1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000 Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the podcast. 2 00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:14,000 So same thing as usual, driving, so I can't use my proper microphone at the moment, but this will do. 3 00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:20,000 So today I just wanted to give an update on myself, some progress, some setbacks, 4 00:00:20,000 --> 00:00:26,000 what I've done in those situations and what I plan to do about them in the future. 5 00:00:26,000 --> 00:00:38,000 So, quick backstory, about April last year I sort of entered into the best state I've been with my Metaphobia since it started. 6 00:00:38,000 --> 00:00:44,000 I was working pretty much full time, I was going to the gym six days a week. 7 00:00:44,000 --> 00:00:50,000 I'd started my first bulk, so if you know what a bulk is, you know it's a pretty scary thing for someone with a Metaphobia to do, 8 00:00:50,000 --> 00:00:59,000 let alone just a normal person in general. But I did that and I bulked for about six, seven months. 9 00:00:59,000 --> 00:01:07,000 I was eating about 3,200 calories a day. Obviously you can go higher. I'm a little guy, I don't really need that much, 10 00:01:07,000 --> 00:01:14,000 so that was plenty for me, that was more than enough. And I gained weight for the first time in my life. 11 00:01:14,000 --> 00:01:23,000 I actually felt really good, I felt really content, really sound mentally. I had pretty much no anxiety. 12 00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:29,000 I never really felt sick, even though I was eating so much more food than I was used to. 13 00:01:29,000 --> 00:01:35,000 I was sleeping really well. My life in general was just going really well. 14 00:01:35,000 --> 00:01:50,000 I wasn't necessarily going anywhere career-wise. I'm still working at the same place, just a retail store. 15 00:01:50,000 --> 00:01:57,000 Nothing too fancy. But I was really content. 16 00:01:57,000 --> 00:02:05,000 And the context is why I'm mentioning all this anyways. Up until about November, early November, 17 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:12,000 I was doing really well. So that was like six, seven months, however long, whatever. 18 00:02:12,000 --> 00:02:22,000 And I sort of started to fall back a little bit into my ways. I noticed a lot of signs early on during that period 19 00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:27,000 that things were going to start getting a little worse. I started depersonalizing a little bit. 20 00:02:27,000 --> 00:02:31,000 I don't know if you know what that means or if you've ever had that happen, but I felt really out of my body. 21 00:02:31,000 --> 00:02:35,000 I'm pretty sure that's the right word. There's another word that's very similar. 22 00:02:35,000 --> 00:02:41,000 But I had that sort of out of body feeling a lot, and it made it really hard to tell anything. 23 00:02:41,000 --> 00:02:49,000 I had a really poor physical sensation of touch. Nothing just felt right. My own body didn't feel right. 24 00:02:49,000 --> 00:02:56,000 Nothing just felt good. So that's sort of what started it. And then it just sort of progressed worse and worse. 25 00:02:56,000 --> 00:03:05,000 I started having panic attacks at work again. Not major ones, but enough for me to actually leave. 26 00:03:05,000 --> 00:03:16,000 And I eventually got to the point where I had a massive panic attack that wasn't even caused by a metaphobia initially. 27 00:03:16,000 --> 00:03:21,000 It was health anxiety related, because I do sort of suffer with that as well. 28 00:03:21,000 --> 00:03:28,000 I convinced myself some shit, and then I started feeling sick as a result of that, because that's just how it goes. 29 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:36,000 I had one of the biggest panic attacks of my life. This was only last month. And here we are now, basically. 30 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:45,000 That was sort of my lowest point, I would say. And I'm sort of rebuilding up what I've had since then. 31 00:03:45,000 --> 00:03:50,000 It's gone good. Progress has been steady, but fluctuates. It's not a straight line. 32 00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:55,000 So some days are going to be terrible. Some days are going to be really good. Some days are going to be in between. 33 00:03:55,000 --> 00:04:01,000 And I've had all of those. I write in a journal every day. I also have a part where I list all my wins. 34 00:04:01,000 --> 00:04:07,000 So a win for me can be something as small as I ate even though I really didn't want to. 35 00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:14,000 Or I went to the supermarket even though I was really anxious. I did something that I was scared of, but I still did it. 36 00:04:14,000 --> 00:04:21,000 So I've been keeping track of that. It's also good to look back on. I don't know if you guys have a journal or not, 37 00:04:21,000 --> 00:04:25,000 but you should definitely start writing one, even if it's just a few sentences a day. 38 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:29,000 It's just really good to look back on. It's nice to see the progress you make. 39 00:04:29,000 --> 00:04:35,000 I notice I write in a lot less when I'm not anxious. So I can always tell when I'm feeling better, 40 00:04:35,000 --> 00:04:40,000 because I'll go back two months ago and say one sentence or six months or whatever. 41 00:04:40,000 --> 00:04:45,000 But yeah, so that's basically what's going on at the moment. 42 00:04:45,000 --> 00:04:50,000 I'm sort of figuring my shit out again, trying to do it in a better way. 43 00:04:50,000 --> 00:04:56,000 Just using the skills that I've learned and trying to build some new ones. So here we are. 44 00:04:56,000 --> 00:05:05,000 So I would say that was a pretty massive setback, that whole entire thing happening, as more of a recent thing. 45 00:05:05,000 --> 00:05:13,000 But I sort of felt like it was inevitable, because I knew that I go through these periods of my life 46 00:05:13,000 --> 00:05:20,000 where my anxiety will get super bad for a couple months at least, and it'll make it nearly impossible to do anything. 47 00:05:20,000 --> 00:05:24,000 Just for a little bit, and then it'll slowly get better and better. 48 00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:29,000 But it'll just be really hard for a while, and then I'll sort of slowly come out of it, 49 00:05:29,000 --> 00:05:33,000 and then I'll be on top of the world for six months, but then it'll happen again, or maybe a year, 50 00:05:33,000 --> 00:05:36,000 and then it'll just happen again. And it's been dual. 51 00:05:36,000 --> 00:05:41,000 I've been in this cycle, this is the third time since I actually realized I had a metaphobia, 52 00:05:41,000 --> 00:05:47,000 like four or five years ago, whatever it is. So I sort of want to stop that. 53 00:05:47,000 --> 00:05:50,000 I want to get out of that cycle. I don't want to be in it anymore. 54 00:05:50,000 --> 00:05:57,000 I know that my coping mechanisms probably aren't the greatest, and by that I mean when I sort of get into a better way, 55 00:05:57,000 --> 00:06:01,000 I don't really use the things that I've learned. 56 00:06:01,000 --> 00:06:05,000 I sort of just brush it all aside and pretend to be like a person that doesn't have anxiety, 57 00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:12,000 but that's just not who I am. And unfortunately for me, I do have anxiety, 58 00:06:12,000 --> 00:06:18,000 and I'm going to have it for probably the rest of my life, but that's okay, because we can manage it. 59 00:06:18,000 --> 00:06:22,000 We can get past anything, and we can figure this shit out. 60 00:06:22,000 --> 00:06:30,000 But I sort of act like I don't have it when I get into these periods of feeling really good, 61 00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:35,000 and I feel like that's where I screw up a little bit, because I forget all my coping skills. 62 00:06:35,000 --> 00:06:40,000 I start getting really lazy with it, and then when anxiety eventually does roll back around, 63 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:45,000 I'm so unprepared to deal with it that it hits me, and then I get back up, and then it hits me again, 64 00:06:45,000 --> 00:06:49,000 and then it gets you again and again and again until you eventually just sort of fall back. 65 00:06:49,000 --> 00:06:58,000 So I aim to be not dismissive, but disengage, and by that I mean I want to not dismiss the thoughts that I have, 66 00:06:58,000 --> 00:07:02,000 or if I have an anxious, like a little anxiety attack, whatever the hell, 67 00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:06,000 I don't want to dismiss it and be like, oh whatever, I want to disengage from it, 68 00:07:06,000 --> 00:07:10,000 I want to acknowledge that it happened, but then I want to disengage that, and I want to not go any further. 69 00:07:10,000 --> 00:07:15,000 I want to just acknowledge it, give it a couple seconds of thought, and be like, 70 00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:18,000 that happened, and I have to be okay with it, and then that's it. 71 00:07:18,000 --> 00:07:22,000 So that's sort of what I want to do, sort of what I have been doing. 72 00:07:22,000 --> 00:07:25,000 I actually don't really have that many panic attacks anymore. 73 00:07:25,000 --> 00:07:34,000 I've had two in the last three months that I can remember, at least bad ones. 74 00:07:34,000 --> 00:07:37,000 I could probably have little mini ones here and there, 75 00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:43,000 but yeah, so I've had two pretty nasty ones in the last three, four months. 76 00:07:43,000 --> 00:07:46,000 Some wins. All right, let's do some wins. Let's do something positive. 77 00:07:46,000 --> 00:07:52,000 So a win for me, right? So here's an example. 78 00:07:52,000 --> 00:07:55,000 I was really anxious about, so I mentioned I live out of town. 79 00:07:55,000 --> 00:07:57,000 It takes me a while to get to the shops and stuff. 80 00:07:57,000 --> 00:08:01,000 So after that massive panic attack, I was pretty scared to leave the house, 81 00:08:01,000 --> 00:08:03,000 as you can probably imagine. 82 00:08:03,000 --> 00:08:08,000 You know, first massive panic attack like that in a long time just freaked me the hell out. 83 00:08:08,000 --> 00:08:10,000 So I genuinely thought I was going to die. 84 00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:13,000 So I was terrified to leave the house. 85 00:08:13,000 --> 00:08:15,000 Like I really couldn't do much at all. 86 00:08:15,000 --> 00:08:18,000 I really didn't want to leave the bed, let alone the house. 87 00:08:18,000 --> 00:08:22,000 Came around to payday, had to go get groceries, you know, got to feed myself, 88 00:08:22,000 --> 00:08:24,000 got to feed my animals, you know. 89 00:08:24,000 --> 00:08:26,000 So I really had no choice. 90 00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:29,000 I had to drive into the town to get all my groceries. 91 00:08:29,000 --> 00:08:30,000 I also had to go to the chemist. 92 00:08:30,000 --> 00:08:34,000 I had to go to the shop to buy some more incense because I really liked those. 93 00:08:34,000 --> 00:08:37,000 Had to, what else did I do? 94 00:08:37,000 --> 00:08:40,000 Went to somewhere. I don't know. 95 00:08:40,000 --> 00:08:42,000 I went to a lot of places though. 96 00:08:42,000 --> 00:08:46,000 So I basically went from not being able to leave my bed or my house 97 00:08:46,000 --> 00:08:50,000 to the next day I had to go and do my entire, you know, 98 00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:55,000 like a fortnight's worth of grocery shopping just from that. 99 00:08:55,000 --> 00:08:57,000 And I had succeeded. I did it all. 100 00:08:57,000 --> 00:08:59,000 You know, I used all my coping strategies I had. 101 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:01,000 I used my deep breathing. 102 00:09:01,000 --> 00:09:06,000 I had an air pod in playing something in the background, some just, you know, whatever. 103 00:09:06,000 --> 00:09:11,000 I was acknowledging the way I was feeling, but I wasn't, you know, giving it a million thoughts. 104 00:09:11,000 --> 00:09:16,000 I was just like, you know what, I hear you, but that's it, sort of thing. 105 00:09:16,000 --> 00:09:18,000 You know, whatever. 106 00:09:18,000 --> 00:09:20,000 But I did it. So that's a pretty big win for me. 107 00:09:20,000 --> 00:09:24,000 Yeah, it might not sound like the biggest win for you guys if you think that. 108 00:09:24,000 --> 00:09:25,000 I don't know. 109 00:09:25,000 --> 00:09:30,000 Everyone's idea of massive win or a little win is really, really different. 110 00:09:30,000 --> 00:09:32,000 But little wins make bigger wins. 111 00:09:32,000 --> 00:09:35,000 So it's all about that. 112 00:09:35,000 --> 00:09:36,000 It doesn't matter what. 113 00:09:36,000 --> 00:09:38,000 It doesn't matter if you take one step outside. 114 00:09:38,000 --> 00:09:40,000 If it's more than you did the day before, you're winning. 115 00:09:40,000 --> 00:09:44,000 Also, remember to leave a rating if you feel like it or a review or whatever the hell it is. 116 00:09:44,000 --> 00:09:45,000 I don't really know. 117 00:09:45,000 --> 00:09:50,000 But yeah, if you want to, you want to help support the podcast, that would be really handy. 118 00:09:50,000 --> 00:09:52,000 So yeah, thank you guys. 119 00:09:52,000 --> 00:10:11,000 I'll see you next time.