My Brain vs. The Zombie Chicks

On Sundays, I'm all about getting as many things done for the week as possible, so that I don't have to worry about them at 6 in the morning.  I was home alone, doing mom-type things like laundry, cleaning, and finding random Legos in odd places. Since Trash Day is Mondays, I went through the fridge looking for expired food and such.  I found some eggs, and they were near their expiration date.  I got a pot, filled it with water, and put the eggs on to boil.  I was back in the laundry room, emptying the dryer, when I heard a noise. 

*cheep* *cheep* *cheep* *cheep*

I ignored it, at first.  I thought it was my son's tablet PC with an alert about something.

*cheep* *cheep* *cheep* *cheep*

Then my brain perked up.  Sayyyy...that sounds like a baby chick! 

*cheep* *cheep* *cheep* *cheep*

No, I told my brain.  The eggs we buy at the store are not fertilized.  They check those eggs before they send them off to sell them.  Those eggs have been sitting in the cold fridge for almost two weeks. Get yourself together, brain. There are no baby chicks in those eggs.

*cheep* *cheep* *cheep* *cheep*

The thing about anxiety is that it has no rhyme or reason. Most of the time, I can talk myself out of whatever I'm freaking out about. Most of the time, I can tell myself that this anxiety I'm feeling is a side effect of one of the drugs I'm on. Any other day, I can laugh and find something to distract myself.  There are no baby chicks in the eggs. But not this day. 

*cheep* *cheep* *cheep*

The more I tried to tell myself that I was being completely stupid, the larger those thoughts became.  There are no baby chicks in the eggs.  And then all of a sudden, I realized that, if indeed there WERE baby chicks in the pot, boiling away, I was letting them die. I was horrified. A nice visual popped up in my imagination.  That helped my anxiety so, so much.

*cheep* *cheep*

I raced back into the kitchen and pulled the pot off the heat.  Then I pulled on a pot holder and started grabbing eggs, shaking them and listening, to see if a chicken rescue was in order.  I couldn't hear anything after I removed the pot from the heat, because There. Were. No. Chicks. In. Those. Eggs. I got my phone, and found an article via the great and powerful Google that said that told me that the phenomenon was all about science and stuff.  A normal sort of thing.  Happens all the time, according to the internet, although it had never, ever happened to me.   I let the eggs sit there for a few more minutes, just to be sure, then put them back on to boil. No cheeping sounds that time. 

Situation normal, brain.