Anxiety when you know you royally fucked up

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

Something happened today and it was because I was nervous, extremely nervous, and it didn’t go as I planned. Basically, I had a very important conversation with somebody around some things with my work, and I went in nervous but thought I could get it done and now put forward my plan but I could barely string a sentence together. I was anxious and just a mess. 
🤦🏽‍♂️ I won’t know the outcome of this conversation for at least 10 days/5 -7 working days but it was completely and utterly a shit show. Has this happened to anybody? How can I stop thinking about it and mentally recover from this so I don’t worry about it over the next 7 working days. I haven’t stopped thinking about it since 9am 

Help.

[Lost_Space_Explorer5]

Hey @Saltwaterdreamtime I'm sorry to hear the conversation didn't go well for you. But damn yes I think we've all royally fucked up at some point and then continued to dwell on the issue to the point that it gets in the way of our functioning. Just this week I sat on an interview panel as a youth representative and argued with the people in charge because I felt the process was corrupt- I was way out of turn but wanted to stand by my values. I feel terrible about it and like I should have just gone along with what they said like what do I know I've messed up class presentations because of anxiety and had this job interview that was hilariously (not so funny at the time) terrible. And just today I was meant to meet my friend and somehow lost track of time and was 30 mins late, I felt horrible, worthless and inconsiderate

Ultimately I think it's just a waiting game until the cringe moment loses it's intensity and we forgive ourselves enough to try and move on because everyone makes mistakes. Everyone. Everyone beats themselves up in ways we wouldn't treat others. We put ourselves down and replay events over and over  

I don't think it's your fault you got anxious and things didn't go as well as you hoped. The next week is probably gonna be pretty difficult with that anxiety but I reckon using coping strategies, talking to people who care about you and won't bring you down, and distracting yourself could help?

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

Last night I layed solo on the floor in the dark in our lounge room with my headphones on and just chilled there for a bit, just to stop my mind from racing @Lost_Space_Explorer5 

The other thing that comes to me is should I call and ask to have a redo, meet them again? Do people do that? Is that socially acceptable? Would it give me a better case? I’m so incredibly embarrassed about the way I conducted myself yesterday and I know I can’t change it but, it was a shit show. If they approve what I want I will be very surprised. I need to stop thinking about it, but also, kind of want to slam my head against a brick wall 8000 times then cut my brain out and run over with it a car for being so dumb. 

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

Am I being ridiculous? Am I overthinking? God, I hate when I’m like this.

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

I’m the worst person to be around when I can’t decide something or I have to wait for an answer, THE WORST person. And the way my brain works is I talk in circles and also back track 8 thousand times in one conversation so yesterday went like this

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

It’s not a big deal, but it kind of is, most normal people would not be this upset. Maybe just forget I said anything, maybe it will be ok, it’ll be alright yeah, yeah it will be. In 5-7 business days they will phone me and it will be ok.

[Hannah-RO]

Hey @Saltwaterdreamtime did listening to music help your brain to slow down a bit? It is such a tough one, and I think like @Lost_Space_Explorer5 was saying we have all had shitty experiences that we then can't stop thinking about and its a horrible space to be in. I have definitely had job interviews where I've said things and later thought... "Why on earth did I say that I would never normally say that who am I"

I think its good to remember that when you do a job interview or a big work meeting, it's really normal to be quite nervous and anxious about it, and its because you care. The person on the other side of this, if they are a nice person, should be respectful of this and understand the vulnerable position you're in. 

Thank you for your drawing - I definitely relate to having those conversations! I think it is completely understandable to be feeling this way and it doesn't make you not-normal. Is there anything you can do while you're waiting to hear back from them?

[Saltwaterdreamtime]

I just have to continue working and block it out for now, I mean, I keep thinking if I should call them and discuss it, but then maybe it wasn’t that bad and by me calling I’m just brining attention to errors they may not have picked up on, you know?

Yeah that draw is every conversation I’m having at the moment. My brain is seriously fried, even non work related conversations are just a circle at the moment, I’ll be like “so this happened today... wait look, theres a dog outside haha, I remember my old dog... where was I? Oh yeah, the cat... oh no, I wasn’t talking about the cat I was talking about today, what happened again?”

I’ve been unmedicated for quite a while and sometimes I really question if I should give it another shot.  @Hannah-RO 

[Alexarose]

Hey @Saltwaterdreamtime
I totally know what you mean when you get completely stuck on something that was totally awful and makes you wish you could just erase your mind of it. I get really anxious about these things when it happens and I find it hard to stop thinking about it. I feel like my mind can be my worst enemy like why do i keep reminding myself of something so ugh!
from my personal experiences the things that help me the most are things that take a lot of mental work and make me tired. I'm not a major exercise person (but maybe you are so there could be more options for you to burn some energy or what I like to call overthinking power) so i'll take myself on a long walk and listen to music or an intense podcast that requires me to really think about it/engage. I also find talking to someone about their life/problems helps, my mum is a great talker and if you get her started on something she will probably continue for as long as you need her too lmao. So i might go chat with her about whats going on with her kind of thing.
Drawing/painting/reading/cleaning my room and all those kind of things also help. Basically i just want to distract myself and make sure i'm tired and can go straight to sleep
hope some of this is at least a bit helpful! But yeah I feel you and hope you get through this next week