My Anxiety Journey

A journey.

My anxiety journey.

I consider it a journey because it has been a long (and mostly difficult) part of my life, but it is also something that I have made great strides with and have learned a lot about myself in the process.

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I am not a doctor, nor a trained mental health professional.  Everything I write about is from my personal experience only.  Please consult your doctor before trying anything new.

Anxious feelings started for me as early as about 10 years old.  I worried about things most kids my age probably shouldn’t have even thought about.

In middle school, I would get worried over my teacher calling on me to read in front of the class.  Or even worse was doing a presentation in front of a group of people.  What if I would make a mistake?  Would my classmates laugh at me?  Would I get made fun of?

Even at that young age, I would have trouble falling asleep at night, feeling my heart pounding, thinking about “possible” things that could go wrong the next day.

I was so young at the time that I didn’t know what was wrong with me or how to process what I was feeling.  I thought something could be physically wrong with me, so thinking and worrying about that only made things worse.

These fears I had began to turn into a habit that started repeating every day.  Since I felt anxious so frequently, it became something that I just dealt with on a daily basis because I thought that was how my “normal” was supposed to feel.

When I got a little older in college, I started having panic attacks.  Most of the time they would happen DURING class.  The panic would take over my body….my heart would race, I felt like I couldn’t breathe, I would get shaky and couldn’t concentrate on anything.  I felt trapped with nowhere to go besides sit there and wait for the anxiety to pass.  There are no words to describe what that actually feels like.  All you want to do is leave wherever you are and just go breakdown and cry.

The fear of not knowing when or where another panic attack would strike would lead into a vicious cycle.  It got so bad for me at times that I would get anxious at just the thought of walking in and sitting down in a classroom surrounded by my colleagues.  It made me feel claustrophobic.  I was always “that person” sitting as close to the door as possible just in case I had a panic attack and needed to get out of the room as quickly as I could.  I was always making sure I had an exit.

Even at this age (my early 20’s), I couldn’t understand WHY I had these fears and didn’t know WHAT to do to make them better.  I didn’t talk about it with many people because I felt ashamed by it.  Embarrassed by it.  I thought that no one would understand what I was going through, so I dealt with it silently.

Holding things inside NEVER makes anything better……a lesson I have learned since then.

It wasn’t just going to school that I had anxiety about.  Going to any store to shop made me feel nervous.  Being in large crowds without much room to move around made me uneasy.  Going to a doctor’s visit would cause me sheer panic.  I would get shaky, weak and feel like I couldn’t breathe while sitting in a doctor’s office waiting room.  In fact, that is one of the main reasons why I waited so long to get help. Just the thought of having to go to the doctor made the anxiety worse, so I did whatever I could to avoid it.

After I graduated college and started working in the corporate world, my anxiety got a little better for some extended periods of time.  I would still get nervous about certain things, but working got me into more of a routine.  With anxiety, it is always more comforting and calming to have a routine because you tend to know what is coming next (for the most part) and don’t have the need to anticipate the worst.

But then, it would never fail. There would always be that certain trigger that would get my anxiety spiraling out of control again.  Triggers can be different for everyone.  Big life changes are what hits me hard (an illness or death in the family, a break up with a significant other, a stressful job).

About 10 years ago, I hit my absolute lowest point.  I was newly married at the time.  Moved into a new house, about a half hour away from my family and where I grew up.  Had a stressful job.  It was a lot for me to handle all at once.  My anxiety got so out of control for so long that I couldn’t sleep, I didn’t want to eat and couldn’t even get out of bed.  I knew I needed to seek professional help.  It felt like my body had been taken over and I lost all control.  I literally felt like I was dying.

I went to see my family doctor who put me on medicine and suggested that I try therapy to see if talking through things would help for me.  It took months for me to start to feel even remotely back to myself after hitting that extremely low point.  I made a promise to myself after that happened that I would never let myself get to that place again.  I would learn as much as I could about anxiety, listen to my body and not be afraid to talk openly to people about it.

I’m proud to say that, as I write this 10 years later, I have come a long way in my journey.  I have been on and off medicine quite a few times, have tried therapy (including cognitive behavior therapy), and also have learned as much as I could about natural ways to ease my anxiety.  Don’t get me wrong…..my anxiety has not disappeared and there have been plenty of ups and downs, but I have never let myself get to that extreme low point again.

I read a shocking statistic on the Anxiety and Depression Association of America’s website that says:

“Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S., affecting 40 million adults, or 18.1% of the population every year. The disorders are treatable, yet only 36.9% of those suffering receive treatment.”

How is such a BIG problem talked about by so few people?  Just because there aren’t often physical outward signs of anxiety doesn’t make it any less of an illness.

I am happy to see that over the past few years, there has been a lot more attention brought to mental illness in general, but there is still such a small percentage of people receiving help for something that is treatable.

Sharing my story is terrifying (trust me – easily one of the most terrifying things I have done in my life 😐 ), but if I am able to play even a small part in helping someone know that they are not alone in their suffering, it is okay to talk openly about it, and there are many ways to seek treatment….that makes it totally worthwhile to me.

If you are comfortable sharing your experience(s) with anxiety, I would love to hear from you. I find that the more I talk about it openly with people, the better I feel.  Not only does it make me feel better, but it also surprises me HOW MANY OTHER PEOPLE have trouble with anxiety and have just never opened up about it.

While I still have some rough days, I now know that not EVERY day is bad.  I don’t ALWAYS feel anxious.  And when I do, I know the feelings are not going to hurt me and they will pass.  THEY. WILL. PASS.  My anxiety does not define who I am as a person.  Some days I may have to dig a little deeper to find a positive side of things or tell myself to slow down and take some deep breaths when I feel overwhelmed.  And you know what?  That’s okay.  Because we all have different things that we struggle with.  It’s called being human.