Friday, January 12, 2007

It's Friday, I'm (Not) In Love

If there is an opposite of an adrenaline junkie, I am most definitely it. I’m anti-adrenaline, anti-rush, anti-jitter. I don’t watch scary movies because the stress involved in viewing people being chased by aliens, chainsawed into skin lamps or eaten by overgrown predators is just too much for me. I will never jump out of a plane or bungee off a bridge or strap on an oxygen tank and swim 150 feet below the surface. Why? Because genetics and evolution saw fit to leave me with arms and legs, not wings or gills. I do everything in my power to engineer my surroundings into the antithesis of drama and stress. Should you, as a person, be involved in creating drama or stress in my life, I will undoubtedly cut you out, just as I have cut out alien movies and scuba diving.

This isn’t to say that I’m not a good handler, because I am. I can handle just about anything. And when I say ‘anything’, I’m still talking about middle class employed white girl ‘anything.’ Like spending two-hundred dollars on shoes and realizing DAMN this pair is wicked uncomfortable! Or, OH NO! I appear to have torn my nail! Whatever am I to do? I can handle the stress of not finding earrings to match my outfit or the button mysteriously disappearing from my jeans. I deal well with deadlines and projects, simply because it gives me something to do. I do not handle boredom well, and it’s just pure luck that I never set the house on fire as a kid. I could go through a box of matches in less than an hour, scratching each red-tipped stick against the side and watching it burst into flames, only to flicker out forty-five seconds later.

But the past three days- sweet baby jesus. The stress, the anxiety, the all consuming fear, is about to kill me. I find myself alternating between a desire to buy a carton of cigarettes and hoping that a bottle of valium will just magically appear in my cupboard. What’s funny, and not, is that I used to make fun of people with valium. “I could use a valium dispenser,” they’d say. And mentally I would berate them for needing a crutch, a pathetic drug, to ease the pain. “Try breathing exercises!” I’d say. “Maybe a yoga class!” And then I’d put a sympathetic smile on face while inside I said poor, poor schmuck. Can’t even manage their stress levels.

I am here to tell you I am sorry. I should never have made fun of you. Perhaps your commute to work really was that bad. Maybe your child really is the devil. I judged, and I’m sorry.

Last night I laid on my couch for three hours, willing my legs to stop their nervous, uncontrollable twitching. Praying my heart would slow it’s frantic pace for just one godamn minute, just to give me some peace. Stomach and I had several chats about how keeping food below the Mason-Dixon line was non-negotiable. And then I pulled out that (prescription) bottle of valium and thought, maybe, please, yes, this will help. I took four.

I am notoriously hard to sedate and didn’t have much hope, but two hours later it finally kicked in. Oh, the peace. The blessed, blessed peace.

I know, trust me, I know, that I’m being very vague. I haven’t elaborated on my three days (and what will probably be many more stress-filled ones) and that’s a little unfair. It’s only because I seem to have forgotten my KY and I imagine that an un-lubed legal fist up my ass quite would be quite uncomfortable.

Just know that I realize I asked for it. I had to go and tempt Fate. I had to complain about my luck and my shitty, shitty month of sickness and dead cats and strange, invasive tests. I accept it, and that is fine. I am a grown ass woman. It would just be nice to have a permanent IV full of heavy sedatives.

9 comments:

Carl from L.A. said...

I, like you, do not look for stress, and I will not stress over anything that hasn't happened yet.

If yours hasn't happened yet, don't stress it.

If it has happened, then consider the worst case scenario - that's containment.

Hope it's nothing major.

Anonymous said...

think about the abosolut worse possible outcome from your situation. Ask yourself how bad that really is - in the grand scheme of things - and whether or not you could handle it.

Most times people that worry aren't worried about what really might happen but what they imagine that would feel like.

do yourself a favor and stop worrying about what might could possible maybe happen.

this advice come from a guy who knows all too well what it's like to live with anxiety and the fear of those "what if" situations.

Deb said...

Not a fan of stress, or adrenalin either!

chin up, hope you're ok.

kiki said...

i'm still of the mindset that you don't need valium, but then i've never been in a situation where i've been overly stressed.

i don't know whether this means i'm an un-stresser, haven't experienced life yet or just too damn lazy to care

i'll keep you posted

Anonymous said...

Hey Birdie,
Sometimes it is better to vent one's feelings than to let them stew inside of you. As for worrying, nothing usually turns out as bad as we can imagine it to be. However, that is so much easier said than done.
Kathy

Anonymous said...

so you're back to not commenting on our comments again? You know how much i hate that.

Anonymous said...

Something is in the water. 2007 doesn't seem to feel the same as 2006 with its mishaps and events that made life change for the worse. I am sending good vibes your way, and good chi, good ju-ju, whatever you want to call it.
But if you wouldn't mind boomerang-ing some of that back to me when you're done :P
My first month of "oh-seven" has reduced me into a crying ball of lumpy depressed human flesh on my soft fluffy couch. Man...maybe it's just the residue of 2006???

HUG

~Texas Roxy

Anonymous said...

Oops...I meant to say 2007 DOES feel like 2006...ugh.

~Texas Roxy

Unknown said...

carl- it has happened. yesterday, to be exact. but this is the corporate world, and no one can keep a secret for longer than 2.5 seconds so i knew about it two weeks ago. lots of nausea since then.

duckie- i can handle it. i'm a big girl. it's just sad :( i need comforting.

deb- thanks! with some vicodin and a man to comfort me, i should pull through in about 6 months.

kiki- i say you're a no-stress kind of person

kathy- you are so right- much easier said than done

duckie- don't judge me. i love you.

roxy- good thoughts back at you :) no more crappy depressing days where it takes too much energy to crawl off the couch to pee.