Pulling the covers over my head

Yesterday I was pretty brave about being laid off. Hopeful and upbeat, I said, and that's how I felt.

But then when I turned off the light and got into bed, it all changed.

I was so scared. It was like my body was vibrating with an ice-cold electricity, and I was afraid of being overwhelmed. My chest felt tight and my heart felt like it wanted to race. So I sat up in bed, crossed my legs, and started to meditate.

I didn't push the feeling away. I let it come. I tried to really feel it, to not resist it, to let it run any way it wanted. Weird images flew through my head. I watched them go by. The only thing I tried to regulate was my breathing.

After a while the waves of fear subsided, and then they stopped. I don't know how long it took. I didn't care. I just lay down. I wanted to sleep.

But the fear came back, a huge feeling, like an Empire State Building full of fear was hanging over me.

I thought about going to see if my mother was awake, but I didn't want to upset her.

I didn't want to sit up and meditate any more, so instead I tried to think about when in my life I'd ever been this afraid. I couldn't think of a time; my mind was impossibly blank, but the effort to think, to measure my fear was enough to drive a wedge between me and the feeling, and after a while I was calm enough to sleep.

In the morning, I was all upbeat and happy again.

I'll see what happens tonight. I'm not worried about feeling afraid. It's just a feeling. Besides, I started making a budget today, so I'm on the way to knowing the limits of my safety net.

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