Anxiety

 There is always something to fret about:

Covid, or the new school year, or a new lump, or my kids' health.

There is always something to stress about:

A work-related project, whether my kid will get into high-level math, auditions, job interviews...

It's like there is a box that exists in my mind - the worry box - and it is never empty. As some things get resolved, new fears and anxieties come to fill it. It doesn't matter how good or how bad things get - the box stays about the same size (well, maybe expanding and contracting slightly). There is only so much room for anxiety, but there is always at least some room for anxiety.

At the beginning of the pandemic I was totally and completely freaking out about food. I was so worried that we will be in a situation when food will need to be rationed or that we will run out of essentials (flour! salt!) that I couldn't sleep.

I am pretty calm about grocery shopping these days (we are stocked up on flour and salt!), but now I am really worried about math in middle school (we have an upcoming meeting with the principal this week).

A couple of weeks ago, I wasn't worried about math, but I worried about a new lump.

Last week, when the kids were staying with the grandparents, my husband and I had the house to ourselves and could work to our hearts content. No interruptions! No stress - right?

Wrong! Thursday night, I had a near-meltdown because of a work project. True, the client is challenging and the deadlines are tight - but that wasn't anything new, that's been going on for the last few weeks! So all of a sudden, in the absence of stress and anxiety due to managing 3 kids while working full time, I had all this empty space in the worry box - so it got filled with the "next available representative".

That stupid worry box - it's like I can't function without a certain level of anxiety; if there is nothing obvious to worry about, I'll make it out of nothing.

Good thing: there are only a couple of things I can worry about at any given time... Once the "worry box" is at capacity, I can't be bothered with any additional anxieties... they'll just have to wait a week or two until there is space available...