Lately I've been dealing with a lot of anxiety. It seems to come out of nowhere and it seizes my brain. If there's been something I've been worrying about, that worry rolls over and over and over in my brain. It's not crippling or debilitating, but it definitely makes it harder to focus.
Anxiety is odd. There is no one size fits all for anxiety. Anyone who is effected by it will describe it to you in a million different ways. Sometimes it's even hard to put descriptive words to how it feels. The person just knows it's a living hell. At it's worst, mine feels like I'm sky diving without a parachute.
I've dealt with anxiety my whole life, but as a kid I didn't know what it was or how to describe what I was feeling. If I said I was nervous before speaking in front of a class or a dance performance, I was told everyone gets nervous before a performance. These types of dismissals aided and hindered me as I grew up. It aided me by giving me the will to push through those feelings and "appear" ok, but it hindered me by not letting me name my problem. Had I been able to name anxiety, I could have started my healing/coping process sooner.
It's only been recently that I realized it was anxiety I dealt with as a kid. More specifically social anxiety. I was reading a tumblr post (I know soooo scientific) describing being terrified of saying the word "here" for roll call in school. It talked about rehearsing saying the word "here" in their head hoping to not forget when it came their turn. I did that, every class, every year, even in college. I HATE talking about myself in front of a group of people. I hated the "Lets go around the room and tell us something about yourself" exercises in class. My heartbeat would quicken, I'd get shortness of breath, and then I'd rehearse what I was going to say till it was time for me to speak. Then what I rehearsed would not be what came out of my mouth. Once the ordeal was over my physical symptoms would subside, but it never got easier. I just got better at pushing which made me better at identifying what triggers my anxiety which in turn helps me manage it better.
Identifying my triggers has been HUGE in managing my symptoms when they arise. It gives me the grounding I need. This way when a worrisome thought hijacks my brain I can recognize when the worry starts to become irrational. I can seek out help from friends and coworkers to help talk me back down to reality.
I've also found that yoga helps manage my symptoms. It's not necessarily the active meditation that helps me (which it does), but it's more so the poses. They loosen my body, my muscles. I think for me that's where I hold a lot of my tension. I'll be sitting on the couch and realize I've been tense and I'm not sure for how long. A couple months ago I found Yoga with Adrienne on youtube and it's helped. I didn't realize how tight my body was until I started doing some of her programs. After the first 30 days (non-consecutive cause ya know life happens), I felt infinitely better. With my anxiety mounting this week I just realized that it's been a week and a half since I did yoga. It's really easy for me to get off track with the tools I have to help manage my anxiety.
I'm not perfect at managing my anxiety. I also don't always realize I'm functioning in an anxious state until it's pretty intense. But I now at least have some tools to get myself back to a manageable state.
The goal of this post was to give me an outlet for the anxiety I've been feeling. If I can write about it and get things out of my head, they're less likely to roll around and give me trouble. Should someone else stumble across this and gain comfort knowing they're not the only one who deals with anxiety (cause it's very isolating), then great.
Till next time.
