Don't Fight Alone

I'm not the most frequent blogger out there. In fact, it's taken me since march to figure out something I wanted to blog about.

But I feel particularly inclined to write. I feel like I need to express a part of my life and something I did to help myself, so that others will hopefully take that advice and get the help they need too.

First off - If I sound a little "newsy" or whatever you wanna call it, please excuse it. I haven't blogged in months, and I've done a lot of news writing pieces for school since then, so this might be a combination of news writing, opinion, 3rd person, reflection, and whatever else you can throw into a blog.

Now, I want to talk about anxiety. The height of my anxiety was around Spring 2011. I had been out of school early for about 5 or 6 months at this point, and way behind because I wasn't doing my online school work. My anxiety riddled me, and it was a battle I was fighting alone because I was too ashamed to admit to anyone what I was going through.

There's this stigma that surrounds anxiety, and mental illness as a whole, that if you have a mental illness you are either A) Weak B) Unstable or C) Crazy.

All three are false.

While I can't deny that you encounter some interesting characters in the waiting room at a therapist's place in a hospital, I can say that you aren't crazy, weak or unstable for having a mental illness. Having a mental illness doesn't emasculate you; it doesn't bring down your worthiness as a human being.

Unfortunately though, there is that stigma that surrounds it, and that stigma is the exact reason that people never come out to others for support about what they're going through. You don't want to tell people that you shake like a leaf at all hours of the night, sweating and having a panic attack with tunnel vision, thinking you'd rather be dead than where you are right now.

You don't want to say "Hey mom, listen; don't take this the wrong way, but I fucking hate my life right now. I can't stand it. I dread every second of every day because I fear life. I fear anxiety and I fear every minute that comes because I don't know what it'll bring, so don't even get me started on the future."

Nobody wants to do that. Hell, even as someone who has done that, I wouldn't wanna do it again.

I'm not going to sugar coat it - it is HARD to admit to someone what you're going through. It feels like this rush of everything that you've gone through up to that moment, but it's all happening in one split second. You can see the person's facial expression, as they soak it all in. You can see the pain, and the empathy in their eyes and maybe you love it, or maybe you hate. Either way, it is SO necessary to come out to someone about what you're going through.

Mental illness is such a tough battle. It's a big opponent, and one that you shouldn't fight alone. Nobody deserves to go through it. Nobody deserves to be feeling like every day is a new day trapped in their own personal prison cell - that prison cell being their brain.

It is so essential for you to seek help. It is so essential for you to battle this head on, but to battle it with others by your side. Don't let it linger, don't let it continue to get worse to the point where you can't take it anymore.

When I admitted to my mom that I was having severe anxiety, things didn't get better right away; in fact, they got worse.

Because I had admitted everything I was going through to her, we began to face everything head on. I stopped pretending that it was okay, and really went after my demons, which is probably the most difficult part of the battle. It's hard to face what you're going through, and it's hard to dive right on in and tackle it head on, but when you do that, you slowly start coming up to the surface. Slowly but surely you begin to understand that you're not in this alone, and that there are solutions and fixes to what you're going through. Slowly but surely, you begin to heal.

So please, don't be afraid to open up to someone. Whether it's a friend, family member, or someone that you feel wouldn't pass any judgement; Just please, do it.

I'll end on this quote:

 "You don't have to control your thoughts. You just have to stop letting them control you." - Dan Millman.

I think we all have blocks between us and the best version of ourselves, whether it's shyness, insecurity, anxiety, whether it's a physical block, and the story of a person overcoming that block to their best self. It's truly inspiring because I think all of us are engaged in that every day.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/anxiety.html#TKv285J

I think we all have blocks between us and the best version of ourselves, whether it's shyness, insecurity, anxiety, whether it's a physical block, and the story of a person overcoming that block to their best self. It's truly inspiring because I think all of us are engaged in that every day.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/anxiety.html#TKv285J