I dunno. You mentioned doom and gloom. Picking oneself up and making what seem reasonable decisions isn’t catastrophizing, to me. I’m not minimizing. It just struck me that resilience includes self belief. No offense intended.
Oh ya, I see your point from my doom and gloom comment. I probably just interpreted her actions of saving and frugality that way when they were actually about resilience and self sufficiency. And certainly confidence plays a roll in that. Certainly no offense taken.
A major part of DH’s job is catastrophizing – he does a lot of risk management and stress testing for various financial scenarios. He also comes by it naturally from having to be the responsible adult in his family starting at age ten.
I also tend to catastrophize (with my medical history, there’s a lot of material to work with), and I have spent enormous amounts of energy trying to manage DH’s worst-case mindset, both by being pre-emptive in managing potential “disasters” but also having to take his “sky is falling” seriously (even if it’s truly not a big deal). Alas, he will not consider therapy.
This reply should probably be in the thread about the worst thing we did to our kids.
It feels like wasted energy to worry about too many “what if’s,” particularly those unlikely to occur. It’s like borrowing tomorrow’s worries today so you can’t enjoy the present because the worries casts such a huge shadow.
I feel for folks who can’t help this and hope that therapy can help reduce anxiety and keep concerns more manageable so while one can have a backup plan one doesn’t devote too many resources to it.
At this time I am not close to anyone who spends much energy catastrophizing. I think I’d find it exhausting and gave me second-guessing too much.
This is all interesting – my doctor is trying to convince me that I havean anxiety disorder. DH says he thinks I have some delayed and relatively mild variant of PTSD because “lots of crappy things have happened to you”. Dr says therapy takes too long, is too dependant on the therapist, and really I should just take some antidepressants. We said no thank you.
On the whole, I don’t think of it as worrying so much as overplanning. framing it that way helps me get a healthier distance and keep tabs on where a line should be drawn. But honestly, both my children would be dead if I weren’t a worrier. Once this happens to you, there’s very little to convince you that it was a bad idea to yell “fire” even when everyone else feels it is only a bit of smoke.
It isn’t a Misery Olympics. One person’s catastrophe is another person’s walk in the park. Be gentle with each other is always fine advice.
I did read once (pre-internet), that reading the newspaper can cause people to be depressed due to all the doom and gloom. Now, with the internet…,it easy to see how people catastrophize. I do it al the time.
Last night, I think because of reading this thread and reading about that poor family in Kentucky, I had a nightmare concerning my son and finding out he was dead. It woke me up.
Ugh, my life is one big catastrophe at this point. DS has been in the hospital for 4 1/2 weeks now. At least I think I’ve found a good counselor.
Hello, my name is Pilot2012 and I have general catastrophizing and specific. I’m somewhat reassured to see that others are here:)
Specific: If you’ve been that 1 in (choose your number) it colors your world; the affect/effect of vulnerability. Personally, it also depends whether it happens to me or my family. When “life” looms for my family, I wear the A-1 Ruminator crown.
General: Again, I was thinking about how careful I am about food, exercise, etc. but I just kind of blithely scroll and read; a complete non-specific, often unhealthy diet of unvetted claptrap. Headlines intriguing, click. Along those lines (dating myself), does anyone remember the lead up to Y2K? It kind of stands out as a momentous “internet catastrophizing” for me, not that we went full blown prepper:)
Lots of thoughtful and thought-provoking comments on this thread.
Interesting thought about it being genetic. Or at least running in families. I think my dad catastrophizes. So many things we couldn’t do as children because [insert horrible thing that could happen]. It drove me nuts because I just couldn’t see how he would get to that conclusion.
Fast forward a few decades and I’m having the same thoughts. I’m just not restricting activities like he used to do (probably because I remember how much I hated it). But the worry is certainly there. I feel like ignorance is bliss, but life and aging have taken away that innocence/ignorance and I don’t know how to get it back.
@MaineLonghorn - hugs to you!!!
@greenbutton — your doctor is full of it. There’s more than one kind of therapy, and the one I usually recommend to my patients with anxiety is cognitive behavioral therapy. It’s short-term (usually 10-12 sessions), goal-oriented therapy. In other words, it doesn’t ask you to delve into your past to gain insight on what happened in your childhood or adult life to cause anxiety. It asks, how can we change your responses so you don’t keep falling into the same pattern of behavior? Talk therapy has a role for a lot of people, but not really for people who are just wired to worry. It is highly operator-dependent — get the wrong therapist and you have wasted time and money. CBT isn’t operator-dependent and has been shown in studies to be effective in treating anxiety and depression. The only catch is that some therapists who are trained in CBT prefer to practice talk therapy, so you want to watch for that or discuss it up front. And I imagine availability varies a lot by region— although there are web-based programs available.
I just finished reading a book: “You Are Not a Rock” by Mark Freeman that you might find helpful.
It is a light, fast read, with introductions to concrete methods of allowing feelings and thoughts to flow through our heads without derailing us. Learning not to chase the thoughts. Learning to take actions that move us towards our values (as opposed to taking actions based on our fears) We catastrophize and then take actions to try to control the fear we feel. This guy’s point of view is to learn to accept those feelings as part of being a human, but to also be mindful in the moment of whether your actions (in trying to control the fear) are leading you towards the things you value.
That sounds really new-agey and out there. But the author walks you through concrete steps to get there.
Most importantly, we are not our thoughts, and our attempts to control or stop uncomfortable thoughts and feelings tend to backfire and lead to compulsive behaviors (checking up on our kids, re-checking to be sure the door is locked, spending time on social media to escape or distract from those thoughts). Are those compulsive actions leading you towards your values and goals or are they taking you away from them?
It is an interesting perspective.
My parents made their catastrophic worldview the deciding factor in our lives. They restricted my activities and freedom, spoke in terms of what would go wrong rather than what could, and made every medical or disciplinary setback a tragedy. They used up my empathy reserve by the time I was in my 30s. I was raised hearing that I had to always do exactly as they say because otherwise the stress would kill my father. When he died in his 80s all I could think is he finally got around to it.
And may I say how much I admire all of you who are trying to deal with it? You’ve experienced deaths, tragedies, lethal situations, and you’re proactive, vigilant, self-aware, and compassionate. It’s so heartening to read about the posters here handling their own fears.
@CIEE83 thanks for the info about CBT. That’s what my counselor said she’s going to do with me.
ML, my heart goes out to you. You’re dealing with real crises and not exaggerating. Know that we care.
CBT wasnt the right fit for me. Don’t be afraid to change styles.
My mother was a holocaust survivor (kindertransport); her parents and other family did not survive. I am getting better but have had a long-standing tendency to catastrophize. At times I have seen therapists and was told by one that I have a form of PTSD; I was aware, from a very early age, of the truly terrible things that can and do indeed happen. I suppose that is why I have always seen the potential dark side of things. It’s a terrible way to live. I have read articles about children of holocaust survivors with the same problems. I am always amazed when I read stories of survivors who go on to live full, rich, seemingly happy lives. My mom never got past what happened to her at such an early age.
I missed your comment @MaineLonghorn. Living at times minute by minute is so very hard. Hoping that counselor is a good match for your DS and a healthy outcome is right around the corner. I hope today is a good day.
@eastcoascrazy - Thanks for the book recommendation. I read the intro on Amazon and it was like he read my mind i places. Just yesterday I was putting away a sharp knife in the kitchen when DH walked in, and my mind immediately started the 911 call of explaining how we’d collided and I didn’t stab him on purpose - even though I didn’t even come close to him with that knife in my hand! There were other examples that I’ve lived as well.
I’ve requested the book through my library.
I definitely think being on “high alert” for years takes its toll.
I did not notice so much when I was in the thick of it. Oh, I knew it was stressful, but what came as a shock was how I began to sense my nerves were healing once the kids were out of the house.
We strung together some time without a crisis happening, things got better financially & we were no longer living paycheck to paycheck, and I didn’t feel the weight of the (kids’) world on my shoulders.
I began to have moments when I had what I can only describe as feeling like my old self.
I agree that we need to be gentle with ourselves. Thought patterns are practiced day after day for years on end. It’s going to take a lot of practice to get to a new spot.
@Midwest67 It’s like when you are running and have the momentum you keep going thinking hey I am doing it so I must not be tired but when you stop and sit down you feel aches in your muscles. When I am so busy I just move from one thing to the next not realizing the exhaustion is going to hit me later.
If I reflect back now I think wow what a strong person I was. I survived so much. Back then I didn’t know I had it in me. I believe we have doubts but we are so much more capable then we think. It’s when we get pushed past our limits and are forced to deal with things for survival that we realize how resilient we have become. I have to remind myself hey I made it through this many storms I have the ability to survive whatever happens in the future. Things are going to be ok.
CBT is designed for catastrophizing. It is one of the most common cognitive distortions. Here is a lot of info on it and how CBT can help: https://positivepsychologyprogram.com/cbt-cognitive-behavioral-therapy-techniques-worksheets/