Am I overreacting?!

[notr2d2]

Hi,

just graduated from college and now all I feel basically is anxiety and depression. Can't find a job, don't know if my band is the right one for me (I want to be a musician for a living), anxious whether my new band will work out, have to find a new apartment soon, etc. So I get regular migraine headaches, and diarrhea. Also it's sometimes very difficult to sleep b/c I'm just worrying about the future. Should I be worrying like this? Thank you for reading and take care.

[crazy-girl]

I've been there too!

I was having horrible night panic attacks where I couldn't sleep and I'd wake up choking and my heart would be racing and I also had the digestive problems. I think you might have stress related IBS---Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Talk to your doctor. Or just keep the maalox on hand---that's what I did.

I don't have any advice. But you're not alone!

[M4A1]

Being a musician, have you ever heard of a song call "Point of View" by DB Boulevard? Go download it if you haven't.

It goes something like this:
".... Can't you see?... Life is eeeeasy... If you considering things... from another point of vieeeeww"

I know how you feel, notr2d2. Having been there myself and seeing other people going through the same thing, I can tell that people react differently to these depressions. Many people will feel helpless and sad. Some became apathetic-- which's the most common reaction. But for me, I became extremely intense (you may be able to tell some of that from my other posts). I was in this constant state of anger and it was not pretty. I won't go into detail on why or how I got there, but I can tell you that it-- the way that I was reacting-- did nothing to improve the situation.

I came to realize that I truly needed a change in perspective, or I'll go insane. Eventually, I made "finding a way to change my perspective" as the most urgent goal. Immediately, I start looking for ways to accomplish that. I start asking for advices and looking at self-help books. Overtime, I realized that by being able to experience different emotions means that I can have control over them.

This is when I start making a difference.

I start keeping notes of things that could "trigger" off my anger. (this is how the therapists do it, I heard it from people who went to one) Without getting too technical, I came to understand the resemblance among the things that's on my list. These things (or people) are usually indefinite and unpredictable. Then I finally came to this conclusion-- the uncertainty is what's causing my frustration and anger.

But I wasn't about to stop here, by stopping here will only cause more uncertainty, I need a solution. So I started to seperate the uncertain things into 2 categories, things that could be "cleared-up" and things that is just simply unpredictable. Now that I understand this, I immediately recognize that things could be "cleared-up" can be conquered if I recognize that it can be analyzed and learned. But what about things that it's just unpredictable?

I had a hard time with this at first. But this is what I found. Given enough time and effort, most problems should have a solution and can be "cleared-up." If it is nearly impossible to analyze, then you should recognize the fact that it is nearly impossible to examine and it's not worth your time. AVOID it. If you must face this problem, you need to set your attention to little things that are feasible and achievable.

Do not let the uncertainty get to you. Uncertainty causes fear. Fear can lead to further apathy and/or anger, it can snowball itself up overtime and completely consume you.

Recognize what you CAN do. Start by changing your perspective-- take up a more positive point of view.

Set it up like this:

Immediate objective: Find a new apartment
Unknowns: location of where and what's available, roomates, rent/income ratio
Tools to work with: College educated Brain from Ann Arbor (if I'm correct), Creative mind (musician) that can come up with creative solution

Take up a positive attitude. Feed off that positivism. Think objectively, one target at a time. Take action and elimiate the unknowns. Repeat this process.

Best of luck.