Worry Less

I was born worry-free.  Becoming a worrier evolved over time.

As a kid I worried in private but kept up with the other (tom)boys. We scaled water pipes three stories up the side of Hovey School. I worried we’d get caught (and arrested!) or one of us would fall to our deaths. We fashioned “jiggers” from scrap wood, nails and rope, and screamed as the contraption shimmied and shook down Hampton Hill. A bloody-faced Frankie F. received a group-carry to his front porch. We knocked on the door and ran back to the Hill. I worried his mother would call our parents. She didn’t. Ten stitches later, he was back to co-pilot. No one got sued. All day we passed around a garden hose from kid to kid, and despite ample warnings, no one ever contracted rickets or scurvy.

My worry heightened after eavesdropping on my mother who worried about the Cuban Missile Crisis with her friends. That’s when the school began to practice air raid drills. My feeling of being out of control fed my worry that on any given day a missile (whatever that was) might land in the schoolyard, and not be a good thing.

By adulthood creepy crawly things and over-inflating my tires caused worry. So did taking wrong turns and ending up in the back streets of a shady neighborhood with no outlet. Balloons that suddenly pop and scare the hell out of me. Having correct change at the “correct change only” tolls. I book  hotel rooms on low floors, worried that I might need to escape a burning building. Flying (actually it’s a fear, but I WORRY about the logistics of air travel, and whether the pilot has had enough sleep).

When I became a parent the degree to which I worried included my children. Why? Their survival skills weren’t as adequately developed as my friends from the 60s. Isn’t this what all parents believe? I’ve never seen proof that scurvy CAN NOT be contracted through sharing a bottle of Dr. Pepper.

Later I worried about the Cancer. That the late stage of it made the diagnosis bleak, at best. I worried about him. I worried about him and me. I worried about the kids. I worried about him and the kids. I worried about the separations. The treatments. Losing our jobs. Our home. Our insurance. I worried about infections and hospital bills and strict food preparations and germs swirling around — they were everywhere! All that worry consumed every waking (and sleeping) moment. Despite my diligent worrying we made it through it all.

I worried globally, too.

About the planet. The dirty air we breathe. The acid rain falling from the sky, its waters feeding the food we harvest and eat. Oil spills. Fracking. Nuclear weapons. Nasty crazies who want to hurt nice innocent people. I’m still here despite all of it, including consuming some bizarre foods, by choice.

I worried about really stupid things: Thunderstorms. Parking far away at the mall. Well-meaning clerks spraying things on me. High-pitched animal screeches in the night. Running out of milk during a Nor’easter snowstorm — kind of an inside joke around New England.

Guess what? Years and years of worry resulted in…not much. Without exception, NOTHING I’ve spent a lifetime worrying about ever harmed me the way I worried it would. I survived. My husband survived. Our children survived. Their children will survive. The world survived.

Worry, I’ve learned, is such a wasted emotion. It brings fear and anxiety and paralyzes freedom. It stresses our entire being – physically, mentally, spiritually.

If I could tack back all the worry years of course I would. Since it’s impossible, I move forward.

I worry, still. But it’s manageable and fleeting. I recognize worry for the useless, draining emotion it is and send it packing. Better planning gives me more control over the emotion. Now I turn on lights instead of bumbling around in the dark waiting for something to jump out.

I’m not wasting time worrying anymore…

Except I do worry that the second slice of pizza WILL end up on my hips. It will. That’s a fact, my friends. And it’s nothing to worry about.

BE F-G AWESOME TODAY!
Original graphic and quote: Stephanie DelTorchio