A. The Amygdala Is Beyond Our Full Control
. So, let's say you're at a grocery store. The store is busy. It might be around Christmas time, near Black Friday even. You are over stimulated, but never once did you pout or think consciously about how uncomfortable you feel in your current surroundings...
We all know, it's just life, right? Some form of panic happens to everyone at some point. Right? You can handle it yourself.
Until you start experiencing physical symptoms that concern you. Symptoms that you would never have thought to relate to your anxiety. Then what?
Gastrointestinal issues, constant cold chills without fever, fatigue, malaise, depending on how long you've lived with crippling anxiety, I would say depression, anhedonia (the innability to feel pleasure and doing activities you used to like). Dysphoria, a lot like anhedonia, only instead of being neutral, apathetic, you are a miserable slump of the darkest of depressive episodes.
. Now that you have that picture in your mind, imagine if the person in the store were to have explosive diarrhea.
I know, it's kind of funny, but the reason I chose it is because it's something you cannot help. The same as telling a person to "think positively about not being nauseous" when they have morning sickness.
. In the case of the person at the grocery store, most humans would try to push them. Most humans hold the stigma, that anxiety can be powered through.
Any wellness coach that you go to will most likely tell you that deep breathing will really help in a panic attack situation.
I'm not disputing that, but there is a point when the body has gone beyond the ability to "reverse" the course of sheer terror. There is a point where it becomes out of our control.
. Now, if a person were to go to the doctor with severe diarrhea, would it make sense that the doctor would ask them if they had tried mindfulness? NO.
Would the doctor ask them how much the gastrointestinal upset impairs their life? YES, POSSIBLY.
. Would these same doctors ask a person with general anxiety disorder if they had practiced mindfulness? YES
. Would a doctor seriously inquire about how much anxiety has impaired this patient's life? PROBABLY NOT.
Both of these ailments are invisible at first glance.
Both the anxious person and the gassy person could have an equal chance of lying.
. But for some reason, doctors treat mental health patients as if we are criminals. As if we have come there specifically to lie to them in hopes that will get (?) I don't even know to be honest, because you can get better drugs off the street. With less side effects. Hand to God.
. Vagus nerve could control diarrhea if one knew how to control it. But that sounds really easy, until you sit down and try to concentrate on it, only to find out you're not as connected to it as you thought you were.
. The same can be said about the amygdala. That little gland in your head that tells you whether to fight, flight, fawn, or freeze.. The amygdala is like a wounded child. A wounded child that's been abused, horrified, forgotten and dismissed.. The amygdala child grew up in this way due to constant trauma reinforcing its choices. So it repeats what's worked in the past over and over. The anxetic amygdala has turned into a bitter adult that's stuck in its ways. And, to get through this shit (if you can), you gotta talk to it. Unfortunately.
.
The only comfort I can offer is the promise that it takes a good little chunk of time to reset oneself from a life time of bizarre and unnecessary woes.
Pytch