hello, my name is anxiety

It feels like that sometimes, doesn’t it? Like anxiety is the giant name tag you are wear around to those get to know each other functions. Having a mental illness such as anxiety can cause us to give in to the spiraling thoughts, physical symptoms, and let anxiety control us instead of us controlling it.

I’ve been a victim of it too many times. There were years that I thought anxiety was who I was and that I wasn’t someone who just experienced it. Anxiety stopped me from doing a lot of things, and it ruined a lot of things, too. I let anxiety lead the way for a good portion of my High School years, and now, looking back, I wish I could have told myself that anxiety is anxiety and that’s it. It’s a feeling, it’s not impending doom, or a fortune teller. It’s just a feeling. The feeling sucks, don’t get me wrong, but it’s still just a feeling.

Don’t click away just yet.

Anxiety can feel like a wave out in the ocean, still to me, a wave that is trying to drown me.

What do you do then?

It’s taken years of letting the wave take me under.

letting it choke me.

letting it do it over and over and over again.

I’m not a pro or anything, but I do have tools in my pocket.

I usually feel it. I get the racing heart, the vivid thoughts, stirring feeling in my stomach, and maybe a couple others. I sit with it. Back when anxiety and I were just getting to know each other, the symptoms scared the crap out of me. But now, it’s something I know, oh, anxiety is here, I know what he feels like.

I then try to move on, but that doesn’t always work. It really doesn’t even work most of the time. If an event or social outing is coming up that is bringing out the nerves, I acknowledge it and ask myself questions. Why am I feeling nervous? What am I thinking about? Am I overthinking or not thinking enough?

I usually play a good old de-catastrophizing game that my therapist taught me.

What is the worst possible thing that could go wrong?

What’s most likely going to happen?

What’s the best possible outcome?

I usually run through this about five times. My brain is pretty overreactive and hyper-visualizes everything, so I let it hyper-visualize, because if it can vividly come up with scary, bad, or worrisome case scenarios, it can surely come up with great, vivid scenarios.

But if this doesn’t work, I will write. Blog post, journal entry, song, poem, or work on a section of a book that I’ve been writing. And if this fails me?

I might email my therapist and ask what her availability is for tomorrow. I’m a talker; I talk through every single thing with her because it helps.

This may help you. It might not. That’s because anxiety isn’t the same for everyone. It’s like a chronic or rare disease in that way. Things can be similar, absolutely, but since everyone’s brains are different, that means anxiety is going to be different for everyone.