Something Good- Day 169

Today was a rough day. I was pulled over by a police officer for not stopping at a stop sign. I had stopped, but there is a curve in the road and walls on each side, which prevented the officer from seeing me stop. I do not know what to do when I get stopped by a police officer. I panic and get defensive because I did nothing wrong. This is my third time being stopped by an officer, and my panic reflex has gotten worse each time. It especially makes me anxious because I feel like I have no control over it. I obey all traffic laws as well as I can, but that does not mean I am safe from an officer trying to make a point.

Anyway, the officer gave me a warning, which I still resented because I knew I had stopped. As I drove away though, I was overcome with feelings of anger and resentment and hurt. I wanted to call my best friend or my sister or other family member, to help calm me down and get to a state where I could go to work okay. Instead, I drove to work and blasted my music. My body tensed to the point where my hands couldn’t move the way they should. I thought about pulling over and calling my boss, but I relaxed just enough to drive safely to work.

My body was aching from tensing up so much, and I was in a bad mood. My coworkers could tell right away that I was upset. After working for a while, I finally calmed down enough to do my job. I did snap at one of my coworkers at the end of the night though, and my boss asked me what was going on. I told her about getting pulled over and my bad experiences with police officers and wanting to call out sick. It brought back up some of the feelings, but I mostly held it together.

Anyway, in the midst of all this, I finally was approved for my house refinance. I have been waiting for this for weeks and working on refinancing for months. I am grateful for the terms I was given though and the way this all worked out.

Another thing that made me smile today was talking with a lady who took her dog outside to do his business. She had a crutch, so I stopped to ask if she needed help with walking her dog. She thanked me for my kindness and said I was sweet to offer. She introduced herself, and we talked for a minute before I drove off. It felt good to connect with someone for a minute or two.

Something Good- Day 134 & 135

I went to the post office yesterday morning and was frustrated to find that my package would cost three times more to ship than I expected because they did not offer media mail services through the kiosk. I became even more upset when the slot to drop off packages was broken, so I had to wait for the office to open anyway. I had planned on getting breakfast that morning but did not have time to do so after the post office trip. I went into work frustrated and upset. However, I calmed down after helping a few courteous customers. It is amazing what a few good interactions can do to improve your mood.

This morning I was able to get the breakfast I missed out on last night. I always feel better when I have eaten well, so I am grateful for a better start to my day today.

Hangry

Last week was an especially difficult week emotionally. I had multiple breakdowns a day and just struggled to control my emotions several times throughout the week. By the end of the week, I realized that this was not simply the result of inconvenient timing of mood swings but was instead directly correlating to my eating habits. The longer it took for me to get food, the more aggressive and anxious I became.

I have always known that I struggle with handling needing food. I can tolerate hunger and can go without eating for a while without issues, but if I do not get food when I am expecting to eat, I lose self control. I lash out and have even injured myself at times. This probably sounds a bit extreme, but I looked up a couple articles about “hanger” and aggression around hunger. The ones I found most relevant explained that low blood sugar can decrease serotonin, which increases stress and affects the ability to regulate your mood.

As someone who already struggles with serotonin levels and mood regulation, this can easily send me over the edge. I remember as a kid, kicking myself off a bed because I was so hungry that I didn’t know what to do with myself. The biggest problem with all this is that it is difficult to provide food for yourself when you get to that point. Trying to cook something when your brain isn’t working leads to more anger and frustration because the process takes too long or is not going as planned.

At this point, I have realized as an adult that I have three options. I can withdraw myself from the situation until my body tires itself out and I no longer have the energy to be aggressive, or I can try to maintain self control just long enough to get something to eat, or I can allow things to get to the point when I explode and am at risk of hurting others or myself. I can’t tell you how many times I have experienced these problems as an adult, much less as a child. Granted, as a child, someone else was mostly responsible for providing food for me, but I had less control about how or when that food came.

I think it is interesting to note the differences between what we expect of children and adults. Often when we become most frustrated with how someone is acting, there is probably a physiological component to their behavior. Maybe they literally cannot just keep calm and carry on. Maybe they cannot communicate their needs. Maybe they cannot provide for themselves in the ways we expect. The difference between children and adults though is that we expect the child to learn to do these things and the adult to know how to do these things. But maybe instead we need to focus more on why things are happening to help prevent the physiological reaction because at that point, it is too late in many ways to avoid unwanted reactions.