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| 1 2 | UER Forum > Rookie Forum > Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? (Viewed 10091 times) |
sm0kescreen
Location: Miami, FL, USA Total Likes: 0 likes
mimi / smokescreen
| | | Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < on 10/24/2016 6:32 PM > | Reply with Quote
| | | Don't know if this is the right forum? I hope it is, sorry if it's not. I want to start exploring and scoping out places in my area to explore, but I'm kind of in a catch-22. To preface this, I have professionally diagnosed anxiety and mental health issues, and I'm autistic, so I have a lot of social problems, depression, and extreme fears that I can't kick even though I know they're irrational. I'm aware that I should just "get over it" and stop being a total baby about everything, but I've been trying to do that for over ten years, so I don't think I'm going to have any sudden success. I don't have any offline friends (haven't had any since middle school, and I'm an 18 y/o freshman in college now :/) and my handful of online friends don't live in my state (Florida). But whenever I consider going by myself, I have a lot of anxiety about being assaulted or murdered while I'm alone, or getting injured and trapped somewhere. It's a general fear I have everywhere, even at home, but urban exploring kinda ramps it up a bit since it generally involves less public areas. Most of my life it's rendered me functionally incapable of doing things, or at least not without a lot of anxiety, since I'm scared about a bunch of stupid stuff all the time. I know it doesn't make sense and nobody would probably want to attack or murder me, but it's kind of like that worry you get when you realize you left the stove on, cranked up to 11. I'd like to meet some people to hang out with and maybe explore with if they're interested, but I have anxiety about other people too. I worry that people secretly hate me, or that they'd hurt me if they had the chance to, or that they'd trip me/otherwise screw me over if we ever got into any danger or if they had the opportunity to do so during an exploration. I know it's a stupid worry too, but it's kind of hard to trust people, no matter how much you like them, when you feel certain that somebody is pretending to like you and actually wishes you ill. I'm kind of rambling at this point, but to sum it up - I have no offline friends, don't know how to make any, and have anxiety about both being alone and being with other people. (Good job, brain! What a great recipe for a functional human being!) Don't know if I should just resign myself to being alone and not doing anything my entire mediocre boring life, or if anyone's got any advice. <:/
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| foxhollow
Location: Aus Gender: Neither Total Likes: 12 likes
A Festivus for the rest of us.
| | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 3 on 10/24/2016 10:13 PM > | Reply with Quote
| | | You don't have to "get over" anything, someone that tells you to get over that kind of thing is just nuts. However, it doesn't have to end with that diagnosis. Don't let the label of mental illness hold you back from what you wish to do, because you can do it and I'm sure a lot of people would agree with me. If I lived in Florida I'd be happy to go and check out a place with you, but sadly, I'm on the other side of the International Date Line, so it might be a little bit of a commute. As for offline friends, if you can't meet anyone from school/uni, youth groups, clubs, work, etc, then you may want to consider searching for Reddit or Facebook groups on urbex in your city. It worked pretty well for me, that and Instagram. If you upload some nice shots and use some good urban exploration hashtags, someone in your area might say "hey, nice shots, I've shot there once before, etc, etc". Don't give up on these things, it can be hard at first to both explore alone and try and find pals that like the same thing, but you just have to keep at it and success will come
| I'm out there, Jerry and I'm loving every minute of it. |
| skatchkins
Location: The Desert Gender: Male Total Likes: 1476 likes
| | | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 5 on 10/24/2016 11:26 PM > | Reply with Quote
| | | I'm a super anxious introvert myself. That second pair of eyes really helps on explores though. It's pretty hard to find a solid partner for this type of stuff that can offset your cons with their pros. While I love exploring with my wife, she's a lot like me, so sometimes that just doesn't work. Believe it or not, my best exploring partner is my long ago church college group "bible school" teacher. My first explore, I called him up on a whim and asked if he wanted to "break into an abandoned building to take photos with me." He said, "Let me finish grilling these burgers and I'll be there." The things I'm anxious about, he's not, and the things he's anxious about, I'm not etc. Especially if you're wanting to play photog while at a location, it helps lower my level and let me concentrate on shots. And somehow in turn, playing photog grounds me even more. So maybe the person you find to explore with won't be who you'd first think of. Anyway there are plenty of people on here that s'plore alone and do it well. I hope they chime in with other info.
| Flickr Pitchrs |
| blackhawk This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
Location: Mission Control Total Likes: 3996 likes
UER newbie
| | | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 6 on 10/25/2016 12:10 AM > | Reply with Quote
| | | Posted by wranglerroadhead Anxiety and adrenaline are that awesome drug we explorers crave! Ride that sh*t like a Cali surfer on a tsunami.
| Mmmm, adrenaline, now we're talking. Most us are adrenaline junkies, the 12 step program couldn't do shit to help us Fear is normal, useful to a point. Never let fear command you, it is a poor leader. Learn to listen to it and know when to bug out. You must learn to work this out, one step at a time. If you feel uncomfortable with people it's perfectly fine to explore alone. Life is not risk free, none of it. Living is a risk no matter what you do. Learn to limit your exposure to unreasonable risks. What defines unreasonable? You do. Learn by doing. Read as much here on UER as possible. Learn from others mistakes and successes. Your biggest risks are falls, structural collapses and in drains, drowning. These are mostly preventable if -you- look and think before you do something. Read the Hellholes thread in the Main Forum. https://uer.ca/for...=1&threadid=122644As far as being attacked or murdered, very unlikely. They're called abandoned for just that reason. If you don't pump steel, start now. Strength is useful and builds confidence. Chin ups, push ups, Romanian dead lifts, back squats, and dead lifts in that order, learn to do them letter perfect, one at a time. It will take a year plus, but you can start -now-. Don't worry about the little things; they will sort themselves out in time if you search for the answers. Push forward. Welcome to UER.
[last edit 10/25/2016 12:22 AM by blackhawk - edited 1 times]
| Just when I thought I was out... they pulled me back in. |
| DescentOnARope
Location: Long Island, New York Gender: Male Total Likes: 662 likes
| | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 14 on 5/18/2017 12:53 AM > | Reply with Quote
| | | I was about to make a thread about this when I saw this one. Anxiety has always been a huge problem for me during explores. I'm not worried about getting hurt*, I'm worried about getting caught. Every time I explore, I don't take my time and end up missing a lot because I just have to get out. Last time, about a month ago, we were getting ready to enter a building. My whole body was shaking, my heart was beating so fast it felt like it wasn't, and I couldn't catch my breath. It lasted until the instant we left, at which point I was fine. A big place, and all we explored were two hallways. The people I've told said it was a panic attack, but I have no idea, since it hasn't happened before or since. *opinion subject to change if I fall three stories and get impaled on rebar.
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| blackhawk This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
Location: Mission Control Total Likes: 3996 likes
UER newbie
| | | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 15 on 5/18/2017 1:30 AM > | Reply with Quote
| | | Posted by DescentOnARope I was about to make a thread about this when I saw this one. Anxiety has always been a huge problem for me during explores. I'm not worried about getting hurt*, I'm worried about getting caught. Every time I explore, I don't take my time and end up missing a lot because I just have to get out. Last time, about a month ago, we were getting ready to enter a building. My whole body was shaking, my heart was beating so fast it felt like it wasn't, and I couldn't catch my breath. It lasted until the instant we left, at which point I was fine. A big place, and all we explored were two hallways. The people I've told said it was a panic attack, but I have no idea, since it hasn't happened before or since. *opinion subject to change if I fall three stories and get impaled on rebar.
| If it brothers you this much, take a break. Getting hurt, the sound of an imploding joint, the snap of tendons or the snap of a breaking femur and the pain in colors that follows always should be your greatest fear... or that feeling of endless free falling. Being to stressed and fearful distracts you and can get you hurt. Some time off will help. There are also many low risk sites, small steps before leaps of faith. Fear must be controlled. Learn from your experience and modify your response by will and logic. Master yourself to master the world. Consider exploring with permission; some the best untagged, intact industrial sites I've done were with permission. I wear zoot suit jacket with side vents five inches long, I have two-tone brogues yeah you know this is wrong. But the main thing is unless you're a fool, Ah you know you gotta know, yeah you know, yeah you gotta be cool.Who - Zoot Suit
| Just when I thought I was out... they pulled me back in. |
| lizardqueeen
Total Likes: 1 like
| | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 16 on 11/16/2018 2:11 AM > | Reply with Quote
| | | Posted by DescentOnARope I was about to make a thread about this when I saw this one. Anxiety has always been a huge problem for me during explores. I'm not worried about getting hurt*, I'm worried about getting caught. Every time I explore, I don't take my time and end up missing a lot because I just have to get out. Last time, about a month ago, we were getting ready to enter a building. My whole body was shaking, my heart was beating so fast it felt like it wasn't, and I couldn't catch my breath. It lasted until the instant we left, at which point I was fine. A big place, and all we explored were two hallways. The people I've told said it was a panic attack, but I have no idea, since it hasn't happened before or since. *opinion subject to change if I fall three stories and get impaled on rebar.
| i have a very similar feeling and it's a very annoying thing to keep happening but perhaps as you keep doing it you get more comfortable with it. but i find the desire to explore is just this constant niggling at me that i have to do it even if my anxiety is at an all-time high. damn brains, it makes it so annoying. i think keep pushing and if you want to leave, leave. and go a little further each time
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| element x
Location: New Jersey Gender: Neither Total Likes: 2 likes
| | | Re: Dealing with anxiety before a first exploration/exploring alone? < Reply # 19 on 12/11/2020 6:32 AM > | Reply with Quote
| | | I second the advice about taking it slow and not pushing yourself too far! I also have quite a few mental health issues myself, anxiety being one of them. Easing yourself into it and building up confidence is also a good idea. I think knowing your limits and learning how to trust your gut are one of those things that you build up overtime. As for dealing with anxiety regarding people, anxiety brain is tough as hell. When you're exploring with people, being able to trust them is super important! Learning how to redirect anxiety thoughts when it comes to people can be a good way to deal with it. I definitely feel you there with the feeling that a friend, especially if you don't know them that well, could screw you over. For me, I tend to sort things out with "how am I feeling about it" and "what's real in this situation". So, for example, say you have anxiety that one of your new friends/exploring partners is going to ditch you. Ask yourself "why do I think this person is going to ditch me?" and then go from there. Is it because they're a person you don't know very well? Is it because they've exhibited some red flags they're not trustworthy- and if so, what are those red flags? Investigate to yourself why you might think that way and take it apart ! These things are definitely easier said than done and I'm definitely speaking from doing this (and other therapeutic techniques) over several years, but ya gotta start somewhere. They might help you manage your anxiety too. Again, you know yourself best. If you're comfortable to send me a pm, I can direct you towards some resources.
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