Pteromerhanophobia is the Least of My Worries
I believe I have done a stellar job here of documenting my unmedicated status quo of engulfing anxiety. For 30 years I felt an overwhelming sense of impending doom. I feared that death was around every corner, but I also didn’t hate the idea of dying, so it has been a very confusing three decades. In addition to my constant anxious state, there were events and activities that ramped up my nerves to an even higher level. Social events, driving over bridges, scuba diving below 60ft, violent thunderstorms, festival rides that are disassembled and reassembled on a weekly basis by operators with missing fingers, and, of course, flying.
I had gotten up at 4am to drive to South Carolina to leave my car at my Dad’s house, and have him drive me to the airport. I had planned a last minute trip to Ohio to visit my friend, Jennifer. In my excitement to see her, I forgot that flying to Ohio meant having to fly. Even in the pre-sunrise darkness, Dad could sense my shaking and fidgeting in the passenger seat of his truck.
“‘The Hell is the matter with you?”
“Flying makes me nervous.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Because its 30,000 feet in the air. If something happens, there’s no gentle way to come down. It’s terrifying.”
“Are you still gonna get on the plane?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then, stop worryin’ about shit you can’t control.”
“Stop worryin’ about shit you can’t control,” was my Father’s simplified, colloquialized version of the Serenity Prayer; something that every 12 Stepper is familiar with:
God, grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.
Before Xanax and Prozac, the Serenity prayer was the only defense people had against the all-consuming nervousness that comes with being a human being. Well, there was alcohol. That worked. But once your wife leaves you, your kids quit speaking to you, your boss fires you, and your liver goes on strike, you have to find alternative relaxation techniques.
While I could make a CVS receipt-sized list of things to drink about, the underlying cause was my never-ending panic. Not just “panic,” but my subconscious belief that if worried enough, if I played out every scenario, if I knew all of the possible methods and outcomes of any given situation, then I could prevent anything bad from happening. Twas a fulltime job to play God in that manner. The only way to clock-out at the end of the day was to drink—drink heavily.
I think it surprises most people, to not only find out what an aggressive alcoholic I was behind closed doors, but to find out that my drinking was at its worst when my life was at its absolute best. Do you have any idea how terrifying it is to just sit around with your hands tied, waiting for the other shoe to drop…? I found that out the hard way. I was loved. I was supported. I had intense laughter. I had every opportunity laid out before me. I had good friends. I had a great family. All of those things combined left me completely, unmanageably horrified. Being at the pinnacle of wonderful, meant that the pinnacle of awful was creeping just around the corner… and I was defenseless. I was still defenseless when I was drunk, but I didn’t notice it as much. As it turns out, my worries were validated. The pinnacle of awful was just around the corner. The plot twist being that the awful thing that would ruin my perfect life… was me.
If this past year has taught me anything, its that, in the grand scheme of things, we can control very, very little. Not the weather, not politicians, Hell, this year we couldn’t even trust door handles or the air we were breathing. Don’t even get me started on how little we can control about other people. Perhaps the reason the Serenity Prayer works so well for addicts is because you have to watch your empire crumble around you before you truly understand that the empire was never really yours to begin with. Our lives aren’t even ours; we’re just leasing our carbon form from the earth, our houses and cars from the bank, oxygen from the trees, and if you have kids, absolutely nothing is fucking yours anymore. Not your food, not your body, not your time.
There is a complicated relief/turmoil that comes with losing everything. You learn how to let go and how to cling tightly in equal measure. The trick is figuring out what in your life goes in the trash shoot and what belongs on the mantel. For instance, the people who wipe their brow and happily walk away when you need them the most… let them head on out. Your pride can mosey down the road too. Money, jewelry, objects that were formerly sentimental—lower your weapons, we’re not putting up a fight for any of that.
22-month-old nephews, on the other hand, those are too be held tightly and often. Steadfast friends who have armored up for you over and over and over again, then hunkered down with their arms and umbrellas over you while the storm of the century raged all around—do whatever you have to do to keep them close and safe. Family, who never saw you for what were at your worst, but only ever saw what you had been before and what you would be again… frame that and hang it above the fireplace. That’s your home. That’s your soul.
Since I let my pride pack up its banjo and its knapsack and catch a Greyhound on outta here, I can admit that I am very much a work in progress. I’m like that stretch of I-85 through Salisbury: I broke ground in the 1990s and I will never be finished. Or convenient. I bested more than a few circumstances in the last year that should have killed me. I accomplished the seemingly impossible, though I did it clumsily and sloppily. I was supported and encouraged along the way by people who assured me that every encountered struggle, large or small, would make me stronger in the end. Am I stronger? Yes. Am I still frequently scared shitless? Also, yes.
I can mourn the loss of my old empire while also rejoicing in the construction of a new one. It may be small, but its all mine. The problem is, as I look out over this vast estate that is ripe for development, I find that I’m bricking myself into a small fortress. Old habits die hard, I suppose. My obsession with preventing bad things from happening still lingers in the air with the pollen and smells from the kabob restaurant at the end of the block. That useless default of “watch out! Watch out! Watch out!” bothers me for two big reasons.
First of all, nothing can prevent bad things from happening. Nothing at all. We can maintain a general level of safety in our lives for comfort, but at the end of the day, its Satan and Kim Kardashian’s world and we’re just living in it. Insurance doesn’t even provide insurance—it doesn’t prevent terrible things from happening, it just helps you pay for the terrible things that are inevitable. Healthy people die. Teslas crash. Promises and biding contracts are breakable. Its not fiscally wise to always bet on the worst-case scenario, but it is prudent to know that it is always a possibility. Unfortunately, I’ve let that possibility take over a much bigger portion of my wasted heart than it deserves.
Secondly, my chronic anxiety and panic is something that I have battled with for a long time and finally have some control over. I do not fester in a constant state of fearing the unknown, or fearing fear itself, like I did for the prior 29 years. Which means that this current bout of self-preservation, isolation, and fort erecting is a choice. I’m choosing to close myself off to the exciting and the unfamiliar. Which begs the question, did I really beat addiction to live like this? Afraid?
Lonely I can do. I’m great at being lonely. Ashamed: nailed it. I can be ashamed with my eyes closed and my hands tied behind my back. I’m proficient at being lost. I’m an expert at loathsome. But I am terrible at being afraid. I’ve been afraid my entire life and I’ve never gotten any better at it. Shouldn’t I be able to give it up along with my other failures, like the clarinet, calligraphy, and keeping hamsters alive?
As I write out another long, scenic, digressing post about myself, I have to remember that none of this is about me. I can’t cowardly embrace a life lived in fear, while trying to persuade other addicts to get sober on the basis that life is worth the living. I can’t preach a hope for happiness if I’m actively building an impenetrable wall between myself and any chance to be happy. Nobody can detect a lie better than a liar, so I can’t stand up in a room full of alcoholics and claim that my heart is open when it’s shut, locked, dead bolted, and there’s a bookshelf shoved in front of it. They’ll smell my bullshit. They’ll resent my untruth.
Steele is desperate to do what he sees the grown-ups do. He fumbles with chopsticks, plays in the driver’s seat of the car, runs his little plastic mower back and forth through the yard, and drinks out of every coffee cup and La Croix can that is left within his limited reach. What happens when the day comes that he can leap forward, reach out, run far, fight hard, and put himself out there for the things that he wants for himself… but instead he hides and steps backward into the safety of the shadows because its what he’s seen his Aunt Kara do?
I’ve learned to live with the weight of a lot my mistakes, but that would be my worst.
Life is enough of a losing game, considering that we all die in the end. Shivering through it like a Jack Russell without a Thunder Coat is no way to experience the finite years that we have. I’m not one for logic, but it does seem quite illogical that my take-away from losing people I love would be to avoid loving anymore people. I skidded off the road. It wasn’t out of malice, or neglect, or indifference. It was always going to happen. I had a storm to weather. I made it back. Now I know better. Now I do better.
Sitting around, feeling afraid, drinking away the fear while the walls fall down around you… that’s the dead hamster, swan-honking clarinet way to be afraid. Using fear as motivation to be a better version of yourself is much more productive. I had to come face to face with losing someone I loved before I could muster the strength to whole-heartedly, honorably, fight like Hell for something. The person still left. The fight in me stayed. A little gladiator like me, teeth bared, claws out, muscles flexed, eyeliner: perfect, shoes: painful but fabulous, would be a terrible utility to waste.
I’m not much in general, but I’m the best I’ve ever been. After the Hell I’ve seen, what’s left to be afraid of anyway? Like I said: now I know better. Now I do better. I can be afraid of flying all day long, but I should still take the fucking trip. I have an example to set for grown addicts and dwarfy diaper-wearers. I don’t want either to live like the sky will fall, or to love only as if they are destined to lose.
I can’t control my level of fear, I can only control how I handle it. I can’t control the weather, I can only control what I wear out into the rain. I can’t control my aversion to pain, I can only control whether or not I drink to feel numb. I can’t control whether a man stays with me or leaves, but I can control whether I give him the chance and if I give him my best. In order to do that, I have to climb down from my fort, open my door to the elements, swallow my fear, and let him in. I’ll be honest, I’ll be strong, I’ll be genuine and humble. I’ll give my best. What happens after that? Who knows? That’s some shit I can’t control.
