I've been a worrier all my life. Not about realistic things that actually have a possibility of happening, but about things that are very unlikely and illogical. I've lived with it a long time, and it's just a part of myself that I am always working to control. Most of the time it isn't a big deal.
Sometime in college, though, I started developing a deeper general anxiety. Where I used to love being the center of attention (I was in all the middle school plays, I sang at retirement homes for my school community service, I participated in dance competitions and recitals), I developed a crippling fear of not having an "escape route" from any situation I found myself in. I rarely needed these escape routes, but I was comforted knowing that I had a way out if I needed it.
Before you think I'm totally crazypants, I knew this was not a healthy obsession, so I started going to therapy during my senior year of college. Matt has always been so supportive of whatever I've needed to do to get over some of my fears. I'm finding my anxious episodes are fewer and further between, but I've been told they may never go away entirely. In most situations, I no longer feel the need to have an escape route, but I have one point of anxiety that I haven't been able to allay:
I'm nervous about our wedding ceremony, because there's no escape route up on the altar.
Now, when I linked the article above, I wanted it to be very clear that anxiety does not prevent us from loving, and marrying, and living happily ever after. I have no anxiety regarding marrying Matt. I have 110% faith. If we could get married tomorrow, I would be all over that (and then I wouldn't have time to think about getting anxious). It's simply the location: a ridiculous worry!
(And because I know my future family reads this: No, I am not going to dash back up the aisle. I will be fine. I'm usually more nervous thinking about possibly being anxious than I actually am when I'm in a situation I worried about! And also, Matt and I have discussed this, and we have figured out a pre-ceremony somethin' that I think will be helpful. But that's another post.)
Were you nervous before your ceremony? How do you distract yourself when you start worrying?
That was a beautiful article! Thanks for sharing this and for being so honest, I enjoyed reading.
ReplyDeleteI have no doubt that I'm going to be incredibly nervous before our ceremony, but I know part of that will be that we're not doing a first look so I'll be nervous about seeing him, plus I just get nervous anytime that much attention is on me :-)
I know I'll be nervous as well. It's why there's no way I could recite my own vows. I know I'd be shaking like a leaf and stuttering and would get it all wrong.
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