The A Word

Anxiety. Anxiety can determine whether you go out. It can determine how you live. What you eat. When you sleep. It's the ultimate bully. It's controlling. It's a bastard. Anxiety is a menace. I hate that not just myself, but thousands of others struggle with it. We hide it. We fear it. We don't talk about it. We need to talk about it. I want to talk about it. So that's what I'm going to do today. I'm going to share my story.

I've always struggled with anxiety on some level. When I was younger, it stemmed from exams and striving to be the best I could be. There's nothing wrong with that, but getting several panic attacks because you have exams, that's not quite right. No one was pressuring me to do well, but myself. I remember every Christmas holiday I'd get a panic attack as January came around, because January meant exams. My heart would race, I'd feel sick and felt like I couldn't breathe.

As I got older, my anxiety didn't go away. It just found new triggers. I get anxious when it's dark or if a random advert comes on. I get anxious thinking about leaving the house and actually leaving the house typically involves several days of anxiety and a panic attack. Recent stress has caused my anxiety to go into overdrive and has caused OCD. I'm not going to go into detail with that today, I just can't manage that. But I will one day. I think it will help me. It's such a misunderstood disease and for those who have it, it can be the most overwhelming and exhausting thing.

There's such a stigma around anxiety and other mental health problems. We need to change that. I hope this post will open a discussion here. If you feel comfortable with it, feel free to share your stories too. Let's work together to kick anxiety in the ass. Let's break that stigma and get more people talking about it. Below are a couple of links I recommend checking out. If you need someone to talk to, Samaritans has a helpline which is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The details are below.

Useful Links:

Mind (Info-line: 0300 123 3393 or Email: info@mind.org.uk)

Samaritans (Helpline: 116 123 or Email: jo@samaritans.org)

Avani
xoxo