Help, I’m Trapped Under an Anxiety Blanket and I Can’t Get Up
Which is, ironically, making my anxiety worse.
It makes perfect sense to me that if you’re extremely anxious or suffer from some kind of mental illness, that you should cover yourself with what is essentially a giant lead bib like the kind they use at the dentist’s office when you get X-rays.
Because the dentist’s office is such a relaxing place, am I right?
I like how the hygienist drapes a 50-pound shield over your chest and then runs away like they just cut the wrong wire on a bomb.
I’m typing this on my phone using only eye movements. Thank God I downloaded that app, iTYPE (patent pending).
Remember that movie, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly? It was about a guy who had a paralyzing stroke and could only blink one eye. So somebody had to hold up a board with letters on it and then figure out which letter he was blinking at so he could communicate. It took four hours to spell “the”.
I worry about that a lot.
That’s why I downloaded the app, in case I have a stroke and can only move my nostrils.
To be honest, I worry about a lot of things. A lot of things.
Hence, the blanket.
“FORBID TUMBLE DRY AND IRON!” the instructions screamed at me. “Getting used to a weighted blanket takes about 3–5 days, you would love it.”
I can only assume it takes 3–5 days to build sufficient upper-body strength so you can turn over with this thing pinning you to the mattress like a bug.
“Please be rest assured it is correct size. It is OK when a weighted blanket can’t barely cover a mattress.”
So what if the instructions sound like they were written by a native Chinese speaker who learned English from a meth dealer in Kentucky?
I was sure the blanket was perfectly safe.
My boyfriend offered to leave a bottle of water by my bed before he left, but like a fool, I declined. Half of a granola bar mocks me from my nightstand. So close, and yet so far. I am weak from lack of food and from trying to scratch an itch on my left butt cheek that I can’t reach.
The blanket is a cruel mistress.
How many others have perished, itchy and alone, victims of their own bravado?
Their death certificates say, “Cause of death: unknown.”
Dear friends, do not let my death be a mystery for future generations to puzzle over and create an award-winning podcast about.
It was the blanket.
"It makes perfect sense to me that if you’re extremely anxious or suffer from some kind of mental illness, that you should cover yourself with what is essentially a giant lead bib like the kind they use at the dentist’s office when you get X-rays."
I thought I was the one who first figured out that the lead bib for x-rays was helpful for my general dental anxiety, so I started to ask them to put the bib on me from the moment I sat in the chair until the moment I left. Even if I wasn't having any X-rays. It helps tremendously.
I decided to kick it up a few notches recently and asked them to pile on some filing cabinets and other heavy office equipment on top of me and now I barely even notice what they are doing to my mouth.
- Lisa (aka, Amazing Larry)
Just WAIT til it springs a hole and all of those tiny beads spill, spill, spilllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll