of my life. Sometimes I dream about food, especially when I’m dieting. I have a lot of nightmares; I’m sure that has to do with my anxieties. A major portion of them contain bugs. I am afraid of insects, but I don’t really understand why I always dream about them. 

I tend to sleep 10-12 hours a day. That is pretty much half of my day, everyday. As great as I feel when I sleep, the feeling of uselessness I experience when I’m finally up and about is not worth the dreams. I always tell myself this when I’m in bed, refusing to get up, but for some reason the guilt is not motivation enough to get up. I think maybe it has to do with the fact that I live alone. I have no one to wake up to. Not in a romantic way, but in a “Hey, Noemi, what the hell are you still doing in bed, it’s four in the afternoon!” way. Making a good impression on someone would motivate me to wake up, eat breakfast, and begin my day. 

Anybody want to move in? :p

My One-Nighter With Alcoholics Anonymous

At the insistence of my most recent therapist, the CBT, I decided to try to go to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. All I’ve ever known about AA was what I’d read in Stephen King books. The most recent one I read was Doctor Sleep, in which the main character, a grown up Andy from The Shining has been battling his own demons, one of which was alcohol. I learned all about the 90 in 90, the twelve steps, and having a sponsor.

I went online and found a meeting near my neighborhood at around 10pm the same day of my therapy session. I find it’s easier for me to get stuff done right after talking to a therapist, especially if it’s outside of my comfort zone. I put on some clothes, grabbed a fresh pack of cigarettes and took the train to the church where the meeting was taking place. I started to get cold feet on my way there, using the fact that I was running a couple of minutes late as an excuse. However, I convinced myself to at least walk by the church and if anyone was standing outside to go in. As it turns out I’m not the only night owl in Manhattan. The place was packed. There was a young guy locking his bike up on a nearby post and I smiled nervously at him as I walked down the steps to the basement room where the meeting was being held.

There was coffee, there were cookies, and there were pamphlets galore. I spotted a seat towards the middle and kept a panic attack at bay as everyone around chatted happily amongst themselves.

There were people there who were my age, there was even a boy who was 17. The guest speaker that night was an old, eccentric looking man with Albert Einstein hair and Elton John’s sense of style. He told us all about his exploits. One story in particular was very amusing. He described the car he had in his youth. Apparently he felt he needed to have a pimp mobile in order to establish an identity for himself. So he went out and bought a Caddy with all of the bells and whistles of that time. I kept thinking about what an excellent character he would make in a novel.

Other people took turns “sharing” and when they finished others would respond with their own stories and encouragement. After everyone was finished sharing, the hostess asked if there was anyone in the group who was there for the first time. My heart leaped and beads of sweat just appeared on my forehead with no warning. I didn’t want to bring attention to myself, but I also didn’t want to get in trouble for not saying anything. I quickly began weighing options and consequences, and just as I was about to raise my shaky hand she moved on to another question about if anyone else was a member who was in from out of town. I exhaled, feeling enormously relieved. I felt as if I had dodged a bullet. For some reason I thought I was going to get stoned or burned at the stake if I didn’t raise my hand, but no one even noticed. Anonymous indeed.

At the end of the meeting I ran out of the meeting after an awkward moment in which I found myself trapped in the middle of some prayer circle thing while I was busy putting on my sweater. I actually think that’s the reason I didn’t go back. I was so embarrassed at not having known that I had to take my neighbor’s hand that I actually dashed out of there as soon as they were done. I didn’t even grab a cookie.

 

I’ve read a lot about Alcoholics Anonymous and the way that it has helped a lot of people cope with their alcoholism or other similar addictions. I’ve also read a lot of articles from some conspiracy theorists about how it’s a brainwashing cult. All I can say about it is that the people who were there helped each other out. Some of the able bodied men there volunteered to do some recycling the next day. It was a friendly, welcoming community. Of course, cults are also welcoming communities. But no one forced me to stay and chat, no one grabbed the back of my shirt as I rushed out of the room in embarrassment, and no one shoved a pamphlet in my face and forced me to read the Big Book. So in my own opinion I don’t think it’s a cult. I don’t think it’s a brainwashing scheme. I think it’s a group of people helping each other out. Much like a church or the Salvation Army. And although it may not have been for me, I would absolutely recommend it to anyone who feels the need to get sober.

The First Time I was Hypnotized

 

It was the year 2012 and I had never been to therapy before. I rode my bike through the hot street of Lafayette in the middle of June. The air was thick with humidity and tiny, irritating mosquitoes. By the time I got to the doctor’s office the back of my shirt was saturated with sweat. I signed in and gave my insurance information, and finally the doctor called my name. He was a distinguished man, by which I mean he was over fifty. We went up the stairs to his office. He had a brown leather couch next to which was a side table with a Kleenex box and a reading lamp. His desk was impressive and cluttered, but not messy.

When we sat down he pulled out a tape recorder and asked if I was okay with the session being recorded. I didn’t mind, as long as I didn’t have to hear my own voice being played back at me. I’ve never liked hearing my own voice. After a few initial questions to try to determine the purpose for my visit he asked if I had ever heard of hypnotherapy. Of course I had. Back in my New Age phase during high school I was obsessed with it and even tried autohypnosis several times with no success. In this post I will describe what our first thirty minute session was like.

He told me to get comfortable, and I just sat back on the sticky, leather couch. I didn’t want to lay down because I didn’t feel comfortable putting my feet on his couch, something I’d picked up somewhere along my childhood. We began with breathing exercises. I was monitoring my breath, breathing deeply though my nose and exhaling through my mouth as instructed. I had a bit of an anxiety problem at the time so I didn’t relax as much as I wanted to because I could hear my heartbeat in my own ears. My eyes were closed.

Then he instructed me to let go of all tension. We began at my toes and ended at my forehead. That actually did put me more at ease, much more than the breathing exercises.

Then began the countdown. He counted backwards from ten, telling me after every number that I was more relaxed than the last number. I expected to eventually fall asleep or lose awareness before he hit zero, but it never happened. I didn’t think the hypnotherapy was working, but I went along with it anyway, not wanting to hurt his feelings. (Think of the episode on Community where Britta lets Pierce hypnotize her).

My initial session was to try to get my anxiety attacks under control, so after he hit the number zero he asked me what color I pictured when I began to feel the onset of an attack. I replied dark grey, with jagged lines, like a dark exclamation bubble in a comic book. He told me to picture the gray jagged bubble and to describe any changes I felt in my body. I started to hear my heartbeat thumping in my ears again, picking up speed and volume. I tried to stay still but my left foot began to tap a little. He then began to say “I am aware of my body right now, so what?” He said it over and over again, and prompted me to start saying it with him adding emphasis on the I and the MY.

After a few minutes of repeating it, I began to calm down. It began to make sense, that it was MY body and I was in control of it. Not the other way around. He counted to ten again and I opened my eyes.

“How long do you think your eyes were closed?” He asked me.

“I don’t know, ten, fifteen minutes?”

The doc informed me that I’d had my eyes closed for a half an hour. Maybe I did tap into my subconscious after all.

That was my first hypnosis session. We repeated that mantra for a few more sessions, and I must say I still use that mantra anytime I feel another attack coming on. I barely have them anymore because the knowledge that I have control over my own body keeps them at bay. I thought hypnosis would be a lot more mysterious and intriguing, but my experience taught me that we all experience it differently. My hypnosis was light, but I can’t say it didn’t work and that I wouldn’t try it again.