Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Holiday - the trip home

It seems that I am an obsessive person by nature at times.

Even though I'd made the trip up to Kingscliff successfully, in the days before going home the trip home loomed large in my mind. The last two days I was consumed with a sick worry which was hard to ignore. It was like all my nerve endings were raw, I just couldn't find a positive place in my head. I'd tell myself positive things, that I could do it, I'd be fine, just enjoy the moment, look how pretty the beach is. And during the days, this sometimes helped, as the beach at Kingscliff is very pretty and soothing. But at night, the positive thoughts were just so much shouting into the wind, and I was filled with dread. Maybe this time I wouldn't be ok, maybe I'd just go mad. B assures me this can't happen, but it is hard to believe when you are in that place.

But morning came, as mornings always do. We packed up, and set off at 7.21am last Friday. For me the waiting is the worst part, so it wasn't so much panic once we set off, but a kind of quiet despair. It's not the actual driving the car that bothers me, it's the sheer distance of the drive. Ten hours to home. My brain just couldn't deal with that. So, I did what I did on the way up, just get to the next town, then deal with the next part. Every now and then the whole trip would press itself against my mind, but I fought it off, and told myself things like "Well you want to go home don't you, this is what you have to do", and "Each kilometre you are getting closer to home, you are doing it, you are being successful."

But oh man, the roadworks. The Pacific highway has been having roadworks done on some stretch or another of it for many years, and will for years to come. It is the main road north, number 1. And although we'd had some roadworks on the way up, it was nothing compared to the amount of roadworks on the way home. I think there were about 6-8 stretches of road where we were delayed. To the point where people were getting out of their car to stretch.
After a while it was like, "oh come on!, more *&($ing roadworks?!"

But we got home, and we got home early enough in the evening to pick up the dogs, who were boarding at our vets. We had planned on picking them up Saturday, but it was nice to pick them up early. They are very happy to see us, and have been little furry magnets to us since we got back. :)

Thus ends the holiday blogging. It's hard to know on balance how I should feel about it, but I will hold onto the good, and try not to obsess about how I handled the not so good.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think you did GREAT,girlfriend!!You made it,didn't you? You should be patting youself on the back!!
*kaz gives you a huge cyber pat*
Its an AWESOME achievment and i am very proud of you and i am sure you are stronger because of it.
B really does deserve his Mr Incredible tag as it sounds as though he was,well..incredible :D

Snoozen said...

I also think you should be focussing on the positive. Yes you did have panic attacks but you worked through them and so now you know you can do it. Accentuate the positive eliminate the negative and don't mess with Mr in-between!

Amanda said...

Thanks guys, love ya both! :)