I thought of this title this morning when I took the Penn State Worry Questionnaire. I scored 76 out of 80. I don't know if that is the highest score on the PSWQ in Scotland in 90 years, but it's definitely very impressive. I mean, we already knew I could worry, but ... well you can look forward to reading the full article about my incredible feat in next year's Wisden Worrier's Almanack.
Last week I visited a therapist who suggested that possibly a lot of my problems come down to worry and we should think about working on that. He also suggested a book - The Worry Cure - which might help. In the book it includes the Penn State Worry Questionnaire. It gives you 16 statements, you agree or disagree on a scale of 1 to 5 on each, and add up the scores. They are statements like
- Many situations make me worry.
- When I am under pressure I worry a lot.
- I am always worrying about something.
- I find it easy to dismiss worrisome thoughts.
The last one, by the way, is reversed, so if you disagree agree with this statement highly this is a 1 but you reverse it (subtract it from 6) to get 5.
The PSWQ, by the way, is a solid piece of research, not a random clickbait quiz. The paper about it has been cited more than 2500 times. The book says that nonanxious people score about 30, scores from about 52 can be associated with "some worry problems", while "really chronic worriers" score over 65. I got 76 out of 80. We already knew I could worry.
There were two questions I only got 4 points out of 5. On one question I actually was neutral about and said 3 out of 5. That one was "When I am under pressure I worry a lot". I find that (sometimes) when I'm under pressure I just get on with it, so e.g. I do well in exams partly because I get interested in the questions and think about them, rather than worry about doing badly in the exam. I said 3 out of 5 instead of 1 out of 5 because in some kind of crises I work quite well, whereas in others I don't and collapse a bit, and because of worry.
I can imagine a score around 50, but how on earth could somebody get a score less than 30?? I find that unimaginable. I often find myself realising that other people are not like me inside their heads. This is one of the most trite truisms you can imagine, but I definitely live my life just imagining that people think more or less the same way as me. Of course I have plentiful evidence to the contrary, and this is a particularly strong piece of evidence.
Getting this score really threw me for half an hour or so. I mean, we already knew I could worry, but I had no idea. I found it quite upsetting.
In 1988, Graeme Hick looked like a future superstar of cricket. He never fulfilled his promise in international cricket, and instead of being a legend is one of the most famous nearly-men in cricket history. I was going to tell you what happened to Peter Roebuck, but I don't want to now because I am worried it might upset you (please feel free to find out, having taken that trigger warning into account). These were people who could have - if they had known it in 1988 - had plenty to worry about in their future.
So having use the literary device of the apparently unconnected opening and then bringing it back, not only did I show I could use that anecdote to find a way to worry about those individuals, I also worried about what I was writing enough to change it.
So having use the literary device of the apparently unconnected opening and then bringing it back, not only did I show I could use that anecdote to find a way to worry about those individuals, I also worried about what I was writing enough to change it.
So I close with another literary trope of a constantly repeated refrain closing this piece.
We already knew I could worry.
"I often find myself realising that other people are not like me inside their heads. This is one of the most trite truisms you can imagine, but I definitely live my life just imagining that people think more or less the same way as me"
ReplyDeleteThis is so important to recognise. At the worst of my anxiety and depression during the summer, my thoughts were so buggy that I was assuming everybody else was living with the same levels of anxiety as me but coping with it much, much better.
Realising the incorrectness of that assumption was an important step in accepting that I was ill and not just useless. And accepting that I was ill was a huge step
in my recovery. That, together with new medication, seemed to be really important because I stopped feeling so punitive towards myself.
This is a great comment but I am not sure I do recognise the trite truism in everyday life! Which probably contributes to my problems.
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