The One-hundred Meter Dash: Anxiety & Depression
The one-hundred-meter Dash:
Sprint one-hundred meters to get a three-second rest. If you stop sprinting or take a longer rest, this thing comes to shove you into the ground until you get back up again. You make a choice to get up again and make this dash every waking moment of your day and you don’t know when it will end. You make the sprint when you wake up, after lunch, after work, before dinner, after dinner, and once more before bed.
The one-hundred-meter dash: is the coping mechanisms that you rehearse over and over again to help you get that rest from your anxious brain. Meditate, walk, drink water, eat, tapping, shower, reading, exercising, affirmations, dancing, journaling, drawing, painting, and calling. The more you do these activities, the more it becomes a ritual and a greyscale set of tasks to protect yourself from yourself. They slowly become less of something you enjoy and more of something that allows you to survive. These dashes eventually will wear you down and you’ll lose track of who you are.
The three-second rest period: This is where you have a few moments of your day to feel safe, but you can only stay here briefly. No one can extend this time except for yourself and the only way you can do this is to dash another one-hundred meters. In this period, you feel at peace with yourself. That everything is going to be okay. That you’re building a bit of progress.
The thing that shoves you to the ground: presses you down for however long you let it before you get back up again. You stay here for an hour to three hours when you let yourself rest for too long or stop sprinting. The pain here you experience needs to be contained. Nobody has the capacity to help you except yourself. Get back up or it will burn your relationships and rob you of the present.
Mental strength: choosing to get back up and sprint even though you’re exhausted, feeling alone in this battle like you have nothing left to give.
For some people, this one-hundred-meter dash is temporary. For some people, this one-hundred meters aches on for months and years.
Afterword: Thank you VB, HX, MB, LHT, VM, DX, SN, XL for being part of my team.