Do you have racing thoughts and anxiety?

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Sometimes being a positive person is not enough. It is not enough even trying to bring the best in yourself or other people. It doesn’t work that way. I always believed in understanding people and always thought to get the best out of everyone and I hoped that one day someone would see the same in me but, it seems that people have this perception that I have everything under control and everything goes smoothly in my life. Even my own family doesn’t seem to see me. Oh, what they don’t know, they have no idea, or they do not want to accept that I might not be this strong happy person I seem to give the impression I am. I might not be this healthy confident individual that looks like has everything under control. One of my friends once told me that they wished that they were me, as I was having an easy life. He even went further telling me that I was spoiled, and I never seen hardship despite the fact that he knew very little about me. An easy life! Spoiled and no hardship?! And my response to that! Volunteering my life with a smile. My partner the only person who has been through it all with me, even him seem to not understand. Sometimes on the middle of arguments he goes on to tell me that “I am faking it all”. How I wanted to be that way, but all I do when he says that, is just stop the argument and walk away! Oh, how I wished all this assumption were true! I have no idea how all the people I know and love, none of them sees me, let alone understands me. I wish someone could only see how much I struggle. How every day I push myself to the limits to get out of bad and look, feel or be normal! How being outside for me is like death coming every day! How socialising with people, being in open spaces or busy places brings on me a state where I feel numb and inexistent and at that moment the only thing I do is work with my body so it doesn’t show the shake and the fear is having inside. And I smile and I exhaust myself with talking, to remove the attention from my body. How no one sees me for so many years I do not know. Lately I am job-hunting. I am trying to fight the fear inside the shake when I have to face the interviewer. I am trying to be strong, and use all the techniques I learned in the counselling sessions but how? It has been too long in my body, too long to even remember how I used to be before. Everyone who sees me thinks I am fine and there is nothing wrong with me. Oh, I so wished they could see behind the beautiful curtains. Is another whole world a world that has no meaning, just fear? I am so scared all the time but lately, I am scared of my thoughts as I know that they are breaking my sanity. so, I have decided to stop thinking all together. Maybe if I don’t think everything will be ok and no one will keep telling me that I am not doing enough, or I am not trying enough. Maybe there is a way to fight this anxiety and my agoraphobia maybe my fears are only in my mind. But until there is an answer, I have to fight with my body every day and who knows people will stop seeing my hidden soul. And everything will stop being seen wrong.

So I will never forget my first moment of “anxiety” or panic and what it brought. I was in the 5th grade and I went to the Twilight movie with my friends and their mom. I had read the book Twilight so I knew what to expect, for the most part, and didn’t think I would have a complete utter meltdown at the end of the vampire/werewolf love story. But when Bella was bitten at the end of the movie in her old ballet studio and there was blood and screaming I was instantly brought on with anxiety. And no not the type of anxiety where I freak out about my homework that’s due tomorrow. The type that I had never experienced before... palms sweaty, knees weak... yeah you know the rest. I literally felt like I was dying! I remember getting up out of my seat and running out of the theatre. I was literally about to feint and my friends mom (who thank God is a nurse) told me to put my head between my legs and eat some M$Ms. I remember my heart racing and having tunnel vision and being completely incapable of controlling my feelings. Two words: Panic Attack. In the fifth grade!

There are many articles on anxiety and how to understand it, learn to better cope with it, and manage it. Those words don't sit right with me because I don't want to have to manage anything that I could potentially control. I want it GONE and I believe that's very possible seeing as my unnecessary anxiety IS almost gone!

Most of us make room for anxiety to come along with us on a trip. It’s completely normal when you’re journeying out of your comfort zone. And even though no trip will ever be 100% stress-free we can lessen the anxieties and bring down the stress of it all. Anxiety affects everyone differently so there’s not one particular thing that can cure-all, but what you can do is be prepared for the anxiety that comes with travelling.

Before you read on, let me make something very clear to you. Reading this will not fix your anxiety, nothing will do that. My hope is that those of you experiencing anxiety will realize that there are so many people alongside you, so many people suffering, in so many different ways and you are not alone. We find it hard to talk about our anxiety, not because we don’t want to, but because we don’t know how to. How do you explain something you don’t even understand yourself? We feel so many things but find it so difficult to express them, even though we’re dying to share every petty thought rushing through our heads. Sometimes our heads are so full of crap that we literally feel like we are going to explode. We want to scream at the top of our lungs, but we don’t, we can’t.

My mother told me that the earliest she noticed my anxiety was when I was just four years old. I was so small, yet so irrationally afraid. I do not remember my anxiety back then, but I do remember it in the third grade. The fourth grade. The fifth grade. The sixth grade (where it got completely out of control). The seventh grade, where I couldn't get out of bed. It followed me throughout high school, I switched on and off anti-anxiety medication and anti-depressants, had countless doctor's visits, and yet I am in University now and still struggling. Anxiety is not something that magically goes away one day. I know for a fact that I will struggle with anxiety for the rest of my life. It is debilitating, and frustrating, and so painful, but I know I am capable of pushing through. For me, anxiety is not being able to breathe. It is a pounding in my chest and the weight of a thousand pounds on top of me. It is sweaty palms, red skin, bleeding thumbs, picked at skin. It is crying in the bathroom at school, in my car, in public. It is embarrassing, it causes me to miss class, hyperventilate around strangers. I wish there was a cure. I hate that in moments when I should be doing nothing but enjoying myself, I am panicked and anxious and so angry at myself. What bugs me most is that I tend to become anxious in moments I didn't even feel were uncomfortable to me. I am angry that during my time off of school, where nothing should stress me out, that I have crushing anxiety while watching a movie with my family. It makes me feel alone, even when I am in a room of people. I am supported by the people in my life, and they say they understand what I go through, but sometimes I just want to scream. I want to rip my hair out and silence the noise. I have gotten on new medication, which seems to be calming things down a little bit, I have gotten into yoga, I meditate, and I have been trying to get more sleep. It sounds cheesy and annoying, but exercising has started to make my head feel a little clearer. Maybe one day I can run or stretch enough to shake the anxiety straight out of my body. Until then, I am going to breathe, believe in myself, and take one day at a time.

Have you ever felt like it’s the end of the world because your anxiety was that bad?

How do I even begin ?

My dog, KOKO, is very well-behaved and lovable but also anti-social. When she sees another dog on a leash, her light brown hair from neck to tail stands on end, giving the appearance of turning dark. She becomes highly-agitated and begins to bark.

Sometimes you forget how to breath. Sometimes you shake so bad you have to use two hands to drink a glass of water. Sometimes you forget how to speak and you stutter. Sometimes you feel the whole world is literally on your shoulders and it's all pressing you down. And sometimes you think you are such a mess that everyone can tell that you are panicking and it makes you panic more. It's a shaking in your chest that isn't really diagnosable. It's a jitter in the hands when you are uncomfortable. It's the butterfly in your stomach that has nothing to do with your soul mate. Its feeling alone when you are surrounded by those you love. Anxiety eats away at everything. Every thought, every movement, every interaction. I'm confident on the outside, I am the I don't care what you think I am living MY life person. But on the inside, more often than not, I am living in a hurricane. My thoughts are 90 mph winds, my feelings the swelling ocean. I am a wreck. But. Put on a strong face and don't let anyone know. Because that would be showing weakness and letting people know there is something different about you. Your family will worry because they don't quite understand the feeling, or have been thought to just deal. And it's just trying to get through the day till you can come home to an absolute safe place. Its handling your business, while trying not to literally shake apart. And the worst of all, as I mentioned before. Is the absolute aloneness you feel in all of this. You can have a spouse who goes through the same things, or is empathetic to your feelings. But at the end of the day, it's you. It's you fighting these issues. It's you learning to smile through the storm and make everyone believe you're not completely broken down inside. Because "it'll pass" , "just be happier", "you're just being dramatic". There are some people who will ask "What's wrong, how can I fix this?" And while that helps, it still makes you feel broken. Anxiety is a parasite. It pulls little bits from you everyday. And yes you can fight to get those pieces back, but when are you just done? When is it too much to fight everyday to not feel lonely, or scared, or like the worst human on this earth? And it doesn't drive you to suicide, because then you get anxiety about leaving those you love behind. But it drives you to nothingness, which is almost worse. It puts you into a depression that even if you didn't have depression is hard to get out of. And you know what sucks the most? It's the absolute panic of it all, because what if my anxiety causes me to lose, or miss, or forget, or just not be able to care because I am dealing with too much inside? I don't know why "God", or who ever you believe in, made this a thing. Scientists will say it's just a chemical imbalance. But I say it's an unfair human condition that no normal working brain should have. So why do so many of us suffer from it? And why do I feel so alone because of it? Am I broken, am I lost, am I just a misprint in the human species? The only answer I have for any of those questions is, I don't know and all I can do is keep pushing on. And breaking through the panic. Because at the end of the day, I am a pet mom, a wife, and a loved daughter, sister, and friend. And they make this life worth living. Even with the uneasiness I feel pretty much every day, I can't leave them behind. This life isn't fair, it's not fair I battle this. But life rarely is fair. So I guess let's go.