Hand Me The Weed Killer
Today was the first day in a long time that I taught a proper class. A class that was officially mine and that I got paid for. For a long time now this is what I’ve been wanting, and yet in the moments before the class started I was so nervous I thought I was going to throw up. Isn’t it funny how the things we want most in life can be the scariest things? I knew I was in no danger, and that in reality if the class went poorly, it was only one class. But my mind and body still reacted like it was a life or death scenario. I’ve struggled with anxiety for some time now. In fact, I’m really not sure when it began. It makes it hard for me to do the things I want most. Like going out for dinner with friends – in the past I would call the whole thing off at the last minute. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to go – I wouldn’t have made the plans in the first place if that were the case. Rather, the dread had descended and I couldn’t make myself go, I just didn’t have the mental strength to push through the anxiety barrier.
It’s not really that I am any stronger, though. It’s more that I have the tools to deal with my anxiety. I’ve tried a lot of different techniques, and some of them do help, but the anxiety itself never really goes away. I’m on pills, I do breathing exercises, I use the CBT homework that my counsellor gave me. These things make a difference, for sure. I can make myself do things that I want to do, in spite of my anxiety.
It also helps a lot to know what my negative thought patterns are. If I were to dig up the anxiety plant that is growing in my mind, at the deepest roots I’d find my feelings of inadequacy, self-doubt, and shame. These are not thoughts that I consciously think; they are buried so deep in my subconscious that I automatically engage them in every other thought that I have. It takes a lot of effort on a daily basis to counteract them, and, honestly, it is completely exhausting.
I am doing a lot better than what I was at the end of last year. It may be a tiring effort, but at least now I am aware of the problem and can fight it. That anxiety plant isn’t going anywhere – just like the weeds growing in the cracks of my patio, no amount of weed killer can ever truly destroy it. It will always be there, under the concrete slabs of my brain. But now it’s manageable, for the most part. I’m back teaching again, and I’m applying for my PGCE, something I have denied myself for a few years now. I might still trip up on the weeds underfoot, but if I fall I know that it is absolutely possible to pick myself back up again.
