Hello, world.

I know its been a few months since my last post – the holidays were crazy, per the usual, and then the next thing I knew, I woke up and it’s Leap Year. It’s interesting that I’m choosing today to write this post; last night I had one of the worst night’s sleep in years, and when I did sleep, my mind was plagued by nightmares. I woke up sweating and then was immediately cold, and nothing and no one could help. I was having trouble catching my breath, and the whole world felt like it was imploding on me.

I know that, logically speaking, none of this is actually happening, but to anyone who has never had to suffer from anxiety, who has never experienced what true anxiety feels like, has never had an anxiety attack, or has never known someone and seen it firsthand, this is a very real and scary thing to deal with, and for many of us, it’s a daily struggle.

Last night, in the middle of the night, I posted a meme on Instagram that concerned someone I know. She reached out to me and I reassured her that I was okay, but that I was just dealing with my anxiety on a public platform. It’s important that people know they are NOT alone, and that anxiety is a real thing…. and a bitch and a half at that.

I fucking HATE feeling like this. It’s not a constant battle, but it is something I have dealt with my entire life. As a matter of fact, up until a few years ago, I didn’t even know I had anxiety. I had spent the majority of my life on edge, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but I just assumed that was the norm. I had never actually known what it felt like to not have a care in the world. Even before children, I would stay up, worrying relentlessly about things of which I had ZERO control; but my brain chemistry couldn’t have given two fucks. The mind is a vast, endless universe, compacted inside a small brain, and yet it can control 100% of your life, at any given time.

I don’t have anxiety attacks often- rarely, in fact, but if I’m not careful, it’s almost too easy to let negative thoughts and fears virtually take over your life. And my mind has some pretty dark corners. But allow me to put your minds at ease. I don’t hear voices telling me to do bad things, and I don’t even think about causing harm to myself or others. Rather, the dark corners of my mind are where I go when I just cannot stop worrying for those I love, or for myself for that matter. It’s horrible.

Back before I was actually diagnosed with Severe Anxiety Disorder, and given the proper medication to balance out my brain chemistry, my mind would jump from happy to sheer paranoia in a matter of seconds. Allow me to give you an example:

When Adam would leave for work, and told me he would call me at 5pm, at 5:01pm I would start blowing up his cell phone. TRUE STORY. Call after call after call…. I was relentless. From an outsider’s perspective, I must have appeared fucking crazy, but in my mind it all made perfect sense. He hadn’t called because he was probably dead. I know that seems beyond extreme, but welcome to the world of severe anxiety. I remember so many nights, pacing back and forth, looking out the front window, waiting for the police to come to tell me there had been an accident, or something terrible had happened. I would literally be staring out the window, planning his funeral and trying to figure out how to help my children cope with the loss.

I realize how incredibly crazy I sound, and even I must admit that now, looking back, I must have acted crazy, as well. I would lay in bed at night, and instead of thinking and stressing about the shit I had to get done, I would lay there wondering if this would be the last night I spent with my family. I would wonder, “Will one of my kids be murdered tomorrow? Will someone I love be kidnapped?” The fears were never for myself, but for my loved ones.

Most people never had a clue – they would just assume I was high-strung and über intense; and I usually hid it by being extra hyper or extra outgoing, if only to help me distract myself from all the horrible and irrational thoughts taking over my mind. I, myself, never had a clue, until my daughter was almost a year old and I had what seemed like the beginning of a complete nervous breakdown. I went and spoke to my OBGYN, because I thought perhaps that I was suffering from some form of postpartum depression, but once she started asking me pointed questions about my life, my state of mind and how long I had been feeling this way, she immediately referred me to a doctor for an official diagnosis. I was shocked…. Didn’t EVERYONE assume their kids were going to be taken? Wasn’t it completely normal to feel the world coming down on you and knowing, truly knowing, that at any second, the sky would simply fall? Apparently not. But I had never even given a second thought about it. That was my world, and I just assumed that was everyone’s world. I would watch other people go about their daily lives, and I would ask myself, “How do they do it? How are they not reaching for a paper bag just to catch a breath?!” 

Once I was told I had Severe Anxiety Disorder, and would need to go on medication, I had a complete meltdown. What was so wrong with me, that I would have to take medicine, most likely for the rest of my life, just to function? I was crying hysterically, and when the doctor asked me why, I remember saying something along the lines of, “Because if I can’t do this on my own, and I need medication to cope, then that must mean that I’m essentially broken. I’m weak and that is the complete opposite of who I am and what I stand for.”

Let me stop and state, emphatically, that I have never ever judged anyone who required medication to help them cope with daily life; it was just a complete shock to my system and psyche that I was now “one of them”. I didn’t want to have to rely on prescriptions to be able to function – I was a tough bitch. No one could tear me down. I could do this on my own, thank you very much. But it goes so far beyond that, and I’m grateful that I allowed myself to be vulnerable in that moment and accept what I was being told. Once I made peace with my situation, and once I fully understood that what I had been experiencing my ENTIRE life was not the norm, I knew that I was about to see life in a very different light.

It has been a few years since I started taking anxiety medication, and it’s something that I am not ashamed to admit, even in the slightest. I write about things that make people uncomfortable, but my ultimate goal is to help people stop and take inventory of their own lives. I’m constantly surprised by how many people confide in me about their own anxieties and fears, but refuse to talk about it for fear of judgment from others. So allow me to put your minds at ease. If you need to judge, judge me. Feel free to look down on me or see me as weak or somehow “broken”, because I can assure you, I am not. I am just a human being trying to deal with the day to day struggles of living with anxiety. Even with medication, it never goes away completely, although its a micrometer of what it used to be. But as adults, we all have different struggles that pop up on any given day, and it’s how we deal with these struggles that determine who we are. Whether or not you require medication to cope to me is irrelevant, unless you’re abusing said medication or are simply taking them to dull some form of pain.

So to those of you who know how to manage those struggles without medication, I applaud you. In fact, I’m fucking jealous. I wish I didn’t need medication, but the fact of the matter is, I do. And you know what? That’s okay.

Even with stress-related anxiety attacks, or any form of anxiety – mild or severe – you are not alone. Remember that, as you sit, looking out the window and imagining the worst, or laying in bed, convinced it’s a loved one’s last night on Earth, help IS available. Had I gotten the help I needed sooner, my path in life wouldn’t have felt like Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, but in the end, all that matters is what we do in the present, and what we do in the future. We cannot change the past, but we can certainly do our part to try not to repeat it.

Sincerely,

Kate Robinson