anxious mess, busy hands

making is the only way to quiet my noisy mind

a collection of photos from a trip to TN last month

It shouldn’t have been a surprise to me that saying goodbye to my business would be hard, but somehow I hadn’t prepared for that part.

On top of the ever-roiling news churn, I’ve been an anxious mess. My shaky hands (thanks to my caffeine intake on top of taking a variety of meds) have been distracting me, making me dream up all sorts of terrible illnesses that could be the cause. Because it couldn’t just be…everything, right? No, that’s impossible.

The only thing that’s been helping has been making things, reminding myself that my hands know how to do so many things even when my brain has trouble putting sentences together.

I’m not usually an advocate of—figuratively—shoving my fingers in my ears and saying “la la la la la!” to block out everything that might cause anxiety, but right now that’s what I need. I care so deeply about human rights, and I’m scared for our democracy in an existential way that has me doomscrolling for hours on end, just hoping for a glimmer at the end of this tunnel.

The rights stripped, the lives upended, the people disappeared—all of these things literally keep me awake at night. The truth of the matter is: I’m only one person. I’ve been nearly six feet tall since the 8th grade so I’m used to being noticed, but realistically, I’m nobody, and I can’t do everything every day the way social media seems to advocate. What I can do right now is to shut out some of the droning in order to allow myself some time to be present.

The photos above were all taken on a recent trip my partner and I took to visit friends at their gorgeous mountain home in Tennessee. I spent my days talking about art and writing, reading, and keeping my hands busy. I didn’t look at the news, and if politics came up, its placement in the conversation felt organic instead of being the only topic worth discussing.

I’m going into “vacation mode” for two weeks (after encouragement from my therapist) and doing a social media/news blackout. Instead of lost hours scrolling, I’ll be making things, or better yet, I might even get some writing done.

Helping me with this is a handy tool called Brick*. Brick makes blocking apps on my phone a physical activity by requiring me to get up and tap the Brick device (which we keep on the fridge). So, if I’m reading on the couch or writing at my desk far from the kitchen and I have my phone Bricked, I have to move my ass in order to look at YouTube or Instagram. And more often than not, putting a barrier between me and a thing often means I won’t do that thing unless I really have a good reason. ADHD is a real pain in the ass, but sometimes it works in my favor, like when I want to ignore the world awhile.

*I’m not sponsored by Brick, I just love it.

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I want to get some conversations started to build some community here and hopefully start carving out a corner for fellow neurodivergent writers and makers who might need a little help, too.

So, if you’d like to discuss anything from this post or share how you’re coping with your anxiety, I’d love to hear from you.

And as always, please subscribe. Posts like this will always be free, but subscribing will get you access to the chat and other things I have planned for the near future.