Tag: Worry

What’s the Worry?

Why do I worry?  Maybe it’s because I think I have the super power of worrying.  The more I worry, the more I can control the situation.  That would be pretty awesome but not likely I guess.  Or maybe it’s because I enjoy that out of control, gut wrenching feeling when I worry.  No, no, that’s not it either.  It’s really because worrying gives me a good excuse to eat chocolate. That’s got to be it!  Who doesn’t love a good excuse to eat chocolate?  And that sweet yummy goodness definitely “helps” when I’m worried!  Problem is, if I’m worried all the time…well, that’s a lot of chocolate…and, incidentally, pounds.

So what’s the real reason?  Why do I worry?  Human nature?  Because I selfishly feel the need to be in control of all situations?  (Very big headed of me, I know.)  Is it because I’m a Mom?  Maybe, but that’s another post for another day.  I don’t know if I have the perfect answer to the question.  But my best answer is because I have a trust issue.  I know I cannot control every situation or everyone’s actions.  I have to trust everyone will make the best choice in every situation but that’s not the trust I am talking about.

Matthew 6:27

Can any of you, by worrying, add a single hour to your life?

We definitely cannot add hours to our lives from worry but I do think we can lose hours of our lives to worrying.  From just this past year, if I had all the time back I spent worrying about this or that I would, by now, probably have an extra month.  For a 30 day month there are 720 hours.  Seven hundred and twenty hours seems like a lot of time to spend worrying but if you average that time into a single year it comes to be a little less than 2 hours of worrying a day.  Granted, I don’t worry 2 hours every day.  Sometimes I worry more…

I like to think of all the good things I could do with that extra month of time: I could volunteer more, take my kids out to the park or visit with friends and family.  Sometimes maybe I could use that time to do something for myself, like maybe blow dry my hair instead of running out the door with a wet head everyday or have a minute to file my nails.  (It’s the little things that keep me happy!)

I may have gotten away from the point.

If I really look hard at those times I worry, my trust issue is glaring right back at me.  Am I trusting the One who is really in control to work everything for my good?  Or am I nervous something is not going to go exactly the way I would have planned?  Funny thing about my plans, they don’t always work out the best for me.  So who am I trusting?  Am I trusting myself to make the best decisions or am I relying on the Lord to put every piece in place in every situation?  The right answer, and I want this to be my answer, would be to say, “Of course I am trusting God!” but, right now, I would be a big fat liar if I said that.  How do I know?  Because I worry so much!

Psalm 112:7

They will have no fear of bad news; their hearts are secure trusting in the Lord.

I AM A WORK IN PROGRESS!

The Waiting – Part 2

The Waiting – Part 2

Waiting

Phillipians 4:6
Do not worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.

After I managed to get myself all worked up about my potential diagnosis, I knew it was time to calm down and go to the one who knows all, sees all and is all.  It only took me a few hours to look at seemingly every site on the web concerning my potential diagnosis as well as get myself so panicked I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.  All I felt like doing was vegging on the couch and eating candy.  Although I do really like candy, I knew this attempt at comforting myself was a problem.

I am the best at getting myself worked up very quickly and taking a long time to calm down.  We had a year full of trauma three years ago and ever since them I worry more than ever.  I know beyond any doubt that worry is not part of God’s plan for my life but it is one of the things I struggle with most.  I heard a speaker at a conference one time use the word “catastophizing”.  That’s when your worry goes immediately to the worst possible scenario.  For example: If someone doesn’t call to check in when they are supposed to, the mind immediately starts to panic and wonder if we should send out a search party to look for their car…in a ditch…on the side of the road.  In reality, they just had to make a quick pit stop to pick up a snack or go to the bathroom and it took them a few minutes longer to get home.  I don’t know if you are the same but I am definitely a “catastophizer”!   I know it, own it and do my best to battle against it but it is hard.  Sometimes I need reinforcements.

Prayer is powerful and God wants us to bring our prayers and petitions to Him.  He wants us to reach for Him, to lean on Him.  We can find peace in Him.  Cast our worries on Him.  In the midst of my “catastrophizing” I realized I had forgotten to call on the name of the Lord to help me.  I knew it was time to make a change and battle the worry that filled my mind.   I needed to call upon the Lord and ask others to do the same.  I didn’t want to cause anyone to worry but I needed to seek peace and also needed to ask for some reinforcements.  The potential diagnosis wasn’t life threatening but it did have the potential to be life altering later in my life and it scared me.  I started praying and asked some of my prayer warriors to intercede for me as well.

It did seem like forever as I waited.  I knew my friends and family were praying for me and seeking God’s comfort for me as I waited.  I was seeking God’s peace for when I finally did receive the results.  It’s a hard prayer to pray.  While I know God is the great physician and can heal anything I also didn’t want to fall apart if, in fact, the results came back positive.  I needed strength not to slip back into my tendency to be a “catastrophizer”!

I believe when I walked out of the doctor’s office on Monday, looking at my history and current symptoms, the doctor believed the results would be positive.  He didn’t say as much but when I asked him directly he said, “Let’s wait on the results before we move forward”.  It might not have been what he meant, however, I took it to mean he thought the results would be positive but he didn’t want to make me worry.  After much prayer, a few calls to the doctors office to see where the results were (I’m working on my patience as well) and a message to the phone nurse, the results were in.  I sobbed, from relief, when I heard them.

The Waiting, Part 1

I walked into the doctor’s office last Monday to get my hand checked. It was swollen and hurting quite a bit. I thought, possibly, I had broken a bone in my hand, maybe pulled a muscle or strained something. I left the doctor’s office light headed and probably a little pale. He would not treat my hand until he sent me to get blood work for a potentially life altering immune system disease. What I thought was going to be a simple splint to fix it or maybe a cortisone shot to calm the swelling turned into a week of waiting and worrying!

The doctor sent me away with a prescription for testing. I saw the doc on Monday, went for testing on Tuesday and then I had to wait. Wait for results, wonder about what the results might be. Would they be positive or negative? If positive, would these results lead to a major life adjustment now? Would a positive result and diagnosis mean I would lose some mobility and function later in life? I had so many questions and so many what if’s. I hadn’t even been diagnosed yet. I was waiting but I was also worrying…A LOT!

“Stay off the internet!” Those were the last words the doctor said to me before I left his office. It was great advice but of course I didn’t take it! Information, scary information, is so readily available. Honestly, before I even left the doctor’s office I had already looked up the disease. I told him as much and that’s what prompted him to advise staying off the internet. When I got home, of course, I had to find as many websites as possible with information about the disease. The doctor was right, it was a mistake to look at the internet.

I looked at all the risk factors, treatment options, home care suggestions. By the time I was done, I had convinced myself the tests were going to come back positive. As I read the risk factors I was a match for every single one of them. Swollen, painful, warm knuckles…check, age…check, family history…check and the list went on from there. I had myself so worked up that I was one misplaced sock away from bursting into tears. I’m not sure why I didn’t listen to the doctor. Oh wait, yes I do.

The waiting! It is not always easy to wait for something, especially potentially bad news. I had to do something to ease my mind while I was waiting. Easing my fears by looking at the internet DID NOT work! I thought for sure I would find some information to take the worry away and make the waiting easier. I was wrong. I looked at a lot of different websites and none of them eased my fear but they definitely made it worse.

Every time I get myself worked into the cyclone of worry I have a seemingly impossible struggle to get out. I imagine myself stuck in a worry tornado going around and around with no hope of escape. Kind of like the cow from the movie Twister, around and around the heifer went, mooOOOooo mooOOOooo. Just like the cow, every time I get close enough to yell (or in the cow’s case moo) for help the cyclone tears me away again. There is only one true hope to keep me from the tornado of worry, one that will be with me wherever I am, cyclone or not.

Phillipians 4:6
Do not worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.