Decreasing Anxiety by Making the Scary Entertaining
How I learned to love thunderstorms
Flashes of green cut through the storm, and I suddenly understand Gatsby’s infatuation with something so near yet so unattainable. Ah, how I yearn for that which is across the horizon, the freedom and safety taken by pandemic, said to return in some nebulous future.
In reality, three transformers blew up across town, but would I really be an amateur blogger without working a forced metaphor in here somewhere?
Mom says I didn’t like thunderstorms when I was little.
What small child with sensory issues would? They’re loud, they’re bright, they’re unpredictable — scary all-around.
I’m not good at dealing with scary things.
Avoidance is a routine practice for me and has been practically since birth. The concept is simple: if I feel uncomfortable with a thing, I get as far away from the thing as possible. Spelling test with an intimidating word? Fake sick. Haven’t memorized my lines for off-book day at theatre camp? Fake injury. Got invited to a birthday party at a roller rink but didn’t know how to skate? Fake a prior commitment.
My family once got lost driving to a hotel late at night, spending what felt like hours searching and circling until finally finding the Hilton in question. Driving to unfamiliar places was no longer something I was willing to do — I straight up refused to go on a vacation somewhere new because I was afraid we’d get lost on the way.
When scary things couldn’t be avoided… it became a major problem.
I sat in darkness, excited by the novelty of watching a show while reclined, hanging on to every word the planetarium presenter spoke of the universe and our place in it. The machine in the center silently danced as the projected skyline morphed into our galaxy, settling on the sun. The presenter talked of history and predicted futures, and how the sun would die out in a few billion years, Earth dying with it. As the words washed over me, something inside contracted from fear, and I got so freaked out that I made my mom leave in the middle of the show, thinking that would be the end of my worrying.
It wasn’t.
For weeks, if not months, I was plagued with anxieties of the sun exploding, and no data-based assurances would assuage my anxiety. That was one of my earlier existential crises, taking place at age 7ish.
A year or two prior, I had watched a documentary about the deadliest animals alive, (which in hindsight was a terrible idea), and became obsessed with killer bees. Sure, their danger is often overemphasized, and they’ve never been found in this part of the country, but they could totally show up here tomorrow and sting me, right? The thought would keep me up at night.
(Side note: Imagine my horror after seeing #murderhornets trending a few months ago before learning that they don’t kill humans. Brought me right back to elementary school)
When I couldn’t hide from whatever was scary, it consumed me. I would eventually get over it, but it could take years, and I never really processed that fear as much as forgot about it when a new one replaced it.
Thunderstorms scared me, and aside from sleeping through them, they can’t be avoided.
Well, Mom says that they scared me, but I don’t remember being afraid of them, because, at a young age, I learned how to get over that fear.
Mom taught me that thunderstorms are a show: a special opportunity to marvel at the fantastic. There’s a stroke of genius in that — like a storm, shows can be scary, but watching one from a safe place is a privilege.
I remember being pre-school aged, and when the first flashes of lightning joined the rain, we’d shut off all of the lights, just like we were watching a movie, then turn our chairs to look out the portrait window in the living room. And it was magnificent.
You can’t hide from a pandemic.
And you can’t hide from the gross mishandling of one either.
As much as I wish I could apply Mom’s childhood lesson to this situation, I derive no joy from watching city hall meetings that seem straight out of “Parks and Recreation” and gawking at pseudo-science preachers.
So the scary remains scary, and I subjected to it.
I suppose that’s the way it should be with something this serious.
But when avoidance doesn’t work, and there’s no way to transform the scary, it becomes all-consuming. I don’t know how to do this. At least I have some practice with that sort of exhausting fear.
A thunderstorm rolled in a few days ago, the one with the Gatsby allusion.
Mom and I thought the first flashes might’ve been fireworks until thunder shook frames hanging on the wall.
All three of us — Mom, Dad, and I — dropped everything to watch the show, lights turned off, chairs turned to gaze out of the portrait window.
The aforementioned transformers blew early in the storm, lighting the night with a supernatural green glow that looked like it came from a VFX department.
As the lightning drew closer and the thunder grew louder, I sat rapt by the forces of nature before me, basking in the results of its awe-striking power, thankful for the chance to focus on the immense beauty of the simultaneously mundane and extraordinary.
