This isn’t an article featuring tips on handling anxiety, more a personal musing on my own anxiety and fair warning too, it’s pretty long, though I hope not too rambling!
Although I’m fairly adventurous I have an exaggerated anxiety response, even to seemingly mild stressors. Things I’m good at, things I enjoy, things I’ve done over and over again, often still fill me with anxiety.
Just over 20 years ago, as well as suffering from depression, I was also diagnosed with Free Floating Anxiety. Rather than the diagnostic labels empowering me, however, I felt like they trapped me.
After a few years of living a much smaller life, I realised I had a choice to make and that diagnoses or not, my mental health was pretty much up to me to take control of and that there were no magic cures (though at that time medication did offer me some relief, but I never saw it as a long-term solution) so that’s when I started on my long journey back to taking control of my mental health and getting off meds for good.
Although I’m now medication-free and largely stable and well, I do still have that extremely exaggerated anxiety response, and sometimes it can overwhelm me.
What Anxiety Is Like for Me
Nerves before doing things that we perceive as stressful are of course normal, but for one reason or another (perhaps by now, the well-worn neural pathways I’ve created over more than 2 decades aren’t helping), I still feel that I have an unusually excessive anxiety response, though my GP has been highly dismissive.
Unable to concentrate, my stomach churning and in knots, shaking, irritable, unable to eat, sleep or even go to the loo – symptoms I’m sure many with anxiety will be able to identify with.
Instead of mild nervous excitement and butterflies, I can find myself feeling wired and jittery as cortisol courses through me. Unable to concentrate, my stomach churning and in knots, shaking, irritable, unable to eat, sleep or even go to the loo – symptoms I’m sure many with anxiety will be able to identify with.
The tricks I learned during CBT combined with meditation help me a little, but only to a point. I’m now able to identify how I’m feeling at least, which can stop me spiralling into a full-on meltdown, but it doesn’t really ease the anxiety and no amount of rationalising or logical self-talk seems to stop that unwelcome jittery cortisol rush and churning sick feeling of dread that for me, can last for days or even weeks on end.
You might think then that knowing I react this way to certain things that I’d attempt to minimise my exposure to the situations I know can make me anxious. Quite the opposite is true though.
I’m not sure I ever truly left behind my teenage rebellious phase, but my natural desire to disrupt and live life in full colour, combined with my stubborn streak compels me towards anxiety-inducing situations like a moth to a flame.
Avoidance As A Coping Mechanism Isn’t For Me
I truly believe that avoidance isn’t a particularly healthy or ultimately rewarding coping mechanism, Indeed I seem to ascribe to a “feel the crippling, gut-wrenching fear but like a massive idiot, go and do it anyway” type of thinking, so I persist in doing things that I know are likely to cause me anxiety, as conquering them feels like a little personal victory, despite the days of hell I go through beforehand.
It feels like I’m wresting back control, telling my brain to shut up, confirming to myself that if I want to do something, I jolly well will, regardless of the anxiety it will inevitably cause me. I seem to actively seek out situations that cause me to feel this way, like some kind of twisted masochist.
Is this constant battle a ‘healthy’ way of handling anxiety? Is it good for helping me build confidence that will hopefully lead to less anxiety in the future? That I really don’t know, but the other option of not doing stuff because my anxiety tells me not to doesn’t really feel like an option at all to me.
I don’t want fear to hold me back, I want my life to be as big and rich as possible and for that to happen, instead of retreating and waving a white flag, I simply have to face my anxiety head on.
Our Comfort Zones Are All Very Different
Take for example when I started this blog almost 5 years ago, and I made a pledge to say “yes” to things my anxiety repeatedly tells me to say a big resounding “no” to, which has lead to me being in countless situations that have left me with insomnia, feeling sick, physically shaking, unable to think straight and with horrendous IBS flares.
I know a diverse range of people and am lucky to have a large group of friends. Some of whom also suffer from anxiety and other related disorders. Some are medicated, some are not. Some grab it by the horns and do the scary things anyway, others don’t and instead let the anxiety stop them living the lives they want to live.
Nerves and apprehension, of course, are normal and natural, a physical and psychological response to something perceived as a stressor. So now, rather than running through endless worst-case scenarios and dwelling on them, I try not to look at things in terms of success or failure.
I’m OK with simply ‘doing’ and I try not to focus on the potential outcomes. I’ve stopped running endless nightmare scenarios through my head and now reason with an internal shrug that whatever I’m facing “It’ll be fine” and I often think about “what’s the worst that can happen?” too, which can have an instantly calming effect when I realise actually, it’s really no big deal and this kind of rationalisation really does help.
Instead of trying to totally ignore the thoughts that cause my anxiety to spike, I sit with them and to some extent accept that I feel that way.
This acceptance seems to rob the anxious thoughts of their potency and I can sometimes let the anxious ‘what if’ scenarios float away from me. My forthcoming solo snowboarding holiday is making me feel anxious in a way that’s threatening to engulf the usual pre-holiday excitement I usually feel though and that’s because my usual “what’s the worst that can happen?” way of thinking is actually making things worse rather than better.
What’s The Worst That Can Happen?
If you’re anxious about say a job interview, when you apply that logical reasoning to the situation the answer is “I might not get the job” or “I might say something stupid”, neither of which are likely to have any lasting impact other than you feeling a bit frustrated, or a bit stupid for a while. But given my previous experience of being in the mountains and having had medical emergencies, “what’s the worst that can happen?” takes on a far scarier life of its own.
I’m lucky to be part of a wonderful community of outdoor bloggers; some like strolling around and exploring cities and parks, some are triathletes or run marathons, some like long distance hikes and some are full-on adventure fiends, taking part in jungle expeditions and even scaling the heights of some serious mountains like Kathmandu.
As someone who camps, does a bit of walking, kayaking, snowboarding and likes the odd adrenaline rush, imposter syndrome can often be strong when I compare myself to those I regard as hardcore adventurers. But then I have other friends who think I’m crazy/brave/stupid for doing some of the things that I do, and would never consider doing anything like that themselves.
There’s an Art to Not Letting Fear Hold You Back
This leads me to my forthcoming solo snowboarding holiday and how it’s very much taking me out of my comfort zone.
Now in my early forties, I’ve been snowboarding since my mid-twenties and have snowboarded in places like Morzine, La Thuille, Cervinia, Sestriere, Fernie and my favourite, Whistler in Canada.
I’m actually a pretty decent snowboarder, just not great. I still get flummoxed by dreaded flat bits and still occasionally get off chair lifts and fall into a heap. Despite this, I’m proficient on black runs and even breaking my back snowboarding a few years ago hasn’t put me off, though it has slowed me down a little.
I’ve been overseas to places like Morocco, Egypt and to Europe on my own, and I’ve also frequently spent time in places like Scotland and Cornwall alone, but snowboarding on my own is totally new and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hugely apprehensive about it.
I’m not one to take risks in the mountains, but despite this, I’ve found myself in a few sticky situations where I was hugely grateful not to be on my own at the time.
Despite my best efforts I’m not brilliant at mountain navigation, which is one of the reasons why in the past I’ve tended to return multiple times to the same ski resorts as I’ve got to know the mountains there, Whistler in Canada for example I know extremely well, and know all my favourite runs, which other runs lead off them, which chair lifts to get back up and so on.
Flow is that lovely, often elusive state you can find yourself in when doing something completely absorbing and/or pleasurable.
I’ve pondered over why my mountain navigation skills aren’t great and believe the reason in part at least, is that when I’m snowboarding I’m experiencing that wonderful feeling of flow.
Flow is that lovely, often elusive state you can find yourself in when doing something completely absorbing and/or pleasurable. We are immersed there in the present moment, fully enjoying it without any of the usual thoughts and worries of a busy mind that can so easily distract us.
When I’m in this state, totally absorbed by the physicality of snowboarding, the sheer joy of being in the mountains, it’s like part of my conscious brain switches off, I’m on a high, and having to engage my logical brain to figure out what to do when I suddenly find the run I’m on is about to split into 3 and I can’t see any clear signs or piste markers, isn’t something I’m great at.
The Reassuring Safety Net Of Other People & The Role of Our Peer Group
In a group, this isn’t an issue. There’s always one of us that knows where we’re going, or someone to reassure me that yes, this is the ‘right’ way down, but the realisation that mountain navigation will be just down to me this time fills me with an anxiety I can’t seem to shake, and despite my best efforts I seem to be fixating on the fear of taking a wrong turn and getting myself in a pickle.
When I mentioned this in a Facebook post, a friend pointed out that as long as I head down the slope, it’s all good. Of course, thinking purely logically that’s absolutely true, but framed within some of the sketchy experiences I’ve had, it’s not quite as simple as that.
Snowboarding in Cervinia once with my sister and best friend, about 2/3 of the way down the mountain we suddenly came to an abrupt stop in front of 2 huge signs as the run split into 2. In one direction there was a big red sign that said “CLOSED” in the other direction a big red sign said “DANGER”. We stood baffled, totally alone on the run, trying to work out what the hell to do.
There were no chair lifts in sight, from the piste map we couldn’t work out where we were and taking off our boards and walking back up a slope we’d already spent a good 20 minutes boarding down wasn’t an option. We decided “CLOSED” was our best bet and took off our boards and spent nearly an hour walking down the closed almost snowless piste to reach the bottom.
Another time whilst snowboarding in the most insane powder I’ve ever come across in Sestriere in Italy, we were in full white-out conditions. The kind of conditions that are totally and utterly disorientating.
I veered very slightly off piste on the way down (without realising as I couldn’t see), and found myself, just a metre or 2 away from the marked piste but unable to move, up to my waist in snow. It was frankly terrifying, but thankfully my daughter who was boarding close behind me came to a stop on the edge of the piste, took off her board and edged her way towards me. Lying flat and reaching out to help me dig and compact snow around me so I could heave myself out, It took us a good 20 minutes of hard work to get me out and we were both shattered by the end of it.
Add to this a broken back and breaking several ribs multiple times whilst boarding and having to be stretchered off the mountain, a huge fear of drag lifts as with my back injury they are seriously painful for me to use, and I guess it’s understandable why I might be a little anxious about snowboarding alone on a mountain I don’t know in a country where I can only cobble together enough of the language to buy a meal in a restaurant.
Before booking, I asked fellow outdoors bloggers whether they thought snowboarding alone was dangerous or not, and the general consensus was no, as long as I was careful to go for it. It was interesting however when I asked close friends and family the same question, most of their responses were the exact opposite, telling me they thought I was crazy to do it alone.
Although snowboarding is fun, the mountains aren’t always friendly places. Finding yourself alone in bad weather with low visibility on a sketchy slope with daylight fading is a seriously sobering experience, one that requires you to swallow down fear, think logically and focus on getting yourself off the hill as quickly and as safely as possible.
Despite my fears, this will come as no great surprise, I went ahead and booked anyway. After missing the last 3 seasons in a row and with me not getting any younger, I was determined that no matter what, even if I ended up having to go alone, that I wouldn’t miss a fourth season.
I did a lot of research before choosing my accommodation and the location. I opted for a chalet reasoning that if something did happen to me, the chalet hosts and other guests would recognise my absence much faster than a hotel would.
To try and ease the anxiety I’ve told myself I only need to stick to some gentle runs low down the mountain, and that once I get to know a few runs, I’ll be fine.
Even so, I’ve genuinely never been this nervous about going away alone before, and with still over a week to go, the physical feelings that my anxiety is causing are pronounced and frankly exhausting.
I just keep thinking about finishing my very first run, the joyful rush of adrenaline mixed with relief, which is when I’m hoping all this anxiety will finally melt away and leave me alone so I can relax and enjoy the experience.
How Do You Handle Anxiety?
I’d love to know how you handle self-doubt and anxiety.
How do you feel about solo travel, have you ever done it, or would you do it given the chance? If not, why not? Would you ski or snowboard alone, or have you done it in the past? Perhaps you never seem to worry about anything much or you experience anxiety in a markedly different way? Leave a comment below!
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