It’s been two years since I last let my life be dictated by my anxiety. One year since I started talking about it. Seven hours since my last mental breakdown.

Yeah, seven hours. If you had the lovely chance to be anywhere near Connertons during the hours of 530 to probably 7, you’re well aware that it was an honest to God mess down there and I couldn’t handle it. Was I even supposed to be there? Nope. But I couldn’t just leave them after finding out almost everyone had called off and they needed help. But does that mean I was mentally prepared for people’s constant angry complaints directed at me when the only thing I do is hand people’s food out? No.

The worst part of living with something like anxiety is that it’s so unpredictable. It seems to just enjoy wait for the most inconvenient times, like when your life seems to be going well, to just attack you like a Chuck Norris kick to the chest.

When it comes to living with a mental illness, there isn’t an immediate cure or recovery method that makes everything better. Living with something like anxiety for me? That was like a slow process of losing everything.

It was like I had lived in a world of full HD technicolor and once my life changed with all that unnecessarily challenging / annoying /defeating back story happened, anxiety slowly reduced my life from 1080p to 144p. What used to be sharp IMAX quality just became blurry with time and those colors I had become accustomed to just became dull and grey. I just wanted to keep my life together and refused to acknowledge the fact that my life wasn’t the same.

Anxiety is the biggest struggle in my entire life because no matter how high my life will take me, it’ll rip me back to the lower points that I hate being at. Then it just all devolves from there because I just end up so unbelievably angry at myself for letting my anxiety rule me. It also never helps when people say that they can’t believe I’ve been dealing with it or that someone who has their life seemingly together shouldn’t be struggling as much. If anything, when life is going well and anxiety strikes, it’s like having the best WiFi going at full bars and yet still watching angrily as your video refused to load at the best quality.

I hate that it does this to me. I hate that sometimes I just feel like a robot going through the motions of life and not even truly living. I should be enjoying where life is or just happier in general but it’s not logical. It creeps up and rips me apart sometimes. Is it easier to deal with compared to the past? Of course. I’ve learned how to better just articulate my feelings instead of just always having them pent up. I know ways to ground myself when things don’t seem real or when my heart feels like its ripping me to pieces.

The worst part of being more educated about it is honestly just being so aware of when my body is shutting down and absolutely panicking. Panic / anxiety attacks are the worst thing that I constantly deal with.

It always starts off slightly. It’s the slight increase of my heartbeat. Was it something I saw? Was it someone I saw? Was it something that was said? I never know what will set me off and that makes everything even more than a challenge than it needs to be. I try to ignore it as with each beat, the panic spreads from my chest. Sometimes it’s a slow process, sometimes it’s faster than a blink, yet it’s always the same. From my chest, my left shoulder and wrist tingle. The itch is there and I always try to hold onto the reality around me. (I’ve ignored that itch for a few years and pray constantly for the strength to never need to delve back into that darkness again.) The blurriness comes next, where I can’t really see what’s in front of me (this is always worse when driving, let me tell you.) As someone who likes seeing, it just sends the rest of my body into shock. Hearing? That’s like being underwater, where I know things are being said but I just can’t understand it. I try to take a literal hold on reality, lately I’ve been keeping my grounding rocks in my pockets at any given time or just start fiddling with my ring.

Sometimes, if I’m lucky, it passes over quickly. Most times, it’s never that easy. The fast ones are nice because then that means my mind didn’t catch up with everything. The more common occurrence is that as my body has absolutely shut down in being reasonable. I’ve probably started to shake even slightly. (It’s impressive sometimes that I still sometimes manage to keep going through the motions that I’m okay. I’ve even kept doing my job at Connertons or walked around Marketplace without anyone really noticing my distress.) The shakes are induced by the fact that my mind has probably turned on me. Whatever triggered the attack is probably running faster than the Flash around my mind with each passing moment enhancing its clarity and strength. Reality becomes very blurry and I don’t know what to do. They end eventually when I eventually find something to focus on but the attack always takes its toll.

The physical part isn’t the worst honestly. It’s the fact that each attack rips open old scars while inflicting new ones in my mind faster than I can comprehend. It takes a while for me to get back to a more stable mindset.

I’m not going to lie, just writing up this post has been extremely difficult but the things that are better for us are never easy. The only reason why I’m more grounded than usual is because I immediately went to one of my friends for a hug and just took the chance to break down before I went to critical. I also spent time with a group of people that honestly helps me find the strength to be the type of person I want to be. If it wasn’t for that few hours with my friends from the retreat, I wouldn’t be strong enough to finish this post.

Then I remember. that I am so much better than my weaknesses. People see my struggle. People know what I’m capable of. People know that I’m strong and are there for me when I can’t do that by myself. Who I am is someone that never quits and that’s why I’ve proudly had this tattoo for a year now.

This tattoo means the world to me. ‘Keep Going’ in my handwriting comes from the Churchill quote ‘If you’re going through hell – keep going.’ I felt it was appropriate to accompany the phoenix. Basic mythology? A phoenix was a bird like creature that would go its entire life before catching flame and burning completely. But instead of the creature meeting a horrific, intense death, it would be reborn from the ashes and cinders and begin again. This phoenix was the best representation I had for myself. After all I had gone through and everything I will probably experience, there’s a great chance that it might seem that fate has completely defeated me and that I shouldn’t exist. I keep pushing on. I keep rising from those ashes to be stronger than the last time and be a wonderful creature that inspires wonder and awe. Also, theoretically, a blue flame or star burns hotter and brighter than a red one so I chose to think that I’m stronger than usual because of how much I chose to push forward and not give up.

*This next paragraph addresses self-harm*

The location was particular as well. I put the handwriting on my left shoulder because I needed to remind myself. When I was young, around 13, I had begun to self-harm. I was so desperate to control something in my life that I took a push pin and just couldn’t help myself. I didn’t want people to know that I was weak and losing control, so I picked my left shoulder. No one would see that thanks to Catholic school enforced uniforms that were not flattering whatsoever. I remember silently bawling as it happened. It was a point I never thought I’d get past. And then slowly, my hurt just grew and grew that I became more reckless and moved to my wrist. But more than anything, it started with that shoulder.It was the beginning of a very dark part of my life. Instead of rising from the ashes, I just let myself be consumed by the darkness of my mind and almost gave up on life. I chose to put ‘Keep Going’ there because whenever I get that itch, I will see those words that I have permanently etched onto my body. I can’t give up and, not that I ever could, I can’t forget where the darkness began. I’m glad those scars are gone and are just covered by a beautiful tattoo. There are still some days that I wake up in a panic because I get nightmares that I never stopped, but the tattoo serves as a reminder that I’m past that point and like the blue phoenix, I’ll keep rising no matter how low I reach.

This picture is accompanied by this mp 3 because this is where I started trying to make a difference. I asked permission from everyone involved to do this story. My boss gave me the approval to do this piece and I honestly think she knew I needed to do this for myself. It was one of the most challenging stories I’ve ever done. I was so scared to put the reality of living with something like this out there. I needed to do it and be a small voice for those who were afraid to speak up. I had at least three different attacks but it’s one of my proudest accomplishments because I didn’t let my fear control me. I put together this piece that might not win awards but it gave a voice to a very real problem that affects many people in my age group.

Yes I’m strong, but that’s because I understand I am weak. I needed to do this news story on living with anxiety a little over a year ago because talking about these inner demons gives us all the strength to take on this battle together. Was it terrifying to know that the world would know my struggle? Yes, but it was worth it because I am no longer the girl who hides her pain with scars of self harm because she was so desperate to control anything in her life and even flirted with the idea of suicide and death way too many times.

Not all days are good and I’ve accepted that. I’m never going to be completely better but I’m getting strong. The battle with living with mental illness is a long and winding road, but having the strength to be honest and get help will let me win the war in the end.

I hope tomorrow is the beginning of a span of better days.