It took me 20 years to tell my doctor I wasn't ok– why?
I trusted my doctor, so why did it take me 20 years to share how I was really feeling?
I’ve been on Lexapro for just over a year. It’s one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
But at nearly every doctor’s appointment over the last 20 years I’ve always said I’m doing just fine.
But I most likely never was.
Why couldn’t I be honest with my doctor?
I think I had a lot of shame and didn’t want to be judged. But my doctor is supposed to help me. It still didn’t matter.
I wonder– can we be honest with our doctors, coaches, therapists, counselors, partners, friends, family?
About 10 years back when I was going through my divorce, I had a therapist. And I couldn’t be honest with him, either. It’s not his fault, though. He was good.
He even knew I had OCD even though I’d never allowed him to talk to me about it.
I just wanted my life FIXED. I didn’t want to talk about the past. I didn’t want to talk about how broken I was. I wanted to find solutions and best practices so I could focus on getting better results.
But when we refuse to speak about the root causes of issues, I wonder if any solutions will work.
Once I hinted to my physician that I had anxiety, he kindly suggested to me that I should elaborate and we should look into treatment, including therapy.
He was right.
I was trying to pretend my anxiety away, like I could ignore it and it would go away.
But that just exacerbated it for me. It was overwhelming. And I tried to drink and snack it away– which is why when I tried to cut out drinking and sugar I just couldn’t.
But over 2020 I decided to look head on into the painful parts of my life.
I have clarity now that was never possible to me. I’ve learned to move through emotions and choose actions that do actually make my life better.
I stopped 98% of my drinking and snacking and I’ve lost 16lbs in just December– not that I think anyone needs to lose weight and I wasn’t trying. That’s how EASY it is to choose water when I’m thirsty, food when I’m hungry and rest when I’m tired. And I think the weight is just a side effect of treating my body in the way it’s been asking.
When it’s in pain, I need to let it feel, not try to numb it away with food and drink.
I remember when Dr. Lou told me I had OCD. Well, he didn’t actually tell me. It was in my chart. He was surprised I didn’t know.
I was SO ASHAMED that something was wrong with me– and it was now on a piece of paper. I had such shame connected to this diagnosis, because I figured it meant no one would love me or accept me and they’d just hold it over me.
This is why I didn’t hint to my physician that I needed help– until my thoughts around learning about myself changed. Rather than believing that something was ‘wrong’ with me I decided to just focus on feeling well. And part of that discussion ended up around anxiety.
He explained how the brain works. He told me that I wasn’t weak for having anxiety. That I could solve this overwhelming feeling in my chest with both medicine and therapy and lifestyle changes.
And he was right.
I hope that the stigma around mental health continues to move in a direction that allows us to be honest with ourselves and those who are closest to us.
Coaching has also been wildly helpful in the processing of my trauma, and once I realized that there was so much I needed to feel I was also able to begin to feel something different–joy.
Here’s to a future of feeling well.
Happy end of 2020, friends.
