It will help me to write this out and feedback is appreciated.

[Tobin S.]

Let me start by saying that I started looking at my mental health issues as more of a spiritual problem than a physical one a couple of years ago, and more intensely so about a year ago. I've also started to look beyond my conception of victimization to see how I might be at the very least perpetuating my problems.

So, that way of looking at these issues might be uncomfortable to some people, and it's okay if you don't agree with me. I just wanted to tell you where I'm coming from at the beginning so you don't get blindsided by something that many people might view as unconventional.

For the past few years I've had a very specific issue with anxiety that I've called white coat anxiety. I'm a trucker and every year I have to do a D.O.T. mandated physical for my job to ensure that my health isn't a safety issue as I conduct my job. If you are perfectly healthy you have to do one every two years. Since I have a health issue I have to do it every year.

This physical has really set me on edge for the past few years. About three years ago I had sort of a panic attack right before a physical that caused my blood pressure and pulse rate to spike. I was under a lot of financial pressure having just been fired from a job, and I desperately needed work. I was afraid of failing the physical for a job because I was heavier than I'd ever been, and that fear became a self-fulfilling prophecy. It was because my blood pressure and pulse were too high that I failed a physical for a job. In short, I failed the physical because I was afraid that I was going to fail the physical. My blood pressure and pulse are really in the normal range when I'm not feeling that high level of anxiety.

I've managed to get by the past few years by explaining to the medical people that I have white coat anxiety and that my blood pressure and pulse will initially be too high, but if they let me sit alone for a bit and calm down the numbers will come down. And that has worked. I have known this whole time that this issue is strictly caused by me, but the matter has seemed initially insoluble. I've just been having to go into it feeling very stressed. It bothers me for weeks before I have to do the physical to the point where I'm making plans in my head in the event that I can't pass the physical. The thought "I can't pass the physical" continually goes through my mind. It all has seemed uncontrollable to me.

Usually after passing the physical I feel a great sense of relief, "Yay! I can work and support my family again for a year," and I forget about it for about 10 months. Not this year. There was no great sense of relief when I passed it, and I immediately started worrying about not being able to pass it in the future.

It occurred to me this morning when I got home from work why I have this issue. I knew that the answer to the problem has been in me the whole time. I just couldn't see it until now. It's been unconscious.

For a long time I've wanted to get out of trucking. I even went back to school in 2012 and finished my degree while working 50-60 hours a week at my job to try to start something new. I've wanted this badly, but it hasn't panned out for me. I haven't been able to find anything that will replace the income that I get and have built my life around from trucking. I need to be able to make about 55k a year, but I'm from an area of the country where such jobs are hard to come by even for college grads. I can get a job doing something else- that's not the issue. It's just that I can't find anything that will pay enough.

It's to the point that I sometimes fantasize about not having to be a truck driver. Truck driving is stressful, dangerous, difficult, thankless, and I'm just tired of it. I've been doing it for 22 years. The hours are long, and even though I make decent money, it isn't really enough for what we have to deal with out there. And trucking companies aren't subject to the same structure when it comes to compensation as other companies. They don't have to pay me time and a half for overtime, for example, and my employer doesn't. (For anyone wanting an explanation of that, just ask and I'll provide it below.)

Do you see where I'm going here? Well, maybe or maybe not.

As I was lying in bed this morning trying to get to sleep before the sun came up, the answer occurred to me and I was immediately at peace over the whole deal: my anxiety at the physicals is simply an unconscious attempt on my part to try to sabotage my career as a trucker so I will "have" to do something different. I have sublimated my desire for a different life by consciously acquiescing and resigning myself to the idea that I'll always be a trucker. There is no hope for anything else in my conscious way of looking at things and this sad idea is really unbearable to me, so it got ushered off into my personal subconscious where it has been wreaking havoc.