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(Since I accidentally posted on Sunday when I didn’t need to, this post is “officially” meant for Tuesday! rolls eyes…)

anxiety-disorders

I feel JITTERY and JUMPY — at certain times. Most often when I’m under an unusual amount of stress. When I’m in that place I find that sudden loud noises startle me. (But then ALL noise seems loud to me when I’m in that place.) When his lordship and Bran were both sick with colds a couple months ago, every time they sneezed or coughed it seemed so loud I wanted to put my hands over my ears. I thought I was going to go nuts if they didn’t stop hacking and blowing their noses. I was stressed from trying to care for two very sick guys.

When I’m feeling that way, I’m extremely hypersensitive to even quiet noises. I couldn’t count how many times I’ve been home alone and in the downstairs family room watching TV when I fancy I hear the door opening up here. Or I’ll hear footsteps. And Drollery can even be sitting right there beside me when it happens. His close proximity doesn’t seem to lesson the effects of the stress or anxiety or whatever it is.

New or strange situations can bring on the JITTERS and JUMPINESS. Any kind of circumstance that makes me feel out of my comfort zone can cause them. Going to the DMV to renew my drivers license is a great example. I can stand in that line on the verge of a panic attack until the deed is done and the picture is snapped!

Sudden movement is another thing can bring on my JITTERY JUMPINESS. When Twitch unexpectedly jumps up on the arm of my chair, Lordy! That cat is going to give me a heart attack one of these days! So you can guess how I feel about spiders!!!

I suspect a lot of you are familiar with these feelings, too. I think MANY folks in our culture live in that fight/flight mode these days. So much stress! Running kids all over, sitting in a traffic jam, multitasking at work, not enough sleep. When we live with such enormous amounts of stress and anxiety and our bodies don’t have time to recover between episodes, our system just continues to pump out stress hormones that are stimulants. That might have worked for the cave man who had to watch out for lions and tigers and bears (oh my!), but it’s way too much stimulant for the sedate physical lives we live these days!

So what do we do about it? Here’s a few suggestions from anxietycentre.com…

 

There are some short-term strategies that can be helpful as well:

  • Reducing your stress as much as possible can reduce nervous system reactivity.
  • Controlled relaxed breathing can calm down the nervous system, making it less reactive.
  • Avoiding simulants can also allow the nervous system to fear down.
  • Getting good sleep can calm an overly reactive nervous system.
  • Regular light to moderate exercise is a good way to diffuse stress and calm the body.
  • Having fun is a good stress buster.

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(Personally I think they should have included chocolate, a bottle of wine, or a strawberry margarita in any combination on there!!! 😀 )

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The Blogging A to Z Challenge — J

Picture Credits:
biting knuckles — f3y.com
just breathe — www.chu.cam.ac.uk