I am very worried ...

Because I tend to worry a lot, I have devised a system to stop me worrying which unfortunately has caused me more worry than before.

I worry about many things which the rest of you may consider inconsequential and not worth worrying about. For example, have I remembered to put a piece of cheese in the mouse trap? Have I bought enough apples to make an apple pie? Is wearing a brown tie too ostentatious for attending the church committee meeting? These kind of thoughts cause me no end of sleepless nights especially when I have to do something important.

For example, if I have to go somewhere I've never been before, say another town. I usually go there the day before to check how to get there. Which route to drive, where is the car park, or which bus or train to take. That sort of thing. I check the day before having to go to the place in question. It's a common malady, I understand. Once I booked for a group therapy session with other like-minded people. I went to the meeting place the day before and everyone in the group was also there checking where the place was.

For a while I also visited a hypnotist because I was terrified of heights. The slightest height made me panic; like walking on the side-walk rather than on the road itself. The hypnotist would put me in a trance and when I woke up I was on something high. Like the Empire State Building, the Eiffel Tower, the leaning Tower of Pisa and such like. I had to give up the treatment because of the costs involved. Not once did he put me on top of a cupboard or a tree in his garden. 

Anyway, I digress, as I am liable to do to add amusement to my otherwise tedious stories.

As I was saying before I interrupted myself; I have devised a system to stop me from worrying, or at least to curtail a little my tendency towards despondency and despair. 

I have designated a room in our house as the "Worry Room". I have promised myself that I am not allowed to worry about anything ever unless I am in the Worry Room. If a negative thought crosses my mind as I am nonchalantly crossing the road, or otherwise engaged in non-worrying activities, I quickly dismiss it out of my mind and leave it until I am at home and in the Worry Room whereupon I consider its anxiety levels.

This system has worked for about a week or so. I purposely concentrate on dismissing any worrying thoughts until I am in the Worry Room when I deal with them in order of seriousness and impending doom. 

I have made a little notice saying "DO NOT DISTURB" which I hang with a piece of string to the door handle and it stops the family coming into the Worry Room when I'm inside worrying about the price of carrots, and how will we feed our pet rabbit, and will it affect his eyesight and we'll have to take him to the optician. Does an optician cost more than the carrots anyway?

One day, in a state of extreme worry, I absent-mindedly took the notice with me in the room and hanged it on the inside door handle. I could not get out of the room because I did not want to disobey my own edict not to open the door and disturb whoever is on the other side. I had to shout for a family member outside the Worry Room to open the door and let me out.

However, the worrying problem is now worse because I have now lost the key to the Worry Room. I just cannot remember where I last put it and where it could possibly be. I have searched all over the place with no success. I'll admit I am worried about the situation but I cannot worry about it properly because I cannot enter the Worry Room in order to deal with this particular worry.

I'm sure you can understand my dilemma. How can I worry about the lost key when I am not in the Worry Room to worry about it?

I can't climb through the window because of my latent fear of heights. The last thing I need now is another course of hypnotism which will take me all over the world. 

Any suggestions?