I have an incredible fear of bridges. It’s not the getting on or reaching the other side. It’s the trusting that the bridge has the ability and strength to withstand the weight in the middle. I suffered a major anxiety attack a couple of years ago while having to drive over the Bay Bridge, which connects San Francisco and Oakland, California. I was not familiar with San Francisco territory or traffic, and I had to do the driving as my husband, contentedly sitting in the passenger seat next to me, was on a very intense conference call with Australia. I remember streams of tears rolling down my face as I crept onto the bridge; absolutely terrified of seeing what lie ahead of me as well as the water that rippled below me.
I suddenly realized I needed to turn the internal faucet off (my personal water works system) or else I would not even be able to see to attack this monster. I was nearly paralyzed yet had no choice but to continue on. I was expecting other cars to honk and drivers to holler at me because I simply could not drive as fast as they in effort to get to the other side. I was discouraged and petrified at the fact that I was failing to get control of myself as my hands and feet started going numb at the halfway point. Facing this momentary adversity was going to be my demise! I had to hold it together, but I was literally crumbling inside! I couldn’t share what I was experiencing to my inaccessible husband — nor did I want him to see me in a bug-eyed “freaky girl” panic mode to make him question, “Is this the hot mess I married?” I felt utterly hopeless and helpless.
There I was stuck in the absolute center of the bridge… no helicopter to lower a rope and magically lift me out of my despair… no caped superhero to heed my cry and swoop down to save me and my knight in shining amour immersed in closing a deal… no chance at all that I could just call it a day and give up. I HAD TO KEEP GOING IF I WANTED OFF THIS ROLLERCOASTER TO SURVIVE MY DAUNTING TASK OF SURVIVAL!
And of course about ¾ of the way over this bridge, I start having thoughts: what if a sudden earthquake? What if someone is speeding and rams into me sending us flying over the edge? What if there is a traffic jam and we could be stuck for eternity? What if one of the wires or beams was on its last thread? What if all the above started happening all at the same time? Unrealistic thoughts became a reality that could happen at any second. After all, tragedy of all these types have really happened in history — could happen today too, right? This bridge, this day, this car, this driver…DOOM!!! My future seemed delusionally bleak and coming to a close.
Being blinded by my panic up to this point, it suddenly dawned on me that while all this is DE-concentrating the faith in myself to continue, I see the other side of the bridge the entire time! So I start telling myself, “You’re dumb!” “Major Wuss!” And not only do I see it, I’m driving closer, closer to the safe landing — my destination to regain inner peace, trusted footing, a positive glimmer that I could be victorious in defeating this colossal giant. I’m closer to tomorrow because now I can see the hope of making it across. As I arrived at my destination safe and sound and unharmed (other than the painful un-prying of my fingers that dug into the steering wheel) I feel overwhelming exhilaration. I wanted to pull over, put the car in park, step on solid ground, and with arms extended high, yell, “I did it! There’s hope for me yet!” What ultimately kept me from doing that is I strongly believe my husband would have me seek counseling when we returned home, and my adrenaline in overdrive made me seeking the closest restroom (go figure).
(*** time to be transparent) I share that with you because it helps me recognize that there are so many times in life that we experience trouble. Trouble that sometimes creeps in and up on us out of the blue, lasting a few moments and at other times trouble that has potential to be life-lasting. And in all honesty, it doesn’t matter whether this trickling of trouble was begat by us, poured on us by others, or what tsunami of disturbance life has shuffled, reshuffled and slammed into us. Let’s face it. It’s gonna’ happen. We can all agree that life on this Earth does not contain an insurance plan for easy answers, simple resolve, or living on winged foot. Going a layer deeper begs the question, “What do we do with our trouble?” We can either fix it or we can learn to accept what cannot be repaired. Those are the options. **Notice that giving up is not on the list of acceptable options? (you did see that, right?)
I mentioned in my story that the scariest part is wondering if there is strength enough to withstand the weight in the middle — in other words, the piles of stuff that continue to go on in our lives. Well, to put it plainly, life is the ‘middle stuff’. And in order to cross that bridge, I could NOT let my trust of the other side being there to dwindle — nor did I want myself to become too weak to conquer what lie before me even if the other side was in my view. Dynamics and logistics of what life brings often fog up or even blind our emotional vision to clearly see what’s on the other side of the bridge. It doesn’t mean that it’s not there. IT IS THERE! It’s only when we start believing that it’s not there, that hopelessness creeps up and moves in. And when that happens, everything gets skewed. Just like my bridge trauma, the other side was there all time… I was hoping for something that my eyes could physically see, yet in my dark pit of desperation, my mental and emotional “eyes” had blinded me from seeing what was really right in front of me all along…HOPE.
Respectfully…
C