Things I’m anxious about today

I woke up this morning a little crazy with anxiety.  The worst thing about it is that I woke up with a list of all the things I should be doing on a loop in my head, and then I froze.  I could have gotten up right then to get started on the list, but did I?  No, I stayed in bed.  Because I could put off all the hard things.  I do that all the time (procrastinate).   Of course, that gives me less time overall to get everything done, so all it really does is ratchet up the anxiety a little more.  Not exactly helpful behavior.

Instead, let’s a play a game (courtesy of Mom) called “What’s the worst that could happen?”

Anxiety Causing Thing #1: Quiz #4 for vector calculus and the midterm I have to take on Thursday

What’s the worst that could happen?  Well, I could get all the answers wrong on my quiz, but that doesn’t affect my grade (just makes my professor think I’m an idiot), so there isn’t anything to worry about there.  Of course, my performance on my quizzes is an indicator of my performance on the midterm, so if I don’t do well on my quizzes, I may not do well on my midterm.  And I could fail my midterm.  So what if I do?  I won’t have a very good grade in my calculus class.  That would be a blow to my ego (something I could survive), and it may put me on the road to failing this class.  What if I fail the class?  I’m taking it online at a community college because I need the prereq for grad school.  If I fail it, I’m out approximately $350.  If I fail it, I can retake it later.  Will I fail it?  Probably not.  I may not get an A.  I may not even get a B.  But I probably won’t fail.  I submitted my quiz this morning (confident that I got three out of four right), so that’s out of my hands, and I still have today, tomorrow, Wednesday, and part of Thursday to study for the midterm.  Breathe deep.

Anxiety Causing Thing #2: Work

What’s the worst that could happen?  I could get fired.  Or laid off.  Or whatever.  That could happen, but there’s nothing I can do about it (and there’s no immediate indication that it’s coming), so that’s not what’s making me edgy.  There’s nothing specific about work that’s bothering me.  No major deadlines, no one is asking me to do anything I’m not capable of, I don’t have any issues with any coworkers.  I just don’t like it.  I don’t want to come here every day.  (I know, whine whine whine, most people don’t actually like going to work.)  I want to do something with flexible hours where I can work from home and have more time for me.  The math that’s stressing me out is the first step in that direction, so this is more of a low-level, back-burner, always-bugging-me sort of thing that every once in a while jumps up and says, “Hey!  Loser!  Worry about me!”

Anxiety Causing Thing #3: Army Ten-Miler

Did I tell you about this?  A few weeks ago, John registered to run in the Army Ten-Miler this October, and I caved to the very mild peer pressure and registered with him.  So what’s the worst that could happen?  I’ll be so slow that the bus that picks up the slowpokes who aren’t going to finish in the required time will pick me up.  Humiliating.  I have 17 weeks to train for it.  I had more, but I didn’t use them.  I can’t procrastinate on this one, so every day I don’t start this training plan gets under my skin, and I didn’t run today.  Well, I kinda did.  I sprinted around the block (up the hills) a couple of times with the dogs this morning.  My math anxiety trumped my race anxiety this morning – I spent the extra time on my quiz.  (SuzRocks sent me a link to a half-marathon training plan.  I figure if I’m capable of running a half-marathon by the time I finish training, ten miles should seem easy.  Ish.  I just need to start the &^$* training plan.)

There are other things that bug me (there are always other things), but those are the three I woke up with this morning.  Peace, serenity, lots of gym time tonight, some studying…I’ve got it under control.

Happy thoughts!

10 Comments

  1. DJ Bro

    Right there with you. I was up from 3:15-5:30 this morning because I couldn’t sleep thinking about all the things that need doing. Ugh! You’ll make it! (I think)

  2. I hate those kinds of moments…even though when you rationalize…it’s usually not THE END OF THE WORLD…though it sure feels like it sometimes.

    Go you and the 10 miler! We’re currently training for a half…I can send you our training plan if you’d like…we used it for two previous half marathons, so I know it works…or at least it gets you to the finish line 🙂 Just email me… 🙂

  3. Zannah

    On the plus side, none of this stuff keeps me up at night. Sleeping is almost never a problem. I’ll send some sleep your way, Cor!

    Jessica, all I can ask is to make it to the finish line before the bus. 🙂 I’ll email you.

  4. momma betty

    Wow, I can’t believe you actually remember something I said. I was going to suggest sending this to your bro, but I see that he responded above.

    (Sigh) I wish I were a multimillionaire. That would solve all your problems.

  5. Vector Calculus!? That gives me anxiety, just thinking about it!! You’ve got 5 weeks left before you even have to START the training program. It’s only a 12 week program- Voila! anxiety gone!

  6. Melvin?

    I wish you were a multimillionaire, too, Mom, but I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t solve all our problems. Might introduce a few nasty buggers we’d rather do without, in fact.

    You got this, Z. You’re much more in control than I ever was in school, and I wasn’t working a full-time job for three out of the five years (five years of grad school just looks gross in writing).

    SuzRocks, I totally agree with about vector calculus. I can honestly say I may never have ever heard of it before this post.

  7. IBCRandy

    If it makes you feel any better I was only 2 classes away from a minor in math and I don’t even know what the heck Vector Calculus is. I’m assuming it’s not just linear algebra (I say “just” as if it’s easy…).

  8. Zannah

    It’s a subset of multivariable calculus, and I think it’s similar to linear algebra, but I don’t really know since I’ve never taken linear algebra.

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