Yesterday I experienced high anxiety which I attributed to multiple factors including the fact that my cat was missing. She always paces by the back door to be let out and even stretches up and puts her paw on the door handle and pulls down. Most of my doors don’t have round knobs, They have the lever kind that you pull down on and the pull the door open. If that door wasn’t so heavy, I swear she’d be able to open it. She’s smarter than any dog I’ve ever met. If she wants my attention, she’ll follow me and nip at the back of my heels to let me know. If I turn and let her know she’s got my attention, she’ll start walking in the direction she wants me to go, which is usually either the location of her food pantry or the back door.

Yesterday I let her out mid morning as I was working my way through the house doing a bit of packing and organizing. By late morning I went to let her in and she didn’t come when I called. She normally comes running right away. Sometimes she gets out of the back yard and so I went to the front door and expected her to run up on the porch right away to come in. This time, that didn’t happen. I didn’t think anything about it at first except for how strange that was. I kept working my way through different rooms of my house.

About every half hour I went back to both doors to call her in and each time I was greeted by a burst of cool fall air and no cat. By mid afternoon my mind was wandering and worrying. If you ever had a pet go missing you know that feeling. A sick feeling in the stomach and a vision of the animal being trapped somewhere or worse, run over by a car.

I tried to go to the gym to take my mind off of it but that worked in the opposite direction. My mind was too free to think about everything and my anxiety started to climb higher. When I was writing then, I eluded to the fact that I had a lot of things contributing to that feeling.. the job, school, money, all my stuff. One of the things I had in the back of my mind was this stupid drug test I have to take for my new contract. It’s not stupid, really. If I was an employer I would want my employees to submit to a test, but damn it’s terrible timing.

Today is day 7 after arriving back home from my Co trip. I’ve written about how I don’t like MJ and would never do that again, but when I was in the mountains, I shrugged and figured I’d give it another shot. I was disappointed again and really actually hated the experience and so this drug test coming up now is like icing on a shit cake. Anyway, I had actually forgotten about it for a hot minute with everything else on my mind.

For the record, i have it from several sources that since I’m not a regular user, it should be out of my system, but as of last Friday I was still weeing dirty on some home test I acquired. Thanks Obama. Jim told me not to worry, just wait till Monday and also said the test probably also includes benzodiazepines, whatever that is, but that I should not take any Xanax. Ok no problem.

When he told me that I didn’t think anything about it because I’ve only ever taken it to help me sleep and haven’t had any for over a month, maybe two. I haven’t needed it. Then yesterday hit and I was seriously feeling terrible. My mind was wrecking havoc and I just wanted relief. Like I said, I’ve never taken it for anything but sleep but I figured I would take just a half a pill to see if that would help. In about a half hour I could feel it working and it was like magic.

I made dinner and didn’t get upset when my daughter complained for the gazillionth time that she didn’t like it. I didn’t care. I continued to clean and organize and pack and just felt so much better. I actually sat down in my office and was able to open a book and read and get inspired to write. It was as if all that anxiety just melted away. Yeah, total magic.

It was like that for about an hour and a half until I tipped over the edge feeling sleepy. Yeah, when you’re tired and take a pill that normally is a sleep aid, that’s bound to happen. According to my FitBit, I fell asleep at 7:19 pm. Wow! 😯

And then woke up (actually Z woke me up) at 9:38PM. That was the most amazing 2 hour nap I’ve ever had. I felt great!

Then I remembered the test and was like, oh crap! Now I’m gonna have 2 potential hits on this thing. Cheeses! It’s like the Universe doesn’t want me to take this new job. Honestly I don’t want to take the job, so in this case the Universe and I are in agreement.

At least I have an RX for the Xanax and can bring that with me. I’m going to hold off to tomorrow anyway.

Despite having that 2 hour nap I still slept a full 7 hours and woke up feeling pretty damn good. I think I just needed a little extra recovery sleep. My anxiety is now back to normal, no thanks to my kitten. 🐱

Oh yeah, as it turns out, in all my rushing around the house in the morning I apparently had let her back in the house and didn’t realize it. She was sleeping in the basement the entire time!! Good grief!!! 🤦🏼‍♀️ Stupid cat (stupid owner). When my son brought it to my attention I felt relieved but also incredibly dumb. I also realized that it did nothing to alleviate my overall worry so I guess I can’t blame that after all.

The missing cat was a lie and that means the truth is that it was caused by something else. The test now is to remove the other sources until I find the one that really matters. How do I do that? Well, one problem at a time I guess. If it’s work, I’m screwed (for now anyway). There are a few other things I’ll be able to eliminate this week though so that’s going to be good.

Yesterday I kept reminding myself that I’m just one human being doing the best she can do with life. It’s a good thing for everyone to keep in mind. As I roll into this week, I’m going to be thankful that my cat is safe and warm inside the house and no matter what happens with this work crap, it’s all going to be just fine. Time now to get the party started.

Ready or Not,

~Miss SugarCookie