I woke up Saturday morning at 2 am, not an unusual occurrence during the past few months. But this one was different. The question to myself came up....are you o.k.....pause, pause, pause....and then the answer, NO I am not o.k. For the next 2 hours I was debating this answer with myself. Took my memories back to 2010, the year when I was diagnosed with severe anxiety. I fought hard against it and managed to deal with it and stopped medication by the end of 2013. It was a tough 3 year battle but through support from family and my doctor I managed to gain back the life I wanted. The events that lead up to my severe anxiety in 2010 are to much to write here.
Back to the present, 2019 has been a very difficult year. 1) Loss of a parent, 2) my child has battled depression over the past 7 months and 3) financially I am in a bad position. So I asked myself on Saturday morning, why have you been lying to yourself and to others during the past 9 months? See, every day people ask “ how are you “. The standard answer “ good, how are you? “.....
Not true at all! I could have won an Oscar award with my acting “ Good “ in the past few months, but now I have put myself in a position where I could potentially fall back to where I was in 2010.
I will not let this happen and through my admission to myself and others since Saturday I already feel relieve and in fact I slept much better the past 2 nights.
The positive I want to bring here is:
1) Recognise and acknowledge your emotions/signs early enough
2) Don’t keep it to yourself. You have people around you that can and will help
3) Through processes, counselling and/or medication and lastly but very important TIME you will return to live a life that you want
4) If you had your anxiety under control and life is pushing a bit on the hard side, don’t wait to act and don’t give up
I also realised now more than ever the importance to become involved and to talk about anxiety. So many people need to hear the positives as well.
Thank you for starting this thread.
Andy
