It’s been several months since I took Eric to Ken Caryl Valley for the first time.

It was slow-going at first, as we carefully walked a flat, paved trail around Brandon Gearheart park, careful not to push too hard. However, as the days turned to weeks, and weeks to months, Eric’s health improved exponentially. Our hikes have gotten longer and more remote, over increasingly rugged and tough terrain. Yet, we've taken less breaks, and the ones we have taken have gotten much shorter. 

Needless to say, it has been a joy to witness such a miraculous recovery after all Eric’s been through these past eleven months. And I am more than happy to play a role in that recovery. 

While I’ve known for years that spending time in nature- in God’s wonderful, untouched creation- is vital to one’s physical, mental, and spiritual health, this year’s only solidified that notion. Not only have these trails healed Eric in ways nobody thought was possible, but they’ve kept me sane as I’ve been fighting through this 14-credit semester, packed full of ridiculously difficult classes. 

Indeed, it has been a fight to keep my head above water, academically-speaking. Somehow, I’m not just keeping all of my grades afloat. I actually have an A in Molecular Biology, and Bs or Cs in everything else! Evidently, whatever I’m doing is working. However, as the semester wears on with no break in sight till Thanksgiving, I’ve been feeling increasingly worn down, anxious, and overwhelmed. 

If I didn’t have access to the valley, I don’t think I’d still be passing all of my classes, let alone doing so while still (somehow) keeping my overall health intact. 

However, I must admit that the cracks are starting to really show. 

Last Thursday, on the way out of class, I was pretty badly spooked by a student arguing with a street preacher in front of the student union center. Despite knowing, logically, that those people had no interest in me, seeing and hearing that kid shout obscenities in the face of an annoying street preacher sent a wave of adrenaline rushing through my veins. 

I managed to keep myself calm; my mind successfully prevented my body from sprinting away from a not-very-threatening situation as though I had a tiger on my ass. But damn… it took everything I had to stay calm and “act natural” despite every nerve in my body screaming at me to run away like my life depended on it. 

It took me hours to stop shivering from that unexpected (and un-dealt-with) rush of fear, even though I logically knew that my fear was entirely unwarranted. Keyword: un-dealt-with. 

Then, starting yesterday, the weather began to change rapidly. Very strong, very dry, cold winds and rushing clouds have finally announced the arrival of fall. 

I’ve always been sensitive to changes in the weather, both great and small. My intuition rarely fails to accurately predict the weather, even when the weatherman fails to do so. Consequently, even though I’m extremely healthy physically, my body still reacts to rapid changes in weather in very strange, uncomfortable ways, especially when I’m already stressed. 

This time around, my left nostril decided to clog up and hasn’t unclogged since, no matter what I’ve tried to clear it out. It's not infected, just full. My lips and mouth have also dried out, likely in response to the increased anxiety I’ve been feeling. Worse, I haven’t been hiding my anxiety all that well, either. 

The transition from summer to winter in Colorado is always a bit chaotic and stressful, all by itself. As I think of it now, we don’t really get a true autumn here. Usually, it’s close to 80 or 90 degrees one day, then a massive cold front comes in and forces that temperature down to 40 or lower the next day. 

The cold, dense air rockets down the foothills and through the canyons to fill in the gaps left by the hot air on the plains. Sometimes, that wind is strong enough to bring down mature trees and flip over semi-trucks. Other times, it’s just strong enough to kick summer out and howl through the branches. However, any dry cold front has the potential to fuel massive wildfires, like the one that happened in Superior, Colorado a few years ago. 

The first wave of dread came over me yesterday, while Eric and I embarked on a quick afternoon hike. Luckily, it wasn’t cold, but the wind was still surprisingly strong, and very, very dry. At some point during our hike, I caught a very brief whiff of someone’s BBQ on the wind, which sent a chill down my spine. For a moment, I worried about a wildfire. Still, I managed to keep that fear hidden from Eric (at least, I think so), and finished the hike. 

However, even as the sun set below the foothills, the wind didn’t relent. In fact, for a time it got stronger, and I began to wonder if a hike with Eric the next morning was a good idea. Especially when I made the decision to stay home because I didn’t want to leave my dogs at home alone, in case another wildfire broke out. 

The next morning, I got up and it was very quiet. A little too quiet, honestly. However, I could feel the change in weather coming. I can’t explain how (aside from my clogged nostril). It was like I just knew that something big was coming. 

I wasn’t alone in this feeling either. While Eric and I headed towards the northern side of Ken Caryl Valley, I didn’t see a single bird or deer out. Everyone was hiding, and rightfully so. The wind was coming up quick, from dead still to a gale, bringing with it a whole lot of cold, dry, dusty air 

Hearing that vicious wind hiss through the grass made me seriously second-guess the hike. But Eric really wanted to go, and since I’m a resident of Ken Caryl Valley, but Eric is not, I had to accompany him. 

At that moment, I think he could tell that I was a little more than trepidatious about our hike. Still, I tried (and failed) to hide it, because logically I knew that there was nothing to be afraid of. Sure, it was very windy and quite cold, but it wasn’t like we were going to hike along the hogback ridge or stand at the edge of a mountain. Why, then, was I trembling before I even felt the cold?

No matter where it comes from, anxiety lights up the brain exactly the same way. My anxiety about fighting traffic, attending classes downtown, and dealing with lots and lots of people in tight spaces flanked by massive buildings with no easy escape, is the exact same anxiety that I felt when the biting wind began to howl past my ears and cut through my layers. Except it was worse, because that anxiety- that irrational, stupid fear I knew, damn well, was fucking stupid- stacked up like a de-buff in World of Warcraft. 

I can handle crowds. I can handle tight spaces. I can handle traffic. I can handle difficult STEM classes. I can handle storms, and everything else that life throws at me. Just not always all at once. 

Yet, there I was this morning, dealing with all of that at once, without taking off for shelter like a wild mustang. Well… kind of. 

Instead, I used Eric as a windbreak for much of the hike. He didn’t mind that I was using him as a sort of shelter, but it was a dead giveaway that I was not having a great time. I was ill-prepared, cold, and very unsettled by the fact that we were literally the only two living things out there. 

Everyone else was hunkered down, yet we kept going, following the trail through a sea of waving stubble between mounds of red rocks. 

As Eric and I stepped up onto the crest of the hill in arguably the coldest and most exposed part of our hike, where we had a perfect view of the oncoming storm, my anxiety began to slowly subside.

As I write now, I think what was happening was that the act of walking the trail, listening for birds sheltering in the Gambel brush, searching for prints in the heavy, red sand, and catching the scents and sights of autumn in the foothills of Colorado, was enough to prevent the fear I was feeling from overwhelming me. 

The act of moving around steadily but not in a hurry, only occasionally stopping to appreciate the beauty of God’s creation, eventually convinced my body that I wasn’t getting chased down by a hungry tiger. Therefore, unlike what happened on Thursday, I was able to calm down physiologically, as well as mentally. 

That said, I was still eager to get back to the Xterra because, unlike Eric, I wasn’t wearing windproof clothing. I assumed that we’d get a hike in before the front came through, not while windiest, coldest part of it pushed through. But, I wasn’t nearly as concerned then as I was when we first stepped onto the trail, despite the fact that the wind wasn’t letting up and I was freezing my ass off. 

Back inside the Xterra, I quickly got warmed back up and was no longer anxious. Ok, I was a little anxious, but not anywhere near to the point that I was scared. I was mostly just anxious to get home and get my schoolwork done, which was not a bad thing. 

As I mentioned before, all anxiety is the same physiologically, no matter where it comes from or what it’s about. However, the goal isn’t to completely stop all anxiety in its tracks. The goal is to harness a reasonable amount of anxiety to power us through difficult tasks, while not getting so anxious that we become overwhelmed. 

To put it a different way, anxiety is like caffeine. In fact, caffeine’s purpose is to suppress calming neurotransmitters like adenosine, so that other stimulating neurotransmitters like serotonin and adrenaline (AKA norepinephrine) can impact the brain instead. Most people seek out caffeine to wake up in the mornings and keep them alert throughout the day. However, too much caffeine can cause people to become overwhelmed by serotonin and adrenaline, sending them into an anxious spiral. 

In the same way, it’s good to have some level of anxiety pumping through one’s veins. It just becomes a bad thing when that anxiety becomes overwhelming, causing excessive fear, restlessness, and even illness. 

One of the best ways to reduce anxiety, no matter what, is to get up, get outside, and get moving at a steady, calm pace. Repetitive motions, like lifting weights or walking with a steady gait over rugged terrain, are especially great at reducing anxiety. Looking for specific things, such as red-colored leaves or chunks of quarts poking out of the soil, are also great ways to ground oneself before anxiety turns to overwhelming fear. 

At least, that's how I coped with my anxiety this morning. 

To be continued…