Something I found interesting that I would like to share.

Anyone get anxiety during specific times of the day.
Could be anxiety from something or nothing you're aware about just during specific times of the day.
example, morning fine, afternoon anxious, night fine.

 

Morning: Super Anxious. Gets better as time goes on. Evening, not anxious at all. Interesting, eh? What do you make of it?

 

Well, I get anxious when I check my email, and since I usually do that in the morning, I'm often anxious in the morning. So maybe it's related to activities we do at certain times of day.

 

You might be right about that. I used to get especially anxious on Saturday mornings. Then the past few months I instituted a new activity for Saturdays where I watch a really good movie that has music in it— or is a fantastical getaway—while drinking a frozen coffee drink, after a very pampering and fattening breakfast. Ever since that new “program,” I wake up with no anxiety at all on Sat. mornings. My little Saturday experiment shows that these habitual anxious moments can be changed.

 

@Diana-M Not saying that some 'escapism' (through watching movies) plus having a frozen coffee drink and a delicious fattening breakfast shouldn't be treats to have and look forward to... but what I see here is activities that are taking your mind off things and/or are soothing you. And it could be that you need more soothing in order to recover from TMS, so a greater amount of (but different and healthier) soothing activities could be warranted, as Dr Sarno wrote in The Mindbody Prescription (page 29):

"Suppose, however, there is another element in the equation; that it is not simply the quantity of rage that brings on symptoms, but the presence or absence of counterbalancing soothing factors … the occurrence of symptoms reflects too much rage and not enough counteracting soothing elements in one’s life."

With me, I stuffed down my feelings and emotions with food because my parents didn't allow me to show my emotions (they made it clear that they weren't acceptable) plus they didn't love me, so I turned to food and this developed into an eating disorder from the age of around 6 or 7 and, of course, in stuffing down my emotions, I also went on to develop a TMSing brain. And so, I always see a danger in using food to soothe oneself -- but I do appreciate that far from everyone is like me, that is, vulnerable to getting an eating disorder.

It's not easy to know though whether one's anger and rage is simply too high or whether it's not that high and there's just not enough "soothing factors" in one's life. So I guess it's about expressing the rage/anger and irritations with life in safe ways like writing them down on paper (e.g. to include asking yourself why you get anxious in the mornings and particularly on Saturday mornings, when you don't soothe yourself)....and doing this together with increasing healthy "soothing factors".

Yes, in the mornings, but not every morning, it depends on what's going on in my life.

It's usually in connection with 'lifey' stuff that I've got to solve or do that is irritating and/or difficult.

My brain mulls over things during the night (to include in dreams that I don't always remember when I wake up) and then I awake feeling anxious but don't necessarily know straight away what my brain's been working on for me. This is what our brains tend to do, that is, to assess and make sense of and try and solve the things that have been or are affecting us during the day. For me, my morning anxiety is like a 'call to arms' (not to fight but) to face and address the 'lifey' stuff and when I knuckle down to it and start to deal with it, a pathway or solution usually comes to me, whereas it hadn't come to me before I had 'slept on it'.

 

Yes! You are so right! I know I do Need more soothing activities.

Haha! Also right about the fattening breakfasts. Sooo much fun, but can’t last forever. It did help get me through a slump this summer, though.

 

This is sad. I’m so sorry this happened to you. Somewhat of the same thing happened to me, but thankfully, I didn’t develop an eating disorder. The main thing is to know how lovable you really are! You are a wonderful person!

 

I think this totally happens to me almost every night! My symptoms really flare sometimes too during the night.

 

Aww...I don't know what to say, except thank you, as I'm so not used to compliments! The same applies to you, you know! -- And I'm really sorry that you had a similar thing happen to you.

I don't know how it was that I turned to food... I think perhaps because they gave me ice lollies, sweets and chocolates to keep me quiet and they loved big dinners (until both of them, many years later, went on a diet) so overeating was something that was acceptable to my parents, and I guess it just went from there.

 

I am the same way! But thank you, too!

I think it’s easy to turn to food. We didn’t have much extra food or treats around when I was young, but my grandparents did and I would always stuff myself there! Food is still a great comfort. I guess it is for most people. The only way I can keep my weight from creeping up is to keep a food log.

It’s sad when parents don’t realize how much their children crave attention—- to be truly seen. Listened to. Not getting that as a child really creates a huge hole in the heart. And it’s a hole I am still constantly trying to fill.

 

I can see the patterns. I mostly feel calmer during the evenings.

 

O for sure. I just frequently see a strange pattern of anxiety during the afternoon. Even without doing tasks.

 

Sorry you had to go through the eating disorder and about your family within ages of 6 or 7 .

 

Thank you, @stevow7. It took a lot of time, but, I'm pleased to be able to say that, thankfully, I've recovered from my eating disorder now.

 

Yes I was conditioned to have pain with weather, mornings, and afternoons. I was able to resolve the physical responses. Alan Gordon's posts on conditioned responses cleared it all up for me. Check out this post. https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/overcoming-conditioned-responses.23324/ (Alan G. - Overcoming conditioned responses)

What worked for me was literally talking to my brain out loud (i.e., this doesn't make any sense, brain, bad weather doesn't cause <insert symptom>, please stop it.) and then I'd continue with whatever activity. Warning: I had to repeat myself over and over and over and over throughout the day and it gets boring, at a certain point I'd roll my eyes. I told my husband not to be alarmed if I'm talking to myself.

This worked very well for my physical pain and now I am currently applying it to my feelings of anxiety. For whatever reason my brain is conditioned to have these anxious feelings toward seeing dust on furniture, fingerprints on glass, dog hair on ground, "imperfections". I developed these symptoms out of the blue one day years ago. I started facing my fear around all of this stuff and am steadily improving like with my physical symptoms.

Over time your brain will create new neuro pathways and not associate "danger" with things like the example I shared above. It's awesome.

 

Thank you soooo much for sharing these real life examples and your victories!

 

Hi! Glad you're feeling better.