“Catastrophizing”

• Not The Only One!
• Post #39

• ” Catastrophizing ”
• Hey gang!
• I’m really  starting to  think of some of you as family,  even though we have never met. I appreciate the feedback,  from both sides, honestly,  some of you really give me food for thought,  and I believe it will help the blog to become  better. As far as some of  the comments about punctuation and spelling, it will  get better as well,  I really could use an editor,  however the last one baled on me☺️. Every time I  proof read it,   I see something different and I  make  changes,  and then the next time I  see something else, and then I second guess myself, and to be honest I  think a lot of it, is that I’m not  reading with  fresh eyes. Ok, this post has been on the docket since January, with  a  few more,  but I’m taking this  opportunity to clean up some of the older rants. Ok, as I  said this is one from the archives  and I  really can’t tell you where , when  ,or how I  got this one percolating in my head. I think it may be something from one of the devotions that I  was reading,  and yes you will  encounter a spiritual facet here as well.  I  just made mention of  how some of you guys have been challenging me  with your comments and hopefully I can return the favor with this post. ☺️☺️. Catastrophizing is not a  common everyday use word, unless perhaps you work in the mental health field.  I’m  pretty sure that many of you have never encountered this word before,  but its something that  each and  everyone of us have experienced.  I  will give you a loose paraphrase meaning of the word, and if it strikes your curiosity for something more defined,  there are still  dictionaries and of course our favorite friend…Google.  Catastrophizing is the ability or belief to always expect   the worse outcome in any given situation and  while at the same time underestimating your ability to  handle or cope with the said situation.  I’m not attempting to  flip you half glass empty people…been  there , done that, and brought a T shirt, as in I use to be in that camp myself.  Notice the  tense, as in past. This goes way beyond having a rose colored or positive outlook on things.  I  mentioned the mental health field and  technically this is not a mental illness,  but is often present along side of  depression,  anxiety and  other things that  have  earned a mental health designation or diagnosis.  On the surface here, if you can  back yourself down and away  from  Catastrophizing ,  then it’s less likely to  push you in the direction of  more serious health conditions that may require medication down the road.  At the on set of this adventure,  I  made note ,that I  have  no initials  behind or in front of  my name,  not even a  jr.:):). I  would  never make  light of mental illness and I  have  had experience with it first hand with more than one  of the persons that I’ve known.  My best experience with this is  my daughter.  She has always wrestled with  anxiety and  still  does till this very day. She handles it much better as she has gotten older, and  that’s mostly due to realizing that she can do hard things, and that she has in the past . I  have to give some credit to  motherhood, as well, because one of her boys,  really  feeds off of her energy,  so if she looses it, he in turn  follows suit. I’m  not  aware of any trauma in  her life, that caused this, just  part of her make up. I  remember her as a kid, always  bright and smart,  but the moment she knew she was being  timed for a test or quiz,  she would  fixate on the clock and all  of  her hard work and  studying would  become a  prisoner  trap in her subconscious.  She would definitely not be the next female. O07☺️☺️☺️. Sometimes,  this is about who we choose to become.  In my last post I  made references to how when we hear certain people’s names,  we immediately run to  or think about their short comings.  I will by no means excuse or defend, O J. Simpson, or other people who may have done heinous things,  but for most people,  they are so much more than their flaws mistakes, and miscues.  We always  seem to judge others  so much more harshly,  while justifying and  giving ourselves a  pass. Last  I checked , we are all human and  have made mistakes,  some more colossal than  others,  but most are forgivable and recoverable from.  God says that there are none that haven’t fallen short. I  was talking to my oldest grandson today and  he just made a big and very  mature decision,  that I  don’t believe was easy for him, because it  did  require a little  self sacrifice,  which probably weighed on him  a little.  My part was to come along side and  encourage him, but to let him  also know that as you get older the choices and decisions get more challenging . Why bring up my grandson,? because as I  said going in ,this  is something that effects each and everyone of us,  and all through out our lifetime. I’m going to peel  back the lid on this a little bit and ask that you get a little  reflective and  see if you  can  place yourself here in some of these situations and  look back,  and ask yourself if  you did a lot of Catastrophizing over things that never had the impact on your life or situation that you first thought or consequently drove yourself to.  Ok, so my grandson is  fourteen,  so  let’s just use that for a baseline. I know it’s been a while for some of us, but do you  remember the  sometimes unprecedented fears of the first day of  high school as a freshman?.  All most all of the freaking out and  fears had nothing to do with  learning or school work, well  at least not at first,  that would come later. Would I get  picked on, would I be seen and thought of as cool,  or would I always be  seen as a geek,  at least until I  graduate college.  Or would it  be  something really stupendous,  such as  tripping getting off the bus and  doing a  face plant in front of a really  cute girl, or maybe  it will  just be  walking out of the bathroom with toilet paper attached to  your shoe, or some place even more so embarrassing☺️. Keep in  mind this  is just day one of high school,  and I’ve already projected myself to being seen as a geek all the way through college….who does that?? We all do!  If you can  some how make it through the first day of  school, you remember that you have four more years of this without ever imagining any bright spots other than Christmas break.  High school can  be full of booby traps and  landmines.  Sometimes we navigate them well, and  other times  not so much! ,but almost everyone has    at least one event that they  thought was an  incredibly embarrassing story.  Let’s just face the facts, that kids can sometimes be  mean and cruel.  I  know for some of you, it has  left a  life long impact on and to your self esteem. I don’t have four years to do this post,   so we need to  speed up high school just a tad. There were countless tests and quizzes that you worried about your performance on.  Some you studied for  and others you were  distracted by  the opposite  sex. We dare not fail to  mention deadlines for projects and  term papers do over the  years , rarely  looking forward to  see that this would  be a life long pattern with deadlines and things that would require your attention. Looking back over the  landscape you may remember just one, out of all the assignments that you  got, that left a significant memory in your brain.  Next thing you know,  your concerns become about SAT scores and college acceptance letters,  because I  surely don’t want  to  revisit the prom night,  when  that huge  zit or pimple decided to  make a guess appearance  on your face,  possibly the nose, so its  the first thing that  people would notice ☺️. Would my scores be good enough and would I get into my first choice or have to settle for  my back up  school, and  all the while thinking at least I’m not talking to a military recruiter as some of the kids were.  I  remember  during  my era, Post  Vietnam,  had not left the military as a  top choice for  many back in the day. So let’s just say that in some ways college is  a groundhog kind of  memory left over from high school,  with  an increased level of  difficulty.  This has added perks ,but the landmines increase in presence and  seem to be just slightly closer together.  So you discover the new found freedom from the folks, and that’s if you are  lucky,  because in some instances you  may find your parents become a  little more clingy, as they head into the  empty nest phase of their lives. So college brings  new interests and people into your life.   I know  for some this can become a  time to explore into  previously uncharted waters, such as with  drugs, drinking and  sex. I think for both sides, meaning male and  female,  the dating thing comes with  some first for many,  especially if you found yourself to be a late bloomer in High school. There is a  new level of  fun that  some take to a whole new  level and  you are trying to  weigh that against what your personal limits may be, verses  good old peer pressure.  Some  pledge fraternities or sororities and may have much anxiety over the  hazing and wondering   will they make the cut. There is a little additional pressure,  if you are a next generation or what they refer to  as a legacy, following in your  parents or siblings footsteps.  All the while asking yourself if  it’s worth the humiliation. This can  also be  when you find out  that men and women date with  different  goals and objectives in mind. If you have never dealt with  the whole  virginity thing  by now, you may be asking yourself if there is something wrong with you ,and  may be feeling added pressure,  to pretend that you  are  a Nike tennis shoe, and ” Just Do  It”.☺️. For some college, can be and endless  party, it’s  kind a kin to people who like a little  coffee with their cream, so studying and graduation can  be an after thought.  Yet,  some buckle down  out of fear of losing a scholarship,  or parents who  will  refuse to  pay if the grades are , let’s say, subpar. So , at the end  of what can  be ,what seemed like the longest four to six years of  your life are over,  you move into the next phase of  life,  which I  will  call,  Catastrophizing 2.0. Some  will  leave  college with what they think and hope will  be a good life partner.  Others may be  thinking how grateful they are  that they went to summer school and  got out in four years, and others are  grateful for interning at a firm that promised them a looksey post graduation.  Some will  have  goals and objectives,  sometimes with a  whole plan  to hit certain  milestone by certain ages. This is also  folly with a  two edged sword.  First of all  life doesn’t always follow the  plans that  we have for it, rarely does. There may be  some small  percentage of  people  who can  say that their lives are exactly what they  planned and was hoping for, usually the silver spoon in the mouth people, but not so much for most !. I  think on one end of the spectrum we  have  people who  see their lives as  a  misfire and  would love   to have a mulligan.  They had hopes and dreams, maybe even the  American dream with the  white  picket fence, and the two  car garage,  with the perfect 2.4 Kiddos,  to only  find out that they  have  fertility problems, or possibly a  child with a  disability,  not exactly what you would call going according to the plan. Then there are those really  high achievers,  driven by various forces,  both internal as well as  external.  Well  if you are one, who has pressure to  join mommy or daddy’s law practice,  that can  be  both.  The pressure to  measure up and  perform can be immense.  Still others  may be pushed  by  keeping up with  The Jones, so we have to  figure out how  much house we  can afford, but somehow we just happened to  end up at the top of our budget,  because we work hard and we deserve it !,  never giving any thought as to the additional pressure that you  may be putting on  your spouse and  marriage.  So let’s just  say you come close and the suspect that you drug out of college with you or one from a few years down the road , turns out to be a decent husband or wife and then  you reproduce.  Congratulations! You get to  move to Catastrophizing 2.5☺️. Rugrats change your  perspectives in major ways, and  while joy lights your heart as you wait to hear that very  first  mommy or daddy from  their lips , and that first step taken, your mind may be speeding off to getting  them into the  best preschool,  or a college fund set up, and what about God parents just in case we are killed in a car accident or  some other freakish thing that we never saw coming . Again the time just flies by and  as your  tenth and  twentieth  high school  class reunions come and go, you start to ask yourself where did the time go and  where did all this gray hair come from?☺️. More please!!, not really,  but its coming whether you are ready for  it or not. Now , you  wake up  one day and find out that you have been  redesignated into a new  category called the ” Sandwich Generation “, and the worse part about this is , that there is no food involved,  so it sounds a little  misleading,  was really  hoping for a  hoagie, or a Philly cheese steak, oh, that’s right I forgot that the doctor told me that  my cholesterol was off the chart. So.. Sandwich??, yes sandwich,  it’s where you  find  yourself stuck,  trapped,  or honored,  depending on  how you feel about being  caught  between  trying to  launch your kiddos, as your parents diminished mental capacity returns them to a child like state , as the world around them  is  changing  rapidly  with  new technologies every day,  and they still don’t understand how online banking works or what is a robo call. Don’t worry,  as history repeats itself,  you will  someday find  yourself there as well,  and  your thinking,  I surely hope not☺️. So it seemed like only  yesterday that we were thinking about the kids college fund and  now we have  concerns if we  are  set for retirement, let alone with all of the traveling we had planned to do. OMG!!, what can be next?  Well,  yeah, you guessed it,  we don’t want to be a burden on or to our kids , as our parents may or may not have been with us.  That  sounds like estate planning and  hmmm, maybe  burial plots:):). And just  incase you  didn’t  finish the dance with  your original dance partner that can get a little tricky for the  kids, because you have a really  sentimental kid, and even though mom and dad divorced almost  thirty years ago,  I  still  think that  they  should be  laid to rest beside one another, after all,  while they were alive, I had to  go to two different locations to  see them,  just doesn’t seem  fair to inconvenience me after they are gone,  to go to two different cemeteries,  just to put flowers on  their graves.  For  Christ sake,  how did we get  here?? I  don’t  always like  being  the barrier  of  bad news, I guess it depends on  what the news is.  This  scenario, that I  have painted is just  one small  possibility with a  thousand different possible variations on it. If you have  not Catastrophized over some or these  illustrations,  then that means either of one of  three things about you is true. One, you have  not gotten to some of these mile markers in your  life,  two,  your not human, and  three you are  the biggest liar, that I  have ever encountered,  or you have taken denial to a whole new level,  oh and yes, I realize that  is four things and not three☺️☺️. My point here is, that we worry about a tremendous amount of  things that  never occur,  or as they say, never amounted to  a hill of beans, don’t ask me what that  means. I  will  concede that much of this has to do with the human condition. I’m  not above the fray ,as it would be,  or some how immune,  as I  said it’s a  human  condition,  which I  am one! So, let me put the door stop up against the  door for you.☺️. If we have faith in God, and I  want  to  say,  or a higher  power, for you agnostics out there, but truth be told,  they are one in the same. ☺️☺️. We should consider that nothing comes our way or into our  lives without first being  filtered through the  loving fingers of  our  creator,  and  while we may not always understand,  sometimes  closer to  rarely understand, God has a plan and purpose in it. I’m  really a bit long here, and I  probably should say as usual.  I  can  feel  myself wanting to  chase a couple of rabbits  here,  but I’m  not going to. Just look back,  especially since you  are  already being reflective and think about  all of the wasted brain cells used up on needles worries and sometimes unsubstantiated fears. Yes, you may  have  encountered some of this,  but nothing on the  level that you gave credence to. God was faithful yesterday and today,  and  He will be tomorrow as well.
• Until next time peace ✌️
• Sandy The Southerner

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