Each new hurdle I cross when it comes to publishing brings its own special brand of anxiety. It’s a mixture of imposter syndrome and cognitive dissonance, because all I heard growing up was what a failure I was. That I’d never amount to anything. And every time I meet a new goal, it comes with a lot of distressing feelings I struggle to navigate.
That’s not to say that I let it rule me. I at least try not to. I have a wealth of coping skills at my disposal, but sometimes things get so bad that all I can do is sit with the feelings without judgment and let them pass. And that’s the coping skill I have the hardest time with. I want to fight, I want to defeat it, but what do you do when the enemy you’re railing against is yourself? Acknowledging my feelings after decades of shoving them away so I could survive is hard, because it feels so antithetical to who I am and how I got here. Having to undo all the negative survival skills that allowed me to get to this point has included learning to sit with my feelings, and that’s the coping skill I have the hardest time with.
That I have to go through this cycle every time I achieve another milestone is almost cruel. I should be excited, jubilant, but instead I have to shelter in place. I have to run down a list of things meant to comfort and soothe and remind myself I’m not the failure they made me out to be. I have to remind myself these feelings will pass, and I have to sit with them while they run their course because that’s how things are in my world. Good things come at a price, and the price is anxiety and fear.
The goal, of course, is to not let the anxiety stop me. I’ve made it too far to give up now and it would be a real shame to torch everything I’ve worked so hard to achieve because my brain is an asshole to me. It’s important to note that with time and therapy and practice, it’s getting easier. The panic attacks aren’t as common, and the anxiety is getting easier to manage as I repeat the skills I use to deal with it. It doesn’t make it less frustrating, though. It doesn’t make sitting with the emotions any more pleasant. What it does, however, is reinforce that I’ll get past it. I’ve made it this far, after all. I can make it past this, too.
I know also that It’s not just me. All my long-term friends that have stuck with me through the ups and downs and in-betweens all understand. We all deal with this in some form, to different extents, and I’m not so self-centered to think that I have it the worst of all of us. We all have our good days and bad, and no one has it worse or better. We just have different coping skills to lean on. But knowing it’s not just me, that others understand and offer a shoulder to lean on helps so much. Just knowing I’m not alone helps because I spent so much of my life isolated, with no one to help me. If I didn’t do it, it didn’t get done. It took a long time to find people like me, that understand without being told, why my life has impacted me the way it has.
If you can relate to this, I want you to know you’re not alone. That you’ve made it this far, and you can keep going. I’m not saying it will be easy, but I am saying it will pass. You’ve survived 100% of bad days, you’ll survive this too. Just take a moment to rest and reset, because you can always pick it back up later.