Treadmill .5 mile in 12 mins @ 3 speed & incline
Stairclimber 10 floors @ 3 speed

Anxiety! It’s a bitch.

My psych appointment for this morning was cancelled, one of my cats pooped in the bathtub, another one (or maybe the same one?) threw up on the carpet, the shirt I wanted to wear to the gym was in laundry, there was a rock in my shoe, construction blocking my regular route, and essentially the morning was trash.

I almost gave up going to the gym the minute I woke up, then 20 mins after I woke up, then while I was driving there, and again in the parking lot. So yeah… I barely made it in the door, only to find out that the bathrooms were closed for cleaning and there were people on my favorite treadmills.

If you know me at all, you will be super proud of me for actually staying in the gym for as long as I did and getting SOMETHING done. I wanted to do 1 mile on the treadmill with intermittent jogging, 5 floors on the stairclimber, and .5 mile on the elliptical. As you can see, this did not happen.

About halfway through my treadmill experience, my back decided to start spasming painfully. As in I had to stand still for a whole minute before it would stop, then I would start walking again and about 3 minutes later, it would start again, repeat the cycle. But I was persistent and go through the 1 mile, even if I wasn’t jogging.

So I am on the treadmill, sweating while barely moving, in pain, ready to quit because my anxiety is overloaded, just trying to talk my way through 1 stupid mile, and this super athletic petite girl hops on the elliptical in front of me and goes to town. Let me tell you, intrusive thoughts are horrible. On any other day I would not give a crap, but today my brain is in overload mode and everything is negative, everything is blown out of proportion, and everything is paranoid.

The inner voices are telling me that this girl chose that machine just to be in my eyesight to show off, to intimidate me, to make me want to quit. She’s just there doing her workout and probably didn’t even notice I was there. But I had to watch her the entire time because I wasn’t about to get up and move.

This sets off the thoughts of “everyone is judging you” and “why are you even here?” and “you’re never going to look like that so you might as well quit” and other non-stop really nasty self-talk.

I finally get through the mile and even though I felt like I was going to throw up, I decided what the hell? Let’s continue this torture on the stairclimber because that’s a great idea. The first one I tried ended up being broken, so I had to go tell the (really kind of dickish) desk guy and he was all “Ugh, again?” and my brain told me that he thought it was all my fault and he was upset with me, not the stupid machine.

Then I go back and get on the remaining functional stairclimber (while thinking why the heck am I doing this? Someone else is going to want this machine, why are you wasting space?) and I get through 5 floors. I’m feeling decent, but stopped to take a break. I am standing there at the top of the stairclimber just sort of trying to breathe and this group of supermodel teenagers comes in with their matching workout gear and gym bags and perfect ponytails. I had already resolved to do 5 more floors since I didn’t jog and stuffed the negative self-talk into a box inside my brain. I got about 3 more floors in before the anxiety took over and I was just a fat girl crying on the stairclimber.

I wasn’t crying because the exercise was hard (even though it was), I wasn’t crying because I was in pain (even though I was), I was crying because I was so overwhelmed with negative thoughts and emotions that I started to have a panic attack. I did manage to push through to a total of 10 floors but the elliptical was not in the stars today. I cleaned off the stairclimber and hid in the (finally open) restroom trying to pull myself together before heading out to the car.

Where I promptly lost my shit and cried and shook and freaked out for like 25 minutes.

However, had I stayed in the gym or just drove home, I would have missed this fella! He came flying out of nowhere and just walked around the parking lot for a while as if to say “Hello, I am a turkey. Your day is better now.” And it was. Momentarily.

I returned home to find the UPS truck blocking my parking space (to the left of the red vehicles). He was sitting there for 10 minutes. And he wasn’t even delivering a package to me! -_- How dare he?

I’ve decided to start this day over after my shower because I refuse to let anxiety win.