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I get up, I get down
Aug. 24th, 2013 09:09 pmSome years ago I was standing jetlagged in a Maryland CVS when I had the fleeting but powerful impression that someone was about to walk up behind me and shoot me in the back of the head.
I tell you this bizarre anecdote to try to convey the depths of my travel anxiety. This is not "have I packed enough books for the flight?!" stuff. For over a decade, I've been arriving in the US with a combination of sleep deprivation, jetlag, and untreated (or worse, incorrectly treated) Bipolar II Disorder.
The flights themselves provoked panic anxiety disorder - not just on the day, but for weeks before - but at least that could be somewhat controlled with tranquillisers and cognitive behavioural therapy. The rest was madness: irritability, withdrawal, and anxiety, including and the sort of weird paranoid feelings that I experienced in that chemist's.
Last year's trip was a noticeable improvement: with the correct diagnosis at last, I was on a mood stabiliser (Epilim) and had something (Zyprexa) to correct the jetlag which can set the bipolar brain see-sawing. Further tweaks to my medication (I'm now on 60 mg Cyprexa and 1500 mg Epilim) mean my Bipolar II is now even better controlled, so I am hopeful for this year's jaunt.
Where I'm not so sure, however, is on the anxiety front - particularly my social anxiety disorder, which contributed earlier this year to my freaking out at the last minute and missing Conflux. An OS trip also always means a convention. I am not a gregarious person by nature. A con is a nauseous mixture of somewhere I don't want to be with somewhere I am still fairly conspicuous. On the whole, I'd rather have a nice cup of tea.
None of this is anyone else's fault. Our family are unfailingly welcoming and generous and I've never had a bad experience at a con (except that one awful panel, but that was my own fault. :) It's so unfair that, instead of being an untarnished privilege and pleasure, our annual trips Up Over have also been the source of so much dread and pain.
I tell you this bizarre anecdote to try to convey the depths of my travel anxiety. This is not "have I packed enough books for the flight?!" stuff. For over a decade, I've been arriving in the US with a combination of sleep deprivation, jetlag, and untreated (or worse, incorrectly treated) Bipolar II Disorder.
The flights themselves provoked panic anxiety disorder - not just on the day, but for weeks before - but at least that could be somewhat controlled with tranquillisers and cognitive behavioural therapy. The rest was madness: irritability, withdrawal, and anxiety, including and the sort of weird paranoid feelings that I experienced in that chemist's.
Last year's trip was a noticeable improvement: with the correct diagnosis at last, I was on a mood stabiliser (Epilim) and had something (Zyprexa) to correct the jetlag which can set the bipolar brain see-sawing. Further tweaks to my medication (I'm now on 60 mg Cyprexa and 1500 mg Epilim) mean my Bipolar II is now even better controlled, so I am hopeful for this year's jaunt.
Where I'm not so sure, however, is on the anxiety front - particularly my social anxiety disorder, which contributed earlier this year to my freaking out at the last minute and missing Conflux. An OS trip also always means a convention. I am not a gregarious person by nature. A con is a nauseous mixture of somewhere I don't want to be with somewhere I am still fairly conspicuous. On the whole, I'd rather have a nice cup of tea.
None of this is anyone else's fault. Our family are unfailingly welcoming and generous and I've never had a bad experience at a con (except that one awful panel, but that was my own fault. :) It's so unfair that, instead of being an untarnished privilege and pleasure, our annual trips Up Over have also been the source of so much dread and pain.
