Anxiety Hits

Years ago, I wouldn’t loosely use words like “depressed” and “anxiety” to describe what I’m feeling. At least for me, you have to be clinically diagnosed with such before you can even use it. I think I was raised that way—to suck it up and shut up. In our family, you are expected to pull yourself together when things get a little tough. 

© Wokandapix

This week has been especially difficult for me I thought I’d lose it. It started last Monday morning when my younger brother (my nephews’ dad) had a bad asthma attack and could barely breathe or move. All morning he was so weak to even open his eyes. Meanwhile, my sister-in-law was at work, leaving the two kids to us to look after. 

What was more problematic for me and my older brother is seeing my elderly mom just as worried-sick. See, we try our very best every day to make things less stressful for mommy as she does a very good job of doing that herself when she worries (and nags) even about the small things. With her getting sick is the last thing we want at a time like this.  

The sisterly-concern will always be the default emotion, but I was so angry at my brother for doing all that to himself. He wouldn’t stop smoking; add to that is his poor diet with absolutely no exercise and sleeping very late. Every possible bodily abuse you can think of, with the exception of drinking liquor and doing drugs, my younger brother is guilty of it. No amount of our badgering can make him kick his bad habits. As my older brother has said, he is beyond accepting counsel so we surrendered to the fact that he’ll never change no matter what we say or do. If he wanted to, he should have done so the minute he became a father. He’s frickin’ 42 years old; if something happens to him he’d be leaving two young boys without a dad!

So, I spent the entire morning thinking of the worst-case scenario: having to rush him to the hospital. This is not a good time to be confined because of the surging cases of Covid. It’s not unlikely that doctors would let him stay to rule out Covid as he’s breathing irregularly. 

More than all the problems that come with having a family member confined in the hospital, I can already imagine how that will be financially-daunting for me and my older brother because his problem is going to be our problem. Just the thought of it is enough to make my stomach churn.

Even while working that day, I had to take care of my nephews, bathing and feeding them. I love my nephews, but they could be quite a handful most of the time. I also had to run the house that day because my mom is just too strung out to even do her minor chores. I had to keep checking every minute to see if she’s okay.

Before noon I was so stressed beyond wits that I had to hide and cry it out. It’s just too much for me. 

Thankfully, his albuterol and steroids made my brother better the latter part of the day. He said he can breathe okay, but still has a headache. Perhaps so we won’t nag him to quit smoking, he thinks it’s more of an eye problem than an asthma attack. But who was he kidding?

It is futile to ask him to stop smoking so my kuya appealed to him to at least lessen it. An appeal that I’m not counting he’d take heed because I’m sure in a matter of days, we’ll see him smoking heavily again. The recent deaths in the family (of my uncle and cousin, both attributed to smoking) didn’t scare him cold turkey so I doubt an asthma attack would. 

The next day my body was a mass of pain that I can’t even move my neck and shoulders, and I’m sure it’s from all the stress last Monday. 

***

I thought I had the worst and won’t have any of the anxiety episode similar to that of last Monday, but yesterday while talking to my manager, I had a rush of it again.

Before the year ended, we heard of the layoffs that happened at work. We thought we already had it all last July, but apparently, some still had to be let go. For some reason, my manager raised his fears that management might also be looking at other teams. He said that we had to work harder and aggressively so the company won’t see any of us as easily expendable. 

I don’t have any problem working twice as hard; the thing is the volume of the projects I handle is significantly lower than how it was the same time last year—or even on any year prior. That is no surprise since the hotel industry is one of the most badly hit by the pandemic and many members and guests have not been traveling. This created a domino effect on our projects and overall workload. The decrease in volume concerns me every day because I don’t want them to even think that I’m being unproductive and I don’t ever want to be seen as redundant by my company.

Even when we are an essential support group that provides assistance to a global staff, and I am a skilled worker who cannot be considered mediocre, we knew that nothing is ever certain when it comes to employment these days. The truth is, no one is indispensable; not even managers. This has been a reality that feels like a barbed lump in the throat of everyone. 

I’ve been with the company for 12 years. It’s the longest stint I have in any job and I value the security of tenure. If you were to ask me, I want to work here until it’s my time to retire. I’m also a midlifer, so the possibility of losing a job at my age can trigger my fears of having to go back to square one when it comes to employment. After the talk with my manager yesterday, it did leave me feeling anxious, uneasy, and worried about my future.

All the things I fear hasn’t happened yet (and I hope it won’t), but see how bad it is affecting me already. That's anxiety, ladies and gentlemen. It hits you like a ton of bricks and debilitates you. 

Anxiety is challenging to manage and many people are suffering from it whether they are open about it or not. I have friends who are also stressing and worrying about something but refuse to talk about it. Every day I see on my newsfeed about a friend’s family member who is sick. On worst days, I’d read about people losing their loved ones or their jobs because of this pandemic. There are some who are less upfront about it, however evident in their actions. I knew of chatty, cheerful people who are now surprisingly withdrawn and quiet. Only when you ask them will you realize that, just like me, something is bothering them.

I guess it’s tough when you realize that there are things we cannot control. 

One would say I should avoid overthinking and always imagining the worst-case scenarios in my head. All the what-ifs and negative thinking. Well, I wish I could simply turn it off.