A mental health chat

I don’t think the main issue is me being ‘cured’ as such. When I open up about my anxiety, I openly know and accept that it will always linger and won’t ever go away.

It can get extremely scary sometimes. Being constrained to your own thoughts of utter hopelessness and feeling like the whole world is closing in on you. To be honest, I thought that those feelings were normal a year ago. I thought that it was something everyone went through on a daily basis, and that crying at 1am in the morning over people in my life ‘hating’ me was normal.

I was definitely never as open with my mental illness as I am now. I still struggle to explain to my parents regarding what is going on in my head because I feel like I’m going mad. I mean, how come I think all my friends hate me? How come I believe I’m a burden and no one wants to be around me anymore? It may sound completely irrational, but it’s real to me.

I denied the fact that I had anxiety. I refused to see anyone and get help because I believed that I was just wasting people’s time if i did seek help because obviously, others deserve it more than me. I turned into a train wreck. I turned into someone who I din’t recognise anymore, and that is one of the scariest things I’ve had to endure yet.

It’s not just ‘feeling anxious in public.’ As much as I have those days where I don’t want to leave my house because I feel physically sick at the thought of being in public, it’s a lot more than that. The thing with generalised anxiety disorder is that it’s like everything you imagine anxiety to be, and a whole lot more. I wish people understood that it was a lot more than just feeling ‘on edge’ now and then. Everyone gets anxious. It’s human nature. Anxiety however is more feeling anxious and a whole lot else on top of that.

There are still times where I sit up at 1am in the morning and have to go to the toilet because I feel like I’m going to throw up. The thought of going on a ‘night out’ excites me (don’t get me wrong), but I get extremely anxious before the event. i hate how busy it can get and how trapped I feel. I worry about getting drunk before alcohol has even entered my system. I go over scenarios in my head over how to get out of a ‘night out’ and just run away.

But I don’t run anymore.

I make sure to put myself in the right mindset, and conquer. Defying all odds, I still end up going out. A simple task to many takes me hours of mental preparation to tell myself, “right, go out for your friends and have a good time.” My anxiety may be my mental illness, but it won’t be my downfall.

It can’t be cured. I can imagine myself even now starting my new apprenticeship and getting worried and stressed over having to interact with new people and to try to not mess anything up. It’ll always be an annoying linger, but it’s going to have to be an annoying linger that I come to terms with how to control. And my down and off days? I will face them head on. Because it’s okay to have those days, and it’s okay to have days where you don’t want to leave the house. It’s okay because in some ways, them days can make you even more determined for when you conquer those fears.

Love and happiness always,
xo, Becca

————————-

Twitter

Instagram

Facebook

Bloglovin

YouTube