Where to turn in a world full of hairballs?

The latest stocks falling into oblivion makes me want to eat potato chips.

And on top of this, friends are getting sick or afraid of getting some disease.  Losses abound and all the way around, I’m letting go. Housing, people dying, bank statements, friends relocating and the like. Life’s messy and hairballs abound.

Like death. I don’t hate the inevitable fact of my own, but I dislike endings, disappearances and the loss of a living being who made my life a little richer.

Life just seems messy in general. I’m so tired of balancing checkbooks, being on hold, trying to digest a budget that makes little sense in the wobbling changes of everything – health care, changing cell phones to a new ear plug, nursing homes and such.

Scared of being a bag lady, of longing, of not belonging: the beat goes on.  Last week I was with my brother after his stroke and I know I should be grateful that I am walking and talking. Yet, life’s messy right now. Everyone I know is feeling it. Even while I sit with him in the nursing home, the nurses are so stressed. Some are nice and they help us change him and hold the phone up to his good ear so that he can hear a voice on the phone.  Still, it’s lonely for him, unable to walk or talk.  Thank God for the Chaplain from Hospice. Warren is amazing. He brings Lee hamburgers and O’Doul’s beer. He reads to him and laughs easily.

In the meantime, the world turns and churns. And what helps quell the hairballs? Community, writing this column, love, and being fully myself with no fear of judgment or shame. Caring for animals who cannot speak for themselves, the voiceless ones, nature, Murphy’s Pub and Pilates.

So far, I keep paying and praying. Most of the people I know are stressed. We all deal with it differently, depending on our patterns and parents. I notice a lot of folks get very sloppy, every thing’s in a mess at home, they’ve dropped the ball on taking care of themselves. Some make plans and break them, others blame and mistreat those around them. The list goes on. So what to do in a world filled with stress, the statistics sky high on anxiety levels and requests for sleeping pills?

When I’m overwhelmed and fall into a puddle, I’m the most comforted by hot water and walks and being with people who talk about their most vulnerable truth, the ones who connect to their fears and hurt without blame or shame. I can relax and be myself.  Hairballs fly but we never hit each other, chuckling in the midst of sorrow.

Like last night, talking to a friend who is retired but staring at his 401K as it drops, he droops and then laughs uproariously. It was real conversation with some humor thrown in. The entire world has gone to hell in a hand basket full of hairballs. Fear of being old and broke, pensions disappearing, marriages splitting, less money in a world full of expensive cucumbers.

Under stress we all regress, everything from more anxiety to irritability, tossing hairballs back and forth can become hardball. Under fear and pressure we all make mistakes, shut down or freak out, there isn’t time or space to breathe.  It’s a great big messy hairball.  What to do?

Katy Byrne, MA, MFT, Psychotherapist, is an author and radio personality in Sonoma.  Reach her at katybyrne@aol.com or conversationswithkaty.com.