Had an existential crisis today. I tried so hard not to freak out and throw myself in a tailspin of unwanted thoughts, but the thoughts sneakily came in and hit me like a tidal wave. I am due to graduate in December this semester and I had a scheduling mishap (we are about 5 weeks in) and I wasn't enrolled for the correct amount of credits, resulting in me actually not being considered a full-time student. (12 credits is considered full-time here) On a whim today I caught this in my Portal for school and thought to email the registrar's office just to clear things up. Good thing I did because I ended up needing a course that I had initially dropped at the beginning of the semester to make time for my internship and that course was one that was required for me to graduate as well. A whole entire mess- believe me, I was in GO mode. Talking with my professor, my advisors, the registrar's office, my mom and more. Within a matter of about 45 minutes, I got the issue fixed and I am in the right number of credits as of now and I was able to switch my courses to fit into my schedule. What if it doesn't work? What if he says no? What happens when there's literally no space for you in that class? What happens if you literally don't graduate in December? Will you have to stay an entire semester longer just to finish one course? How will you afford that extra semester if that does happen? What happens if it DOES work out, and you have allllllllll that work to make up? Will you be able to even catch up? What content have you missed thus far? How are you even going to jump into a class 5-weeks in? The thoughts literally never end. I tried to tell myself, "I'll figure it out, like I always do." This helps me sometimes but then I think, "Well... what if you don't figure it out?" And then the whole process starts over again. Gratitude is the only thing that I've figured out I can use to drown these thoughts out. Simply just trying to find the gratefulness in a situation can reframe my whole mindset. I am just SUPER grateful that ON A WHIM today, I decided to email the registrar's office about the discrepancies in my schedule. Because I truly believe that if I had waited until the end of this week, or even next week, I would not be able to get this figured out because it'd be too late.

Last week I fell into a bit of an existential spiral, which hasn't happened for a long while. Now that I'm mostly on the other side, I think it's important to reflect on the lessons I learned from it. I hope this is helpful for others who find themselves in their own spiral, existential or not. 1. The thought, "I'm never getting out of this one," will always be there, and it will always be a lie. Whenever I fall into a deep existential spiral (which is pretty rare these days), it *always* feels as though I've uncovered some horrible thought that I'm never going to be able to get past. As if I've finally found that one existential thought this is going to ruin me for the rest of my life. When that happens, allow the thought to come and go just like the rest of the thoughts, and take some time to reflect on how you've been there before. For me, it helps to sarcastically agree with it: "Yep you're right! THIS is the one that'll do me in." 2. Keep doing what you do A major difference between this spiral and past ones is that I forced myself to not cancel any plans because of it. I played at an open mic, accompanied my friend on mandolin for his performance, and I attended a run group, all while experiencing an existential crisis. I definitely think this shortened the length of the episode. I proved to myself that I could do some pretty demanding things despite the thoughts. I was also able to reflect on how when I was forced to be present (such as while performing), the existential crisis totally subsided. Which brings me to... 3. Trust in mindfulness I absolutely get it; when you're in the middle of a spiral, the idea of just "bringing yourself into the present moment" seems laughably unhelpful. This time in particular, it really felt irresponsible to *not* attend to the thoughts. It genuinely felt like I had to *solve* these existential questions before I could move on to anything else, including the present moment. But when I reflect on the times that I felt the most at-ease, it was always when I was present. It was during the 10 seconds I took to breath and notice my surroundings. It was when I disengaged from the thoughts and allowed them to come and go. It was when I smelled the fresh air after a thunderstorm, or during a conversation with a friend about her breakup. It was when I named the feelings and emotions I was experiencing, and welcomed it all. Existential thoughts are supposed to be about reality, but when you're lost in them, you aren't actually *in* reality. They're only scary in the virtual reality of the mind. And finally... 4. Yes, the compulsions are the problem I did a LOT of research last week. I watched videos, Googled, and even dove into ChatGPT. The compulsions were obvious, and they were never enough. Every answer that made me feel a little better was followed by doubt less than 15 minutes later. In the moment it genuinely feels like you HAVE to keep doing the compulsions, but you need to trust that that's exactly what is making you feel worse. In order to stop researching, I just had to...stop researching. It was hard at first, but eventually the spiral stopped spinning, and the longer I waited between compulsions, the easier it was to move on.

so I put this into Gemini a couple mins ago but it just gave me the 988 to text but I feel like I don’t know if these thoughts are genuine or intrusive and just amplified because of how I was feeling. This is what I put in there I’ll just copy and paste. I got talking with my grandma and I felt like I needed to get it out but I just kept thinking deeper and deeper like thoughts like “I can’t do this anymore” or “when will this stop” and I have a lot of suicidal intrusive thoughts and sometimes when I feel in such fear and deep sorrow and dispare these thoughts feel so real that I can’t tell if they’re intrusive. But I immediately push them away of course even though I keep wanting to figure it out or figure out how I can break free from this doubt and second guessing. But it freaked me out that maybe I was actually contemplating or genuinely thinking about it or was close to snapping and giving up. Now I feel like I have to figure out of it was intrusive or not because that’s really serious if it is a real thought. I know it’s apart of ocd to figure it out but I can’t tell if it was my imagination made it seem way more real or when I imagined myself doing something to myself it felt like the probability became higher because I was in a state of severe distress. It’s like a thought when your heart is beating so fast you don’t wish it would stop beating you just want a break from it beating so loud or fast or you want it to get better. Idk I pictured myself just being stuck in my body and it freaked me out too like the fact I cant control what my body is doing. I’ve lost some weight the last couple months bc of stress and it just grosses me out thinking how bad I might be getting. I even started thinking maybe I need to be in a mental hospital. And just admit it and just get more help. The thing is I also felt like I had a decent day today but it took so much out of me trying to resist compulsions and “keeping” the good moment going without extreme fear especially of dying. I get so freaked out by random things even things touching me, certain sounds and wish it could all stop sometimes and I keep running away from things I think are triggers for my anxiety but it feels like it’s getting narrower.

Hi. I'm just sort of feeling kind of shitty and in moments like these I tend to swing to one extreme or the other, like methodicially and intensely trying to pull apart every piece of what I am feeling and why, determine what is a "real" problem and what is just a bad mood, and take action to "fix" myself, the problem, or ensure that future me will fix it by setting reminders, planning, or just generally freaking out lol. That can all be a bit compulsive, but I don't want to do my other thing, which is just aggressively ignore or try to deny my feelings because they are "not real" or I just need to "let them go". But I'm feeling a little frozen in my fears so I am hoping de-tangling it a bit in words here will be a good middle ground. I'm about to be a senior in college, and I live in the city where my school is. I haven't seen my family for a bit and I am currently spending a weekend with them at the beach. Today was just kind of rough and has made the past, present, and future collide in my head, fanning fears of both external problems and the fear of fear itself, the fear of OCD spirals. I want to more specically describe the problems I have been having since starting college, but I guess for getting through today that isn't really the point. I guess just....I've been trying to create a life for myself and become someone who is strong enough to live it. I have ADHD and OCD and sometimes it just feels like half my energy goes to functioning through that, and the other half goes to resisting the OCD-urge to spiral about the future, to fear I'll let my life fall apart or won't be able to fix the normal, big and small problems life brings. Today has just felt.....hard. I ate something that made me really sick last night, and I didn't take my normal dose of Adderall today or yesterday which can just make me sort of sleepy. On both phsyical counts, I think I'm fine and don't really feel bad anymore, it just sort of triggered some overthinking. I feel scared that feeling kind of tired has/will effect my ability to enjoy what is supposed to be a relaxing time, or that I won't' have as much energy as I should to do things with my family and will disspoint them. I'm scared that the journey back to the city tomorrow will be chaotic and awful, and that when I return I will continue to make mistakes that put me in negative cycles. Strangely, I'm kind of aware that all of these concerns are either possibly not going to happen, or are just things I definetely cannot do anything about right now. I'm just sort of...frustrated that I can't easily shove away worries I know to be "illogical" and deeply afraid of spiraling deeper. All of these different things overlapping right now just sort of make me feel like I've failed. Failed to.....I don't know, resist compulsions and get over them faster, accomplish things in life and school faster/more, be less socially anxious. Failed to get on the right track, to make any kind of progress. Strangely, a lot of the discomfort I'm feeling in this moment indirectly sort of comes from things I am doing "right", to break cycles. I didn't bring my meds because I want to work on the discomfort I feel with spending time without the goal of productivity, I don't have an exact plan for everything I need to do and I have not psyched myself up to tackled my most urgent goals when I get home because I've also been working on finding ways of doing uncomfortable things that don't involve motivating myself through terror when I can't do anything about it. I'm letting myself take time to cry about all these feelings and write this out here because I don't want to deny myself what I need to get better because I feel like I shouldn't need it. I'm hoping, in a way, even the shitty day I've had today is a sign of progress, my OCD desperately seeking a host in fear of fear because I am beating other compulsions. I think there's also something to be said for the unserious but still powerful issue of just fucking being on vacation with your extended family. Like....its hard to take a moment to cry it out or calm yourself down when you're sharing a bedroom with your mom and sister. I'm feeling glad I'm going home tomorrow, scared of how I might feel when I do, and I guess....fearful of what it means that I wasn't "able" to enjoy myself for the whole time I was here. But those feelings do feel much more distant, after writing this. The time will pass and I will go home regardless. When I get home, maybe I will make "better" choices or be "stronger", maybe I will dig a deep hole for myself. Either way, that's not my burden right now or today. I've tried that method and it didn't get me what I want.