Could I Worry for Australia?

Many years ago, an ex-boyfriend said to me, “You worry for Australia.”

At the time I laughed. Looking back, I probably should have taken it as constructive feedback.

The other night I found myself proving his point.

My son, who recently turned 18, was out with friends. Before he left, he said he'd text me when he got home. Simple enough. Yes, that calmed my nervous system.

Except the text never arrived.

Now, if I'd been at home, I probably would have wandered down the hallway, peeked into his room, seen a pile of limbs under a doona and gone back to sleep. But I wasn't home. Which meant there was no easy way to check.

And that's when my brain got involved.

Not immediately. At first, I was quite reasonable about it all.

Then it was 1am.

Then 2am.

Then 3am.

And if you've ever been awake at 3am worrying about someone you love, you'll know that it is a spectacularly bad time to be making rational decisions or keep your thoughts ‘under wraps’. Nothing good seems to happen in the mind at 3am. The evidence goes missing, perspective packs up for the night, and uncertainty suddenly starts looking a lot like danger.

What strikes me is that the hardest part wasn't that I knew something bad had happened. It was that I didn't know anything at all.

As a therapist I often talk to people about anxiety and catastrophising. But lying awake that night, I was reminded that worry isn't always about what's happening. More often, it's about our struggle with not knowing what's happening.

I've been trying something different lately. When I notice myself heading down the rabbit hole, I ask a simple question:

“Is there anything useful I can do about this right now?”

At 3am, the answer is usually no.

And if the answer is no, then perhaps my job isn't to solve the problem. Perhaps my job is to be kind to the worried part of me, roll over, and let tomorrow bring the information that tonight cannot.

As it turned out, my son was absolutely fine. He'd simply forgotten to text (that's another post).

I, on the other hand, had spent several hours auditioning disasters that never happened.

Maybe that's part of life. Learning that uncertainty and danger aren't the same thing. Learning that not knowing can feel uncomfortable without necessarily meaning something is wrong.

And perhaps accepting that while I may no longer worry for Australia, every now and then, usually around 3am, I can still give it a pretty good crack.