style="font-size:15px;"> nothing Ican do.
I give up.
See how it works? Anxious thoughts make you feel scared, sad, and
ashamed. The situation seems hopeless, so you don’t do anything to
change it. That leaves you feeling worse, only now your worries may be
even stronger because they’ve been running the show since you first
thought “what if?” It’s a vicious cycle.
How can this
all play out?
You may get crabby.
It’s hopeless. You’ve spent a half hour
on one stupid problem. What if you
can’t get any of the others either?
What if you flunk the class? If your
stupid brother weren’t playing that
noisy video game, you’d be able to
think. You start yelling at him. Again.
You may
get needy.
“Can you help me pick out
my outfit? Do I look OK? Can
you find my gloves for me? I can’t
get this zipper. Can you do it?
I can’t decide what to pick.
Will you pick for me? I need—”
“Sweetie,” says your dad, “you
need to do a few more things
by yourself.”
You may
feel sick.
It’s the second week of school,
and once again you can hardly
get out of bed. Your head
aches. You’re dizzy. You’re
exhausted. Do you have a
fever? No. But if you so much
as think about leaving the
house, you end up in the bath-
room getting sick in the sink.
You get trapped
by your fears.
“My sister’s taking me horseback
riding,” says Maggie. “Want to
come?” Horseback riding! That
would be so much fun! But what
if you’re no good at it? What if
you fall off? What if you get hurt?
“Sorry,” you say, “I have to study.”
You can’t stop
criticizing yourself.
“Great job,” says your teacher.
“You played that beautifully.” Was
she even listening? What about
the wrong note you played in the
fifth bar? The performance is this
weekend, and you’re going to stink.
You can’t have fun.
“That was the best movie ever,” says LaToria as
you leave the theater. Was it? You wouldn’t know.
You spent the entire show wondering why Simon
hasn’t answered your text. Did you say something
stupid? What if he’s sharing it?
You can’t stop worrying.
You’re going on vacation. Yay! Only . . . did Dad put your bag in the car?
Did Mom lock the door? What will the hotel be like? What will you eat?
What if you get lost? What if the cat— “What if you stopped asking
questions for once?” says your brother.
In other words . . .
When worry has its way, life becomes complicated, exhausting,
and unhappy.
So, do girls sit back and say, “Whoa. Something has to change here.
Worry is taking over my life”?
Some do, but some don’t. That’s because worry is sneaky. Worry is tricky.
Worry stirs up all these difficult feelings and then ducks the blame.
The truth is, it can be hard to recognize that it’s worry, and not some-
thing else, that’s the real problem. For some girls, feeling angry, queasy,
and stressed out may start to feel natural. They start to believe this is
just who they are. They think, Maybe this is just how life feels. Maybe
this is just what life’s all about.
It’s not what life’s all about. It’s what worry is all about.
who’s in charge?
Worry leads to more worry. It’s
a bit like one of those old sci-fi
movies, where a blob from outer
space wanders around gobbling
up towns, getting bigger and big-
ger as it goes. Feeding the blob
just
