1. Some days are good and some days are bad, I just want you to love me no matter the day.

There are some days where I’m too anxious to get out of bed, much less leave my house, it’s not that I don’t want to see you or hang out with you it’s that I cannot physically bring myself to leave my house. But even if I don’t leave my house that doesn’t mean I love you any less.

2. Some days are good and some days are bad, I just want you to love me no matter the day.

There are some days where I’m too anxious to get out of bed, much less leave my house, it’s not that I don’t want to see you or hang out with you it’s that I cannot physically bring myself to leave my house. But even if I don’t leave my house that doesn’t mean I love you any less.

3. When I’m having a panic attack please give me my space.

I don’t want to be smothered but I also don’t want to be completely left alone. Please don’t do anything that I don’t ask you to do.

4. Just because I’m taking medicine it doesn’t mean I’m “crazy”.

There’s this stigma behind mental illnesses that makes people think that if you have a mental illness you’re “crazy”. But that’s not the case. Being different isn’t bad and having a mental illness doesn’t make you “crazy”. Being different is beautiful and you should embrace that.

5. I am fighting against my mental illness every day.

I am fighting against my anxiety from the minute I wake up to the minute I get home and finally fall asleep again. I am fighting to not let my anxiety keep me from spending time with the people that I love and doing the things that I love. It is important to me that I get to experience life, the good the bad, and the ugly, and to not let anyone or anything keep me from that.

6. Different people experience anxiety in different ways.

The way my anxiety affects me may not be the same way that someone else’s anxiety affects them. In a case where I just want my space someone else might just want someone to hold them. Different people want different things and everyone responds to the effects that anxiety has on them differently.

7. Please do not treat me any differently.

Please do not treat me like I am fragile, like I might explode at any given moment. Do not walk on eggshells around me. Do not baby me, and do not exclude me from things just because you think that my anxiety will hold me back. I do not let my anxiety define me, so please do not allow it to define me either.

8. I’m not making up my mental illness, and I cannot simply “get over it”.

There is often times a stigma behind mental illness where people think that it is something that one can just “get over” and it will no longer matter in a few short hours, which that is not the case. Anxiety and all other mental illnesses are things that people have to learn to live with, not something that they can just “get over” or “snap out of”.

9. I know that my anxiety is often times irrational.

I know that my fears don’t always make sense, but that does not make them any less scary to me. I know that there is usually no reason to be afraid of speaking public or walking into a large crowd, or talking to strangers, or raising your hand in class, but that does not make things any less scary to me. Please do not try to bring me back into reality, I will come back when I’m ready and trying to rush that process might only make things worse.

10. My anxiety does not define me.

My anxiety is not who I am. Sometimes it may hinder me and make it difficult for me to go out and experience life in the same ways that you do. But I do not let it hold me back from doing the things that I love. I do not let my anxiety control my life, while it may make it more difficult for me to get out of bed and leave my house I will do those things because I am more than my mental illness.