A while back, I came across these artistic representations of mental illness as little monsters. I can’t remember who first sent me their way, but I really resonated with the idea. Especially that anxiety is a little, hairy living being. In my mind, it latches onto the back of one shoulder and hangs on to different things in my life, whatever is providing the most interest and fuel. Recently, its entire existence was being fed with our marriage problems. We are still cautious, but the crisis seems to have passed. Anxiety got hungry and after just over a week of calm, it latched onto my self worth.

The last four days have been tough.

The thing about Anxiety and Depression is that our gut responses to it tend not to be healthy ones. When we’re down or feeling on edge, we don’t necessarily think, hmm, I should go outside and take a walk, or breathe deeply in a quiet place. No, we think, let me sit on the sofa for a little longer and surf the ‘net or binge watch a show on my streaming service, and eat more sugar. And while that can be an ok way to medicate, it doesn’t typically leave us in a better place than we started.

So today I spent a lot of time doing what I have been doing to cope for the past several days. Ruminating. Resting. Medicating with screens. Eating sweets. It was NOT helping.

My husband returned home from work in the evening, and one of the beautiful things about this time of year is that even though the weather hasn’t been especially reliable, it is still light out in the evening.

I finally listened to my smarter, deeper instinct and went for a walk.

When I’m feeling anxious and depressed, it’s almost like my skull gets thicker and thicker, and my brain gets smaller and smaller, till it’s a little wrinkled walnut encased in 4 inches of bone. I can’t think creatively. I can only survive.

I started to feel my spirit expand as soon as I got outside. At the last minute, I grabbed a heavy bag of books that needed to go back to the library, and the weight of it grounded me as I walked. The sky was cloudy and I stuck my boot in mud more than once, but it felt so good to be outside, breathing the air, not being responsible for anyone.

I took a different way than usual to the library, dropped the books off, and headed home another way as well.

Long before the end, my thoughts had gotten less oppressive.

I don’t know why it’s so hard to do the right thing, but tonight I did and it helped.