On Soothing The Anxious Beast, and Whether That's Possible At All.

If you've ever experienced heightened anxiety, I know you will likely empathise with how I felt on Sunday when I was in the midst of the worst panic and anxiety I've had in months. I'd felt it simmering beneath the surface, a trembling thing, a chemical reaction about to fire and bubble volcanically to the surface. However, I'd ignored it largely because life was generally pretty good on top of that feeling. I say generally good because I've been brain training myself to look between the apparently 'bad' things, and I have lots of those in my life. A beautiful home. A beautiful, loving husband. A stable job and a steady income. I live in a beautiful part of the world.

I know my thoughts are just my thoughts. I know that I have enough, and am enough. I know that dying is as much a part of life as living is. I know that I will get through a workload as long as both of my arms, all of my limbs end to end. I know, I know, I know. I know uncertainty is part of life. I don't need to know what the future might bring and I know to think the worse case scenario is a protective mechanism at best, and unnecessary because the very worse is unlikely to happen.

Dear Rational Mind,

It doesn't work that way,

Love, Anxiety

And so, still, the beast, lurking in the forest of my mind, in the darkest places, the ones I have no control over, down roads with no map to guide me, into the shadows.

The beast never quite stills, but stirs ominously when this balance I've created in my life tips. It shakes off it's ennui and roars into life, telling me to run, to freeze, to hide under the blanket on the couch and cry and not go out into that scary world that fucks with me. It doesn't matter what therapies or medicines I've used in the past to quell this untameable creature. Despite yogic breathing, somatic movements, herbs and supplements, when she's a risin', she's a risin'.

It's hard to explain to people how debilitating an anxiety attack is. I tried to explain to a work colleague why I was out of sorts on Monday. She stared at me blankly, and changed the conversation. Perhaps she felt I was being over dramatic. My job being what it is, well, we're all in a state of panic, aren't we? It would have been better if it'd been a migraine or a broken leg. That, we can do something with.

The lines from this poem, internet scavenged, describe what anxiety is well. I have picked and chosen the ones that work best for me:

If compassion is an outstretched, helping hand--Then anxiety is a gun to the back of the head.

If happiness is the laughter of a friend--Then anxiety is the howling of a dying dog.

If nature is the skyline from a mountaintop--Then anxiety is the metal slab corpses rest on.

If possibility is a child gazing up at the stars--Then anxiety is a dead rat in the sewers

If togetherness is the soft kiss of a lover--Then anxiety is the last living thing on the planet.

And it feels like you are the last living thing on the planet, too. There's a distance that makes communication impossible. My man wants to soothe me but my skin crawls at his touch. He wants to interact, but I see it as demands. In the end, he sits at the other end of the couch and I crawl into a ball under a blanket on the lounge floor, staring at some inane show on Netflix but not taking it in as the beating of my heart and the crippling irons around my rib cage won't let me breath, and all I can do is think about the fact I am dying. Then I think about the people who are dying and have died around me and I think that quite possibly, I will die soon too, because this beast will kill me.

What I find remarkable, as I soothe and stroke the beast so she sinks beneath the waves of this anxiety again, is that it's quite impossible to find a cure that will work for everyone, nor even an absolute cure that will work for some. There is simply not enough research that can unequivocally vouch for any of the herbal medicines that folklore suggests are good to calm the nerves and sooth anxiety. We know what might work, but a doctor cannot write a script, for, say, valerian or skullcap because there are insufficient studies that support their use. St John's Wort seems to be the best bet, and I feel it has made a difference in my life. My naturopath recommended it. Yet go online, and there's contradictory evidence and not one study that absolutely says that it is beneficial. So I must rely on the fact that since I've taken it, I've been better. A lot better.

The beast is still, more often.

Yet it's not merely St John's Wort - it's also B supplements, inositol and magnesium, as well as meditation, and valerian at night. This litany of remedies has come after some experimentation and research, as well as consultation with a naturopath I trust, but can't afford to go to regularly. I worry about those with anxiety and depression that can't afford professionals to help them wade through the information, and misinformation, about remedies that can help them. At least I can afford that luxury once in a while, save up my questions to ask her when I can. At least I have the intelligence and the desire and the lucidity to read research and studies and sift through the reams of information, and misinformation, on the internet.

And then, a sleepless night. And the beast doesn't sleep either.

And so, in the midst of this awful, crippling, knifing panic, I read. What is it that rages so? What can stop it? Is there a quick calming herbal medicine I can take that is akin to a 2 x 4 to the head and 48 hours of being comatose? Or do I really, really have to live through this awful, awful feeling? I go so far as to have a shower, just in case I am taken to the hospital - one cannot have messy hair if one's having a heart attack, you know. Did you know that the symptoms of a panic attack are akin to the symptoms of a heart attack? I know, because once I was taken to hospital because I had severe chest pains. Turns out it was anxiety - little wonder, as there was a guy walking around our squat with an ax. And that wasn't for chopping wood.

I take valerian nightly because I'd read it worked well in combination with St John's Wort. Valerian, I discover, can also cause symptoms of anxiety. I read about a study where a student tried to kill himself with valerian, and overdosed on it. I mean, who does that? He experienced nausea, heart palpitations, restlessness. I then read you shouldn't continue with valerian for longer than a thirty day stretch. Perhaps. There's not enough evidence for that either. Had I overdosed, somehow, on valerian? Took it for too long?

Restless legs could also be down to a lack of iron, so my man forces me to take iron, though it's not that kind of breathlessness, either. I drink hops tea with chamomile and honey, which helps me almost sleep, but not quite - I'm far too wired. In the midst of my think-I'm-dying-ness I swear off alcohol (goodbye, dear sloe gin on the shelf) and coffee (probably a good idea) and sugar (which I rarely consume). I realise it's not one of those things per se, but a culmination of them, combined too with late nights and early mornings, an absent husband and too many conversations about death and taxes.

We turn the house upside down for the magnesium of which we've run out. In the morning, I grab a container of it from the pharmacy, the one with rhodiola and b vitamins in it. I also grab Bach's rescue remedy, feeling stupid because I know it's a placebo, but I don't care. Sometimes placebos work when you know they're a placebo.¹

After two days of feeling like I'm dying, I go to the doctor - again, on the man's orders. She looks at me blankly, through thick spectacles. 'So, you want a doctor's certificate?' she asks. I shake my head. I hadn't even told her whether I'd skipped work. She was just internally checking the clipboard - another anxious woman needing something she couldn't give, because no studies could unequivocally say that one thing worked over another. And they know valium is bad, and anti-depressants are bad, and - well, maybe this night she just couldn't be bothered asking me what was wrong, and if I wanted to see a counsellor. 'You want valium?' she almost barks at me. Sure, I want valium. I knew what I was there for. Something to tide me over. Even the naturopath in the pharmacy suggested it can be a good idea to have a valium to tide me over.

Until the beast stills. Dear, dear beast. What are you trying to tell me now?

The printer whirrs, as if she'd had her finger on the button the entire time. It spits out the script for 5 mg of diazapem that I can't fill til the morning, because the chemists are shut and I'm too exhausted to drive to the 24 hour one in town.

I sooth her with more hops and chamomile, sit in bed and do nadi shodhana, and cue a yoga nidra meditation on the Insight Timer app. I will wake in the morning and go for a long walk, and if I'm not too exhausted, I'll go to yoga. And I swear off alcohol, sugar and caffeine for a bit, until the beast settles somewhat.

During the third day, the beast snuggles down under my ribcage, between my heart and lungs. I can breath again, and am not so trembly. The valium sits in the drawer, half a tablet to get me through the night and the rest for the next time I collapse - hopefully, many months from now. I can talk to my man, respond to him, cook dinner, snuggle. His heart beats a steady rhythm and the purring beast allows mine to slow alongside it.

There there, I tell the beast. Everything's going to be okay.