Fear and Anxiety

I was diagnosed with anxiety disorder when I was first diagnosed with postpartum depression.  As a result, some things are extremely hard for me.  Planning times to meet with other people is challenging for me, even planning to meet family is tough at times.  I don't know why.  I think it's more about the anxiety leading up to the event.  Usually once I'm there I do okay; especially when my husband is there to calm my nerves.  However, I don't always realize that it's anxiety that is holding me back in life.

Hanalei one of our puppies

Exercise is no exception.  When I was younger, I was bit by a dog just under my right eye - the scar is still visible sometimes.  To this day, I am still scared of dogs.  If I know the dog, I'm okay, but the thought of going for a walk and having a dog run up to me is frightening.  This is something that has kept me from walking with my children for their entire lives.  If my husband isn't there, it is really hard for me to go (I don't think I've gone on a walk more than 5 times without him).  This may be an unrealistic fear now that I live in the city, but in my home town, dogs ran free a lot of the time.  It wasn't uncommon to encounter them in your own yard and definitely if you went for a walk.  However, in the city there are fewer dogs running free and rarely do you see one just walking the streets.  Still, I can't even park next to a car with a dog in it and I know they can't get me.  So, although it might be unrealistic, it's very real for me. 

Dogs aren't the only thing that keep me from walking.  I am so scared of falling down and not being able to get up and some stranger having to help me that I don't want to walk alone.  I also don't want to walk with just my kids.  I'd hate to embarrass them or have them feel like they need to help me when I know that would be nearly impossible.  Unlike my fear of dogs, this fear hasn't been with me forever.  About 14 years ago,  I twisted my ankle pretty badly in a store and fell to the ground.  Although it wasn't broken, I did have to wear a brace and keep pressure off of it.  I had never twisted my ankle before that event, but ever since, I was twisting it all the time and if my husband wasn't there to hold me up, I usually ended up on the ground.  A few years later, my hubby and I went to a Blazer game.  As we were walking back to our car, I twisted my ankle about 7 times before we got back to it; each time my husband was there to hold me up.  By the time we got to the car, I was exhausted, in pain, and so embarrassed (I was probably crying too).  It was probably this walk that solidified my fear of walking.  However, another one still sticks with me too.  On my first day of college, I was walking out of class, stepped on a uneven crack on the sidewalk, my ankle turned and I hit the ground.  Some of my classmates stopped to see if I was okay and pick up my phone that had slid across the ground.  I was able to get up, but I was very sore and my wrist hurt for years after that.  

The fear of falling, compounded with my fear of dogs, has kept me in my house for years.  I still get very nervous walking on pavement and I can't stand to watch people run on the sidewalk or road.  I am so scared that they will fall and get hurt.  It literally makes me sick to my stomach to think about it. 

Are these rational fears?  No, probably not, but they are real fears that I experience still today.  These fears are holding me back from being successful and I know it, but I'm still not sure exactly how to get over them.  

There has to be a way to get over the anxiety that lives inside me.