I’m a Worrier

If there were a Worriers Anonymous group, I'm sure I could be their leader. I worry. About big things. About little things. I worry that I worry too much. Sometimes I worry that I'm not worrying enough about something. I even worry about why I worry. Some might say I just analyze a situation carefully. However, the lines that should exist between thought and analysis or worry are very fuzzy for me. You might think that I would look like a complete wreck if you saw me walking down the street. That really isn’t true. If you didn’t know me well, you’d likely never guess this little nugget of my personality. You’d likely not know why I look sleepy (because I stayed up half the night worrying about something out of my control or not worth worrying about). Looking on from the outside, I look like everyone else. I go to work everyday where I apply myself diligently. I care for my child. I cook. I clean (though maybe not as much as I should). I pay my bills on time without fail. I keep an organized calendar of all of my family’s comings and goings. However, worry isn’t something you can see.

To the casual observer, my life is neat and orderly and organized. However, what’s going on in my head is never like that. To a normal person, I should have little to worry about. I live in a safe neighborhood in a house I love. I have a good kid who is growing up to be a smart, well-adjusted child. I have a caring husband who would do anything in the world for his family and our safety and happiness. The three of us have our health. All of our parents are still living and healthy and active. However, the insanity in my head goes something like this.

1. What if I can’t pay the bills next month? Now, we’ve each been laid off and unemployed for months in the past. We lived through that just fine. We signed the papers on a house then I opted to take a $10K pay cut and give up my company car to take another job. We did just fine with that. We had a child which added thousands of dollars to our yearly expenses. We aren’t in the poor house yet though we might be living in the same neighborhood. I live with the fear and worry each and every day that this will be the month that I can’t make it work.
2. I worry that something will happen to my husband or my child. There really is no basis for this worry. My husband is one of the healthiest people I know other than sinus and allergy issues. He doesn’t have high blood pressure or high cholesterol. He doesn’t smoke. He isn’t overweight. He is of average health for someone his age. But I still worry. My son has had some minor health issues – severe food allergies, asthma, mysterious bacterial infections, etc. but nothing life-threatening. But I still worry. Anyone who is a mom knows what I mean on that one though. You’d always rather be sick yourself than to see your child sick. It is heart-crushing.
3. I worry that something important won’t get done. And even something unimportant. I worry about the house not being clean, the laundry not being done, the toys not getting picked up. It’s an insane worry, I know. It still holds a permanent place in my mind.
4. I worry about my extended family – my parents, my in-laws, my grandmothers. How is their health? What if something happened to one of them?
5. I worry about my job. Everyone knows that the environment in most companies now is to slash jobs at every opportunity. Keep expenses low. What if I become expendable despite my best efforts to be a valuable and productive employee? I’ve been laid off before. It’s not like there isn’t precedent for me working 40 hours before Thursday then being let go on Thursday afternoon as I am finishing up an important project. Sometimes it has nothing to do with what you bring to the table but, rather, what you take from it in terms of expenses.
6. I worry about the most ridiculous things late at night when I should be sleeping. Most of my evenings trying to fall asleep go something like this: Did I remember to pack J’s lunch? Was I supposed to send anything to school with him tomorrow – show and tell, or something for a party, or the check for the week? What’s his letter for this week that I’ll have to think of something that starts with that letter to send? T, I think. T… T… termites. When does the payment come due for the termite contract? Was it $250 or $350 last year? Did I drop those bills in the mail that I meant to? When is that library book due back? I noticed there is a light bulb out in the kitchen. Do we have any more? What’s the name of that movie I wanted to check out? When will I ever have time to watch it? Is that J I hear? Is he okay? Just a cough… good. What did I do with that cookbook I was looking at earlier this evening when the dryer buzzer sounded? I never finished writing out my meal plan and grocery list for dinners this week. What night can I get by the grocery store? What was J’s letter again? T… T… And this can go on for hours, believe it or not. My mind races when I first get into bed. If it’s been a really productive day, I might fall asleep in 20 minutes or so if I’ve freed up a lot of space on my To Do list. However, some nights I feel like the endless, mind-numbing thoughts will go on for eternity and I’ll never get any sleep.

So, what am I doing about this? Well, not as much as I should, I’m sure. Doug and I have been trying to think of things to make our lives easier. Little things. Seemingly insignificant things that might only save us 10 seconds on the average day. However, one day out of 100 that one thing might save us 20 minutes. Take this morning, for instance. We get all the way to J’s school and realize we have forgotten his daily behavior report folder where the teacher records her comments for the day on his behavior. Also in the bag were his napmat sheet, pillow case, and blanket. Now, I am completely fine with him doing without the linens for naptime. I never had all of that stuff for my plastic napmat in kindergarten and I turned out… okay. However, we have to have that folder there everyday. So, Doug drops me off with the little one and heads back to the house to get it. This meant an extra 20 minutes of hassle this morning. So, simple way to avoid this ever happening again? We always look at his folder as soon as we pick him up in the afternoon. We can simply look at it, take out any notes and artwork contained therein, and leave the folder in the basket for the next day. That folder will never go home with us again. Most days that will only save us 5 or 10 seconds to grab that folder but once in a while, it might save us 20 minutes and, much more importantly, it is one less thing to worry about. And, when there are hundreds of those things filling my mind every day, one less is always a good thing.