There are a lot of memes circling social media about anxiety and other disabilities that you can’t see on the outside. There is a stigma around mental health and how it doesn’t meet the qualifications of having a disability because you’re not missing a leg or have noticeable abnormalities that you are suffering from.
I live with chronic anxiety. I’m just now learning what anxiety is and how to cope with it.
Once I saw this meme on social media, I not only recognized that I go through this, but I know people who go through this too. These symptoms are often confused for other mental illnesses or just discarded if you become overwhelmed. This isn’t something that I will just “get over”. There are some days that these symptoms are worse than others. Some days I’m overwhelmed and have to remind myself to do one task at a time and not focus on all the other assignments that are due soon. Then there are some days where I can’t breathe, and I feel like someone is stepping on my chest.
When people look over my schoolwork and notice that I have tackled every subject in detail, what they’re actually looking at is that I had worked out every possible outcome if I hadn’t done the assignment in that much detail, because I was overthinking the assignment. Another quality of my anxiety is always saying yes, even when I know I can’t do it or don’t have time to put out a product that is my best work. This comes from not wanting to let someone down. It would be easier for me to do something half fast and say I tried than not do something at all. I have a bad habit of working until I crash. Mostly to avoid dealing with what is going on but also to settle my nerves over something that I’m dealing with. If I can just focus on something that doesn’t stress me out as much, maybe I’ll make it through the hard times. Procrastination is one of my character flaws. In fact, it just increases my anxiety. I feel like I put out my best work when I’m under pressure. Perhaps that is because I can focus on one thing when working on a deadline and that helps push my anxiety away. This is not a healthy way to cope, but acknowledging there is a problem is the first step to getting better, right?
After acknowledging that I struggle with anxiety, I have ways to minimize the extremes of my anxiety. I’m an advocate for meditation. Even if it’s just for ten minutes at your desk. Meditation is a skill that requires practice. Experienced meditators know how to snap into a meditation state in the blink of an eye. Another way I cope with my anxiety is taking bubble baths with salts and a lit candle. The bath relaxes my muscles and the multiple scents of the bubbles and the candle with the salts helps me relax and allows me to shut off my other senses. I also enjoy going to the gym to burn endorphins. My favorite exercise is spin class. Finding an exercise that fits you will help increase your motivation to workout instead of dreading the gym. Something that I also enjoy doing to decompress is reading a book. Yes, I read textbooks and readings for assignments for about eight to ten hours during the day, but I have found that reading a fiction book whether it be a mystery or romance novel allows me to escape from reality, even if it just for a moment. A tip for reading at night, staring at screens such as computers, tablets and phones actually stimulate the brain and keep you awake longer. Reading a physical book from the library or bookstore helps calm the brain.
Living with anxiety is difficult every day and finding ways to exercise self-care is one of the many ways I manage my anxiety. Advice I was given was to talk to my doctor about my anxiety. Sometimes having chronic anxiety needs to be treated with medication. Anxiety can be chemical and not psychological. Therapy, meditation, bubble baths and reading don’t cure my anxiety but they help to reduce it. I explained to my doctor that I meditate every night and turn off my electronics for a couple hours before bed and I still have high anxiety. Even though I was ashamed of admitting that, it did turn out that I have chronic anxiety and it is chemical. Now that I have a low dose of medication, my life has dramatically improved. If I have learned anything from anxiety it’s that I can’t run from it, so I decided to cope with it. And now I’m no longer ashamed.