Consumed

My imagination,

eats my brain alive,

as if a hundred tigers

are devouring me.

Like a record player,

my mind plays the same song.

Consumed by pessimism,

my body becomes addicted to

dark thoughts and poison.

I can’t relinquish the

pain, fury, and exasperation

I constantly experience internally.

Some inner cuts are left unhealed,

some inner cuts vanish magically.

Consumed by sounds, tastes and sights;

Some are dark, some are light.

I taste nastiness,

or deliciousness.

I see pitch black or

a rainbow of bright colors and shades.

I smell dripping scarlet blood or

a bouquet of white daisies.

During the youth, I had a very challenging time coping with negative emotions in a constructive way. Anger was a big weakness for me, because my level of sensitivity was high and chronic anxiety definitely contributed to this. You could say something to me in the wrong way and I could just "break like a glass flower vase that just fell on the floor". I was extremely sensitive to specific tones, words and would take them literally. I still have this challenge, but I understand and manage it than I did when I was younger.

Anxiety makes me feel angry, because it is an unpleasant thing to deal with on a regular basis, especially when it is at a clinical level. I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder when I was 11 and I started receiving counselling in December 2009, when it got worse. I had the chance to work with a lovely, middle-aged woman who was my counselor. It was definitely a start in the right direction, but I knew that this was not the only therapist that I would be working with. My level of anxiety required me to participate in lifelong therapy sessions, which was prescribed by my psychiatrist.

Living with anxiety is like walking on eggshells; you never know when you're going to have a panic attack, you always predict the worse things that could occur in your everyday lives and you constantly have stomach aches to the point where you're going to vomit. It makes people angry, because people don't want to dealing with these chronic conditions everyday. You get bullied, teased and not everyone will understand where you're coming from, which can feel pretty discouraging for people like myself, who loves people, life and keeping busy with awesome activities. It can disrupt your daily routine, because you would be fixating on the issue at hand, instead of your daily responsibilities and things you want to enjoy.

As my anxiety got worse, I became angry. Some of the teachers didn't always understand where I was coming from, family members wouldn't always say the right things to me, I would get ostracized and bullied by bigger kids who were a part of gangs. Dealing with chronic anxiety was hard enough on me that I didn't need to have additional challenges with people, to the point where I would become angry and unable to regulate myself. It was like I was always blamed for something that wasn't my fault, and it made me question myself quite often. I would become angry with certain people, because I didn't feel like I was accepted for who I was.

As a result of the lack of understanding and compassion I received from both kids and certain teachers I had, I developed a high level of resentment to the point where I eventually became behavioural. It was like I was fighting a double war in my mind and it disrupted the peace that I had in my life. Although I now recognize that being mean and lashing out at others (especially authority figures like teachers) isn't a healthy way to express your anger and pain from dealing with chronic anxiety and a lack of acceptance from people, I felt that it was the best coping mechanism at the time.

I believe that living with a chronic mental illness like an anxiety disorder has given me the opportunity to educate and support others who have similar challenges to me. Life is not meant to be "rainbows and sunshine", whether you're living with a mental illness, a physical ailment or nothing. Things happen in our lives that make us feel scared, sad, angry, frustrated, puzzled and unwanted. Mental illness doesn't make anyone one of us live a better or worse life than others; it means that our brains function differently and we are more sensitive than others. It is not a bad thing; it's something we have to live with. Yes, it's abominable, but life as a whole is abominable from time to time. It's okay to feel negative emotions. It's okay to struggle and learn from our mistakes. It's okay to live differently than others. We are human. We are special.