I’m not going to lie, starting this blog was a big step for me. It also has brought me a lot of anxiety.
I have suffered from anxiety for many years, long before I had a name to call the feeling of being on the verge of tears, the feeling of my head getting hot, the paranoia, the look of exasperation that loved ones gave me when I asked them to validate my fears or assure me for the fifth time that everything would be alright.
Therapy has been a big help; it’s nice talking to someone who gets paid to listen to you and offer advice and tools to help you in your suffering. And yet, whenever I find myself in an anxiety attack or irritable at something not going right, everything building up and building up inside until I snap and say something I regret, all the tools and advice and help I’ve been given just…goes away.
Why is that? Why is it when you’re stressed or scared or paranoid or anxious, you forget everything except for the thing making you stressed or scared or paranoid or anxious? Why do people who suffer from anxiety (or any other mental illness or even neurodivergence that makes them anxious or irritable) have this tunnel vision?
We don’t even realize we’re in the tunnel until it’s too late, we’re in the dark and can’t see a thing, and that makes us MORE scared. Why the rumination? Why the intense focus?
I have at least five friends who are or where phycology majors. I always wondered why (I have friends from other majors, of course. I doubled majored in English and Film and I’m dating a former Theatre major. I have range). Could it be because of the way my brain worked, functioned? The way it took something positive, like my love of Star Trek, and stuck it too my brain like a popcorn kernel? Or even a memory of something I did or said that I regret, how my brain comes back to that in the late hours of the night, like looking up horror movie plots with the lights off?
I was nervous to start this blog for many reasons. Internet safety, for one. The ideology of intense paranoia surrounding anything I post was drilled into me at a young age, being told that I should “never post ANYTHING on the internet, be ABSOLUTELY careful of what you post and who you show it to, things on the internet stay there FOREVER.”
Another reason I had so much hesitation was that I was worried about the mean and negative comments I would get about my writing, but I guess that’s every writer’s fear when putting their writing out there, and it also goes with the territory of putting personal writing out there.
Finally, I think there’s the fear of being perceived, of being known. Which, I feel like most people have that problem (which is why a lot of Instagram accounts are private). Once you put yourself out into the universe, you’re known, and there’s no taking that back (unless you have really great internet-erasing technology or something. I dunno. Again, I studied English and Film, not STEM).
I just want to protect myself. I want to make sure I am safe and happy. And if stressing myself to the point of paralysis or crying while listening to sad Christmas songs, or staying up late worrying and trying to do things to fix it, well, that’s just how my brain is (I am not saying you should DO any of those things. Those are in fact NOT healthy coping mechanisms and I do not recommend any of them. Especially staying up late. A sleep schedule is hard to fix).
I feel awkward just leaving this blog post like this, so here’s something that’s helped me with managing anxiety: writing things down. Not just in a to do list or a planner, but having a separate notebook just for anxious thoughts. I usually write in mine at the end of the day, right before I go to sleep. I found that, once I wrote it down in the little “anxious notebook,” I didn’t feel the need to worry about it anymore, since it was written down. Does that make sense?
And this all depends on the person. Maybe writing things down isn’t your thing, but therapy is (I also love therapy). Maybe therapy isn’t your thing, but something else is.
So there, ending this on a somewhat happier note, rather than an awkward “doom and gloom” one. During the last few weeks I’ve had a lot of anxiety about careers, life paths, the future, even the past, and I’m not ashamed in admitting that. It’s true that no one knows what they’re doing in life, ever. And we have to accept that in order to move forward. Things will get better. They just take time (and I, unfortunately, am very impatient).
As talking about mental health becomes less and less taboo (already there has been a steady change to how we view and discuss mental health in the last few years), I hope to talk about it more on this blog, and grow and learn in the process as well.
E. A. Young Writes 