*rolls fattie, cracks beer, passes both*

always works for me.

I'll whack people for you occhi. Can you whack a few for me too?

Take a deep breath. And distance yourself. If work is getting heavy, well, take time off. Avoid thinking about it for a little (a day? a few hours? however much you can afford). Movies, gym, friends to talk (but not about what's bothering you), shopping, cooking. That kind of thing helps me. Then after my anxiety has subsided, I revisit the problem. It *always* looks better then.

You know, this whole "knowing people from the internet" thing could really help out. It would be much harder to link people when there are fewer connections in meatspace.

I mean, occhiblu, I dunno your first name even, so how could I implicate you in my plan to whack some west coaster? Who would even suspect a quiet IT guy from Northern Ontario?

On second thought, mods please delete this post. I'd never do such a thing!

I think a major problem is that I keep getting new problems -- it's not like there's one major thing that's bugging me, there are 3 or 4 big things and 300 minor things, and once I feel like I've calmed down about one, another one flares up. I keep trying various "This too shall pass" mind tricks to chill out, but the accumulated stress is starting to get to me.

On preview: It's always the quiet ones...

/winks at occhiblu

I write lists. I write everything down, that way my brain knows that every little thing is being addressed, even if only by being written on a slip of paper.

And I go for long, fast walks (I would run but my foot, she is hurting) so's to get my circulation going and endorphins pumping and head a little clearer.

That's just treating the symptoms, though. Do you need to reevaluate what you're doing? Is there something that needs to be let go of, put on hold?

Ooo- poor occhiblu! I'm sorry you're going through so much stress. Will groundsquirrels help? Online ones aren't as effective as real-life ones. Even 45 minutes of them.

Is there something that needs to be let go of, put on hold?

Yes, but it's the thing that's allowing me to pay rent. :-)

And my job is actually currently rocky (it was this morning's explosion). Every emotional part of me is saying just to give it up and get out, but ... there's that rent thing. And student loan thing. And upcoming holidays thing. And total paralyzing fear of change thing.

Hee! Kissing squirrels!

When I feel like this I try to remember two quotes:

"God ('diety') will give you nothing more than you can handle."

"Courage is endurance for one moment more."

Also, I think that we will always have big problems. As soon as we take care of one, the one that was waiting in line behind it becomes the new big problem. Meanwhile new problems get in the back of the line. So I figure that if we always have big problems, then they are all actually the same size and they could just as well be small. So poof! all your problems are now small.

Yes, we don't know what happened really, but I am taking wild guesses to help. If it is something someone said, ignore it. People don't always mean what they say cause they are also under stress/sad/whatnot. If it's that there are too many things on your plate, prioritize. You don't have to be miss perfect and finish everything in time. Just explain that you are doing your best to meet deadlines and that's that. After all, there is unemployment benefits, if you decide to quit. Really use this axiom "It is not as bad as my mind makes it out to be" because of physiological reasons stress-related.

It doesn't seem to be anything in particular that's happened, just accumulated shit.

* Way the fuck too much schoolwork, most of it group projects, which I hate because I feel like I have no control over the outcomes, and because getting anything done takes three times as long (and requires transportation time) as it would to do it myself. I am willing, I think, to give up on getting things "perfect," but it's more that trying to negotiate everyone's pet peeves and working styles is driving me up the wall.

* My full-time job is awful, and it's been on shaky ground for a while, and now there's a meeting tomorrow to discuss whether I'm continuing with the company and in what capacity (this has been an ongoing thing, but everyone's been ignoring it for months).

* The fact that I am working a full-time job *and* doing school full-time (and in an admittedly awesome relationship) makes me feel like I have NO time for myself. There's never a sense of "now I get to relax!" that lasts longer than an hour or so, unless it involves staying up too late, which then makes me overly stressy and tired the next day.

* Minor stresses about academic performance and whether I'm going to end up doing poorly in one of my classes simply because the professor is seriously flakey.

* Holidays. Which bring up memories of my mother, who died a year and a half ago, and I'm just suddenly having huge emotional reactions to that again. Then just the standard "dealing with families" stress on top of it and compounding how much I miss my mom.

(Sorry for the laundry list; it got therapeutic to type it out.)

It's nothing that's insurmountable, or that other people don't go through, it's just... all together, it's giving me a remarkably short fuse, and I feel like I can't get rid of that sinking-stomach, tight-chest, clenched-teeth, holding-breath stressed feeling at all.

Oh occhiblu. Big hugs to you. Group projects are the worst. Mourning is the worstest worst. You'll move through this, though. I know it. You're super strong.

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming. (Yeah..that's from Finding Nemo, but it's good advice.)

Vitamin C and fish oil. I swear my life has changed since my therapist turned me on to fish oil. I added the vitamin C all by myself because I like those little Emergen-C packets and it helps me remember to take the fish oil if I do it every morning with an Emergen-C. You have to take a LOT of fish oil, like 5000 - 7000 mg but honestly I have never been calmer, happier and less stressed in my life. And nothing in my life has changed: my kids are still fucking up, I'm still poor & unlaid, yadda yadda, I have to go to the laundromat and so on, but for some reason it just doesn't bother me as much - I can sort of coast right through it. Try it. Fish oil is expensive, especially when you have to take six huge whacking pills of it every morning, but man oh man, has it been worth it for me.

Do you have any idea if flaxseed oil is supposed to be as beneficial to moods? I used to take it, ran out months ago, and keep meaning to buy more. (For some reason that's more appealing to me than fish oil. Though I like fish. I'm weird.)

I suppose I can also research that myself, just thought I'd ask in case you knew!

I haven't tried the flax seed oil but my therapist said he did and it didn't work as well, so he went back to the fish oil. I know, occasionally I worry about what the hell is in those capsules and the Bass O Matic comes horribly to mind, not to mention mercury and then a friend told me I was going to die of Vitamin A poisoning because a zillion tiny little fish are the equivalent of a polar bear liver or something but I do not care, because I am on fish oil, and nothing makes me anxious or depressed anymore. ;-)

Stress sucks, occhiblu.

I freaked out last night and couldn't stand to be on the computer with my mind multi-tasking out in a dozen different directions into cyberspace.

I decided I was over the edge and had to take a night and just be a person within the physical bounds (body) of a person, spending time simply "being," in a messy room with two of my wonderful cats for company.

Sometimes you just have to collapse for a while and tell this weird misshapen mutated modern world to bugger off.

I hope you can do that a little and I hope this helps.

Vitamin C and fish oil. I swear my life has changed since my therapist turned me on to fish oil.

I think flaxseed oil DOES work quite well, occhiblu. What we're mostly talking about here is getting all of your Omega fatty acids.

For more info on this, I'd consult Canadian professional athlete and vegan Brendan Brazier. He has turned himself into a vegan science experiment, and rightly so, since the triathlon is grueling, he must minimize his STRESS in order to lower his recovery time in order to train more and win... and who better to experiment on than someone who often trains eight hours per day?

Brazier addresses stress (and minimizing cortisone levels!) very specifically, as does another vegan book of mine. I'll take a look at them and e-mail you some pertinent pages.

Maca root is good for stress and lowering cortisone, btw.

occhi:

You need all those good fatty acids in fish oil; flax seed oil doesn't compare. The fatty acids in flax seed oil (like alpha linolenic acid) can be converted by digestion into the fatty acids in fish oils (EPA and DHA) but only in small amounts. Flax also contains many other types of non-omega-3 fatty acids, which are good, but fish oil is the way to go if you're looking for complete fatty acid coverage.


Know what's a funny word? Fatty acid.

Know what's even funnier? "Fatty acid coverage." Sounds like a fish bikini.

"fish bikini" made me laugh out loud.

I've been trying to look at it all as free entertainment. Like I'm watching a movie with myself in it. Works for me.

What does Fish Oil do for your mood? I have some pills at my house, but I'm not consistent about taking them.

Mayo Clinic is showing that fish oil basically seems to bring the dead back to life and make them sing; and they have a bit of info on its effects on depression. (There's plenty of other info online, I'm finding, but I'm trying to stick to reasonably reputable, non-commercial sources just now.)

I wonder if this is why my mood's better when I have eggs for breakfast instead of oatmeal?

Oooo, I'm gonna get better at taking my fish oil!

You can DEFINITELY, BEYOND A DOUBT get all your fatty acids from vegan sources.

I'll read over Brazier's book and post more at home. He studied all of this like a madman. He's a freakin' PROFESSIONAL IRONMAN and he's vegan. Believe me, he has addressed EVERY nutritional issue you can think of (as have Dr Colin T Campbell, Dr Michael Greger, Dr John McDougal, and even Dr Caldwell Esselstyn of the Cleveland Clinic who reverses heart disease with a vegan diet) and there ain't nothin' you can get from meat you can't get from plants (except e coli, mad cow, coronary blockage, etc.; even the spinach scare came from--you guessed it--manure fertilizer.)

You might need some nutritional yeast for B12, etc., but being vegan is easy.

Sorry. I'm vegan and in decent athletic shape. Freaks like me study the helloutta this stuff.

I still recommend ground squirrels. But perhaps in addition to a healthy diet and exercise.

Okay, what if you gave yourself a timeline? Like, I promise to have occhiblu out of this work environment by Feb. 1? Anything's livable if it's for a limited time.

I have no help for the group projects. I'm too control freaky and end up taking them over completely, unless I'm blessed with a proactive group. That's only happened once in my life.

This fish oil...how well does it mix with gin?

Hell... Just watch Office Space often and well, occhiblu.

back up in your ass wit da rezurrection....

jonmc: you let me know how the fish oil mixes with gin; I'll let you know how it goes with vodka. (I wouldn't dream of doing that to my whiskey).

Shane, there was a great article in last month's Yoga Journal about hardcore athletes who were vegans. It appears not be online yet, but it was really kinda of crazy-neat.

s_r: The job is finite, in that once I graduate in a year and a half, I will be switching fields entirely. It's also possible that I just won't be able to keep it past this summer, since I have to do a traineeship during my second year of school and I'm not sure how well that fits with paid employment. (That train of thought, however, leads me down the "OMG HOW AM I GOING TO PAY MY BILLS?!?!?" freak-out...)

I am just trying to grit my teeth through these group projects. The one group that we got to choose ourselves is actually going very well; the randomly assigned groups are just nightmarish right now. And I'm trying not to take over too much, because that would mean I'd have to PRESENT the stuff I'd taken over to the class, and I *hate* speaking in front of groups. Which is kinda keeping my inner control-freak slightly in check.

(I'm also feeling much better now than I did this morning, in large part due to y'all. Thanks.)

Beethoven's VII is always soothing. an especially dark, burnished, spiritual version is Giulini's in Chicago -- you can find it here or here
. and I'm sorry to hear about your mom, occhiblu, I know how you feel. hugs.

Not to derail, but:

You can DEFINITELY, BEYOND A DOUBT get all your fatty acids from vegan sources.

Oh, I agree. I didn't mean to insinuate otherwise, only to explain the diferences between flax seed oil and fish oils.

And Beethoven's VII is my favorite, thanks Matteo!

Dobie Gray's "Drift Away," is my go-to song for stress-relief. (avoid Unkle Kracker's cover like the plague).

Thanks, matteo.

And jon, your sentence could have just stopped at "avoid Unkle Kracker"!

(eh, "yeah, yeah, yeah" is inoffensive enough radio music, but a pox upon him for thinking he's worthy to approach Dobie's masterwork)

Sorry, Speck!

There's also a Michael Bolton cover of 'Drift Away.' I wonder which one is worse.

Glad we could help, occhiblu! That's what friends are for.