Emotional Support Sisters

I am Bug, Missy’s daughter, who also has anxiety. For me, anxiety isn’t just one thing. It is different for different situations. Ex: in school, anxiety is more of a stress thing, I worry about whether things are going to get done and get done well ( proof, 4.0 GPA first term). Am I using this to brag? Maybe a little, but not the point.

 In situations where I may not have full control of the outcome, my anxiousness comes out as fear. Like if I am taking the dog out for a walk when it is dark outside, my heart starts pounding. My brain starts thinking of different, irrational things that can happen. 

Sometimes anxiety is just claustrophobia, like if I am in a hot car and all of my siblings are goofing around and roughhousing.  I start to feel very anxious. I get really tense (I don’t know a better way to describe it). I am ready to snap at anyone or anything. My siblings often call me out on it. I wish I didn’t have to worry about being mean, but I just feel like I could explode at any moment. 

I am what you could say high functioning. I get the job done, I still live life. On the outside, and on the surface I am usually genuinely happy.  Or so it appears. Sometimes I look happy, but in reality, I am sad, scared, irritable, and just miserable.

 In a way, I am also not high-functioning. Like how I boss my siblings around, or how in the dark my heart starts to pound, and my mind goes a million miles an hour thinking of every horrible outcome that could possibly occur, even the irrational ones.  

In 7th grade, all of my big emotions felt like a witch’s cauldron filled with anxiety ready to boil over, and it did in the form of panic attacks. Yup, 7th grade was just one big panic attack. That is when I got on meds that are helping me. Until then, on the outside, I was smiling and having fun, but on the inside I was anxious. All of the definitions you could think of of anxiety were there. 

Coping with anxiety is one big cycle. I am worried about something, so I worry about everything that could happen. I even have dreams about what could happen. Then I worry some more. Then when everything goes peachy I still somehow find a way to internalize the negative. Then I worry about the negative some more and that makes me anxious. It is just one big loop that me and my family like to call toileting into despair because even if we try to break out of the flush, we still spiral down into the stinky hole.

I don’t toilet about everything. There are still things in life that I thoroughly enjoy like I have a musical coming up that I am very excited about. Do I worry about it? Only a little if there was a pie chart It would be 10% worried and 90% happy excited. 

In conclusion, I have anxiety. I cope with it in different ways, like finding the bright side or overthinking it. It is not like I am full-on anxiety town, I have many joys in my life like performing, hobbies, and being with those I love, even if sometimes those things make me a little stressed, they usually don’t.