Little Miss Worry Wart

by jeannatividad

I’m once again dominating the room with the loud clacks of my keyboard. From the sound of it you’d think I’ve been hit with inspiration to write the next bestselling novel, but the truth is I’m too busy chasing after my thoughts. I have to document everything in this message, everything that triggered the worry wart in me.

I hit send. I just e-mailed a full-page story on what transpired earlier to the few friends I have. (I’m not exactly Little Miss Popular.) Those guys are probably not surprised. On the most random of days I send lengthy messages—mostly sounding distressed and depressed—to my friends, detailing yet another episode in my life that I believe was penned by Lemony Snicket.

I get replies, and I start feeling a little less panicky. As usual, my best friends try to calm me down. Their staple lines go:

“Don’t think too much about it.”

“Just don’t be too hard on yourself, okay?”

“It’s probably not as bad as you think it is.”

And most of the time, when all the troubling moments are over and it’s too late to stop overanalyzing things, those words prove to be true. My best friends are pretty awesome, really. It must take solid patience to keep repeating those lines to me, to keep telling me I have nothing to worry about, that I’m going to be all right.

I hit reply again bombarding my friends with so much negativity. Again, my friends show how awesome they are, keeping up with my craziness and raising my spirits. They know that the next day or two, I’ll be sending another lengthy message reporting how things turned out just fine. And their staple replies go:

“I told you, you had nothing to worry about.”

“See. I told you!”

“I told you. I hope now you believe me when I say (insert something nice about me here).”

And after that, I admit I shouldn’t have been so bothered.

It’s such a hard habit to break—being a worry wart.  I’d give anything to just stop torturing myself each time something unpleasant happens. I want to stop creating countless theories in my head of what could have and can go wrong.

After much thought, I figure out a possible solution. It seems a little difficult, but this worry wart believes it can be done. Slowly but surely.

- J

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