Soothe Your Nerves

The Black Woman's Guide to Understanding and Overcoming Anxiety, Panic, and Fearz

Angela Neal-Barnett

• Publisher: Touchstone
• Year: 2010
• ISBN:
  9781451603637
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Abnormal Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Do you or someone you love suffer from "bad nerves"?•Denise is constantly on edge. She's convinced something bad is going to happen.•Ruth will drive an hour out of her way to avoid driving over a bridge. When she has to do it, her chest thumps, her heart starts racing, and she breaks out in a sweat. She's beginning to think she shouldn't leave her house. •Bernice hasn't slept in two months for fear that the witch is going to ride her again. What do these women have in common? They are struggling with crippling anxiety disorders.Thousands of Black women suffer from anxiety. What's worse is that many of us have been raised to believe we are Strong Black Women and that seeking help shows weakness. So we often turn to dangerous quick fixes that only exacerbate the problem -- like overeating and drug and alcohol abuse -- or we deny that we have problems at all.In Soothe Your Nerves, Dr. Angela Neal-Barnett explains which factors can contribute to anxiety, panic, and fear in Black women and offers a range of healing methods that will help you or a loved one reclaim your life.Here finally is a blueprint for understanding and overcoming anxiety from a psychological, spiritual, and Black perspective.

I
BAD NERVES

ONE
What Caused This to Happen to Me?

CALLIE WAS THE MOTHER of four-year-old twins, the wife of a public official, and a university professor. The demands on her time, the discrimination she experienced on the job, and her role as a public person’s spouse combined to make her tense and on edge. She always seemed to be waiting for the other shoe to drop. Callie liked to bake, and baking and eating seemed to calm her nerves. She made big batches of chocolate chip cookies and ate half the dough. Once the cookies were done, she ate half of them. Sometimes for dinner she made wonderful pizzas with four cheeses and an assortment of toppings. Callie would eat three or four slices and then finish up whatever the kids had left on their plates. Before she knew it, she had gained fifty pounds. Part of her knew she had to stop, but eating relieved some of the tension. Could she really give it up?

The answer came fairly quickly. The weight gain began to impact her health. She developed hypertension, and her cholesterol level was sky-high. Her doctor told her that if she wanted to see her twins grow up, she needed to exercise and change her diet. Callie began walking three miles a day. This not only helped her lose weight, but it helped reduce some of the stress she’d been feeling. One day she dropped by my Rise Sally Rise®office and shared about the anticipatory anxiety and panic attacks she was experiencing. I referred her to an anxiety clinic in the area. The lifestyle changes coupled with professional therapy allowed Callie to go from being an anxious, overweight woman to one who was normal weight, confident, and anxiety free.

Glenda, a single mother and postal worker, discovered that alcohol calmed her nerves. Whenever she felt anxious, she took a drink. She often felt anxious when she was out with friends. The drinking reached the point where she would pass out in the street. Her live-in boyfriend became so disgusted that he left. Ultimately, she ended up in a detox center, where she realized her main problem wasn’t the alcohol, it was her anxiety.

Clarice, a manager in a hair care company, started having panic attacks at age twenty-nine. One day while sitting in a routine meeting, she began to have trouble breathing and hot flashes. She excused herself, went to the restroom, and splashed water on her face. It didn’t help. Somehow she made it through the meeting, but she was anxious and terrified it would happen again. An occasional drug user, she found cocaine made her forget about the anxiety. Soon she went from cocaine to crack. It worked quicker. She lost her job, her luxury car, and her apartment, and eventually moved in with her mother. She knew she needed help, but if she had to choose between the anxiety and the crack, she would choose the crack. One day she woke up and thought, “I just can’t do this anymore.” Clarice put on her clothes and walked down the street to the bridge overlooking the Cuyahoga River. As she stood there, preparing to jump, she heard a voice telling her she was not alone. She stepped back, then she caught the bus to the Spiritual Way substance abuse support group at her church.

Overeating, drinking, and drug use are the effects of anxiety. The question is how did these women become anxious in the first place? What caused the anxiety that led to their self-destructive behavior?

I wish there was a simple answer to what causes debilitating, life-controlling anxiety, but there isn’t. If there was just one reason for women developing severe anxiety, we could eliminate that thing from our lives or, better yet, develop a shot that would make severe anxiety nonexistent. The causes of debilitating anxiety are complex and involve a combination of biological, psychological, and social/environmental factors. Some psychologists combine the words and say that the causes of anxiety are biopsychosocial.

STRESS

Initially, Glenda blamed her anxiety on her man and her kids. If they didn’t get on her nerves so bad, she wouldn’t have to use alcohol to calm them. Glenda’s children and boyfriend did contribute to the development of her anxiety, but not in the way Glenda portrayed it. Glenda was a single Black woman trying to balance a job, a relationship, and children. When the children didn’t follow her instructions, as children are likely to do, or interrupted or misbehaved, or when the relationship hit a low point, as is natural in a relationship, or something went wrong at work, the amount of her stress derived from each of these roles increased. Glenda’s response to the increased stress produced more stress, which combined with other psychological, environmental, and biological factors to produce crippling anxiety. Common life stressors for women include the birth or death of a child, the loss of a spouse, divorce, marriage, moving, a new job, the loss of a job, the death of a parent or sibling, health issues, and relationships with children.

When I talk with Black women who are mothers, the situations that seem to generate the greatest amount of stress involve their children, particularly incarceration and pregnancy. As mothers, we want better for our children, and dream big dreams for them. When an unplanned pregnancy occurs or a detention center or jail sentence is handed down, many Black mothers I interview initially see it as the end of their dreams. Later they come to understand that their original assumption was not necessarily correct. Once this realization takes hold, they become focused on not allowing the pregnancy or criminal act to ruin their child’s life. This positive action can create more stress as they seek out services, help arrange child care, visit on a regular basis, and investigate programs that will help their child achieve against the odds.

PREJUDICE AND DISCRIMINATION AS STRESSORS

Institutional discrimination and interpersonal prejudice are two of the most potent psychological and environmental burdens faced by Black women. Psychologist John Dovidio and his research team define institutional discrimination as an act that takes place when the policies and procedures of an organization or company unfairly restrict the opportunities of African Americans or other minority groups or perpetuate advantages or privileges for the majority group. Interpersonal prejudice is defined as actions and behaviors by colleagues that reflect negative beliefs, attitudes, and feelings toward members of minority groups.

Prejudice and discrimination are insidious stressors that affect Black women of all socioeconomic classes. In the workplace, Black women are often seen as twofers, Black and female; by hiring a Black woman you get two minorities for the price of one. Sometimes this places Black women in double jeopardy, forcing them to deal with prejudice and discrimination targeted at both their race and their sex. Whether we are experiencing prejudice and discrimination because we are Black, because we are female, or because we are both, these behaviors take a toll on us physically and emotionally. One outward emotional expression of that toll is anxiety.

Little attention is paid to the anxiety aspect of prejudice and discrimination. Rather, the spotlight has been on anger, as documented in Ellis Cose’s excellent book, Rage of the Privileged Class. Anger and anxiety are closely related. Both quicken your heart rate and heighten your level of arousal. When you think about whatever it is that is making you angry or anxious, you become angrier or more anxious. When we as Black women encounter prejudice and discrimination, we are likely to experience both emotions.

In Callie’s case, the stress of being a wife, mother, and professor, coupled with the rampant interpersonal prejudice and institutional discrimination in her department, caused her anxiety to move from a manageable to an unmanageable state. Little incidents kept happening; for example, the locks on her office suite were changed, but no one informed her. For the past two semesters the chair’s secretary had lost her grades. Arriving early one morning, she overheard three senior professors discussing over coffee what to do about giving that “colored girl” a promotion.

In meetings and university social settings, Callie was often the only person of color and was frequently called upon to give the Black perspective. Her research had won several prestigious awards and earned her national acclaim, but it was on Black women’s literature, a topic that her colleagues told her was too narrow and unfocused. Ironically, the chair’s new, young second wife’s area of expertise was lesbian literature. Although she had neither the national acclaim nor the prestige that Callie did, departmental colleagues heralded her work as “encompassing” and “groundbreaking.”

Eventually, the situation reached the point where Callie found herself constantly on guard, hyperalert, and apprehensively waiting for the next-and she knew there would be a next-incident of discrimination or prejudice. She began scrutinizing the remarks of everyone, from senior faculty to students to the custodial staff, for evidence of prejudice. Every action the department took was analyzed for any hint of discrimination. The process was exhausting and made her tense, more worried, more on edge, and mad. As she put it, “No one else has to deal with this mess but me.”

As Black women climb the corporate ladder, earn degrees, and change income brackets, the type of prejudice and discrimination encountered becomes more divisive, subtler, and more likely to happen on a daily basis. As a result, she may find herself growing anxious and resentful doing a job that “gets on her nerves” in a field she loves.

Benita’s job was working her last nerve. Things had gotten to the point where just thinking about her employment situation caused a panic attack. Benita started out in the city’s transportation department cleaning buses. Taking advantage of the tuition reimbursement program, she earned an associate degree in business and worked her way up from the custodial crew to shift supervisor; in this position she dispensed paychecks, assigned buses, developed schedules, and helped prepare a budget. When an assistant manager’s position opened up, she applied for it. Everyone just knew she would get the job. She didn’t; in fact, she wasn’t even interviewed.

“They told me they decided not to interview anyone who already worked here,” she said. “They wanted someone from the outside who could bring a fresh perspective. So who did they hire? Some white guy with a high school diploma who was a shift supervisor in the city hall cafeteria! Then they had the gall to ask me to help train him. I don’t want to, but I’m afraid if I don’t, they won’t give me a good recommendation if I try to leave. My stomach always seems to be in knots, and I can’t shake the feeling that something else is going to happen.”

STRESS, ANXIETY, AND STRONG BLACK WOMEN

Whether it is discrimination, prejudice, or another stressor, Black women appear to handle stress somewhat differently from men or white women. Men are more likely to do battle with whoever or whatever is causing stress, or they simply remove themselves from the situation. White women seem more likely to find stress relief by devoting time to their children or seeking support and friendship from others. Stress researchers call this a “tend and befriend” response. Black women’s stress responses are intriguing; we tend, befriend, mend, and keep it in. As Black women we have, as Toni Morrison so eloquently puts it, “invented ourselves.” Much of what we have invented to define ourselves as Black women has been resourceful and productive. We are loyal and loving. Many of us know how to persist and persevere. We are creative and have vast experience making a way out of no way. Without a doubt, Black women are the most resilient members of the human race. To paraphrase Maya Angelou, when you try to keep us down, still we rise. This ability to rise against overwhelming odds leads to the concept of the Strong Black Woman.

There are many positives to being a Strong Black Woman. We are ingenious, confident, sassy, and bold. By the same token there are drawbacks, perhaps the biggest being that many women who see themselves as Strong Black Women will keep on keeping on even when they know they should stop. It is as if we feel that to acknowledge we are stressed out or need to rest is akin to giving up membership in the Strong Black Woman club. The opposite of strong is weak, and to pair the words weak and Black woman is to create an oxymoron. In the minds of many Blacks and Whites, a weak Black woman simply does not exist. Rather than being seen as less than she is supposed to be, a Strong Black Woman refuses to admit she is stressed and keeps her feelings and emotions bottled up inside while she helps everyone else. This strategy makes the Strong Black Woman an excellent candidate for the development of anxiety.

Several years ago I conducted a study where self-identified Strong Black Women-women who told us that being strong was an important part of who they were-filled out a diary detailing their activities and emotions. At the same time their blood pressure and heart rate were being monitored. This was done for an entire day. In the diaries the women did not admit to being stressed, even in stressful situations. Marlo wrote, “Had to fire S. today. She didn’t take it very well.” Firing someone is a stressful situation. Yet the only emotion Marlo indicated that she experienced was calm.

But her blood pressure and heart rate readings told a different story. When firing S., Marlo’s blood pressure increased by fifteen points, and a 20-point increase was seen in her heart rate. She wasn’t the only one. Almost every woman in the study exhibited the same pattern. Either these women could not admit to being stressed, or they were unaware they were stressed. Interviews indicated that women were aware of their stress level; they were just unwilling to admit it was problematic. Several said to me, “Baby, I don’t have time to think about that mess. If I did, I’d be stressed out about everything.” Yet taking the time out to acknowledge the stress and do something about it would go a long way toward preventing the development of serious anxiety and the health problems associated with it: chronic upper respiratory infections, hypertension, heart disease, and obesity.

THE FAMILY FACTOR

As Glenda began to confront her past in detox, she realized that her grandmother had also suffered from bad nerves. Glenda’s discovery is not unusual. One of the most eye-opening experiences for many Black women comes when they share their anxiety difficulties with a close family member. The family member usually reveals that others in the family are struggling or have struggled with the same problem. In fact, Black women who have a relative with an anxiety problem are seven to nine times more likely to also have that anxiety problem. For many African-American families, anxiety problems are a long-held family secret.

The familial component of anxiety may be biological, environmental, or both. Several years ago Canadian researchers discovered a genetic link for panic attacks. They discovered that people suffering from panic attacks had a gene that increased levels of a chemical called cholecystokinin, or CCK, in their brain. This is not to say that panic attacks are genetically inherited, but people born with this gene are more susceptible to developing panic attacks.

A family history of anxiety difficulties may not necessarily indicate a biological cause for your anxiety. It may instead indicate that your anxiety has environmental roots. If an anxious parent, grandparent, or other family member raised you, your anxiety may have developed partly by...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• Part I: Bad Nerves
• Part II: Soothing Nerves
• Resources
• Bibliography
• Acknowledgments
• Index
• About The Author