History can repeat itself until we choose to learn to listen.

Lily Mae

2008

Hazel Mae

2025

If History has a way of repeating itself, I believe there is also another saying that goes…
”If we know better, we do better.”
That is if we choose to do so. 
Or quite possibly, that is if we value a desired outcome enough to move through a certain level of discomfort until we can reach the desired result.  

And if so, does that validate that our future, let alone our present, will be an evolution rather than a never ending revisitation of our past? 
I choose to hope so.

With all of that being said, Anxiety has been a good old not so best friend of mine since I can remember.  And the way I have always dealt with it, is to push it away.  Terrified it would destroy me, I felt the only way to survive it was to equally destroy it with either distraction or redirection. 
A good game of hide and seek.  

Every time it showed up, I ran, hid or essentially plugged my ears and sang really loud as if the monster staring directly at me was not there.  No, it was actually worse than that. The creature felt like it was within me and all around me. 
Good luck finding a safe place to hide from that.

After lots of therapy, a couple “recovery centers”, years of literally running as a way to escape and countless self help books I thought I had finally broken free of this until recently. 

What I never realized was that I had trained myself to control the Anxiety by controlling myself and my response to it.  However, when something happens that is completely out of our control, then what?

Losing and saying goodbye to my pug of 18 years, Lily in her physical form was the most difficult event I have chosen to experience.  I say choose because I chose to get her and inevitably love her with all of my heart. 

What I did not choose was that she wouldn’t be physically with me forever. 
100% out of my control and 100% something I tried to ignore and escape from.  

And even in my greatest attempts to control this loss, I 100% could not.

Grief is something so painful and hard to describe unless felt.  And no one can ever feel or compare their grief to yours.  Quite honestly, the idea of comparing grief simply sounds very counterproductive. 

All that I know is that my grief from this loss that was out of my control opened up the door to my long not so lost friend Anxiety.  She knew that my greatest fear of losing control on the ultimate level would break me wide open and vulnerable.  

And she was right.
However, what I didn’t realize was that Anxiety was simply waiting for the moment for me to realize that in relationships, even in this one with Anxiety, that we do better in relating to the other once we take the time to truly know the other better.  Wholeheartedly. 

Losing Lily felt like losing a piece of my heart.  And so Anxiety showed up this time as panic attacks. 
At the best time, in the middle of the night.

I had already lost the physical company of Lily who I had considered as my security blanket over the years of hiding and escaping the grips of Anxiety.  And so now, more vulnerable to the destruction that Anxiety felt like, I had no where to hide, there was no where to run and distraction seemed impossible to even consider.  My only choice was to actually feel Anxiety, wholeheartedly and in its whole form.  

And to my surprise, ride what felt like a wave.  

Just like a good laugh or a deep cry, there is a rise, a crescendo and then a taper until its gone.  All Anxiety wanted me to realize that she too would pass.  She just needed to be heard and felt.  This was the only way she knew how to communicate with me because I had never taken the time to actually get to know her and listen, wholeheartedly.  

Try stopping yourself from laughing when you watch your favorite comedy or have a good laugh attack. 
Tell yourself to not cry when your pet dies.
Good Luck.

With Anxiety, she needed space to breathe too.  For her, the more practice in experiencing the wave together, the less extreme, the quieter and to my surprise, the more I have started to appreciate her company within me.  She’s not a monster or some creature lurking within, in a way, Anxiety is like a friend who tends to worry a lot and needs some empathy and companionship too.  

Relationships have an amazing way of working better when those involved work together. 

And so, as I step into this next chapter with our new little girl, Hazel.  I undoubtedly know that I have chosen to experience a love so great and a journey that could feel so terrifying similar, however this time very different from my past. 

Because at the end of the day, in a lot of ways, history teaches many great things.  And in taking the time to understand our reactions to where we have been with our whole heart, the opportunity becomes greater than simply doing better. By making the choice to ride the waves of life even when the crescendo rises to a place that in the past seemed unbearable.  Just like a wave rises and falls, we can learn that it is possible to feel better in the process.
And just like history, this too shall pass and on the other side is calm crystal clear water.