next steps with anxiety + 2017 shore walk for cancer research

i met with the psychiatrist this friday to talk about how things are going with the anxiety.

i told him the truth. i am still really struggling and some days are better than others.

the mornings tend to be the hardest. it ranges from feeling very anxious to crying and feeling like i can't make it through the day. it depends on the day.

the evenings at home with barrett and malena are the easiest.

until bedtime. then i get anxious about the following morning but i have meds to help me sleep through the night.

i thought that i could go off of those sleep meds as i have been so exhausted that i thought that i could sleep without them. i tried last night and woke up in a panic with nightmares about work. so i am not going to try that again tonight. maybe again sometime in the future.

we are doubling some doses of some drugs, and trying to work me off of one of the three drugs.

we will see how that goes.

between the side effects of the treatment and the anxiety i definitely feel like i am all over the place and my mind is racing in about one million different directions at the same time. and the anxiety makes it really hard to know which of those directions i should move it.

but i am trying hard to make it through this and just take it day by day. that is all i can do.

at the end of our session, my psychiatrist let me know he is leaving scca at the end of july so i will need to meet with a new one after he leaves. even though i have only had two sessions with him, i was bummed. that means starting all over again. on the bright side, i will have a few more sessions before he goes and i am going to start trying to do regular sessions with my counselor on treatment days. as i have said bef0re, it takes a village and the village continues to grow.

it is not easy to write and share about the anxiety and how crippling it has become for me. but it isn't easy to write about cancer either. so i figure if i share what it is like to battle anxiety and it helps someone who is also dealing with it feel less alone or helps someone to understand it better, then mission accomplished.

it is almost time for the 2017 shore walk that we annually participate in that raises funds for fred hutchinson cancer research. at the end of may, my sister-in-law's family held a bunco fundraiser and $2700 was raised in 3 hours. how incredible is that? i know, pretty damn awesome. the shore walk is on june 11th and if you would like to walk/run or donate to our team or just send us good mojo you can find more info on our team page. if you sign up, make sure that you sign up for our team "cancer you can suck it" - great name, right? right.

my friend mary had her next treatment on friday and all went well until she started feel awful towards evening time. but she felt better on saturday, and because she kicks ass, she ran a 5k today and had my name on her bib. she is a fighter. no doubt about that. go mary go!

i probably won't write more on here this week as i am headed for a super busy week as i had out of town on wednesday to celebrate a family member's 21st birthday for a couple of days. my goal is to leave work behind and just take three days to be with family, breathe, take my meds and try to be calm. i have a million things to do between now and then so wednesday feels a long ways away but it will be here before i know it. which i can't think about too much until i take my bedtime meds.

i hope that you all have a good week. make the most of it. enjoy it. do something really fun. xoxo