I never knew I had anxiety. I always had my highs and lows just like everybody else, it was just that my lows were so low that I could barely climb back up again. After gasping for air with tears running down my face, heart pounding like a heavy fist on a table, and thinking of every way a situation could possibly go wrong, I decided that I needed to stop ignoring what was going on. It was normal for me, but after hearing of a friend's diagnosis with generalized anxiety disorder, it seemed like I had a similar issue. I thought about it for a while, but then rejected the idea that I may actually have a mental illness.

While I tried to push it aside, my anxiety pulled me closer, and on one specific night it took any control I had left away from me. While driving by myself going north on I-95 in Florida, my toes started to tingle. The tingling moved into my whole body, my heart felt like it was going to beat out of my chest, I started to violently shake, and then my vision went out and all I could see was black with bright white spots. I don't remember driving after that, but the next thing I remember is sitting in an empty parking lot with no lights and realizing that my car was almost out of gas, my phone was almost dead, and I barely had any cell service. Eventually I was able to call my friend and my parents, they were able to calm me down after a few hours, and I returned to my picturesque waterside university just in time to take my final exams.

I refused to accept the fact that I might have anxiety and then it showed me that it had me; it had me by the throat and wasn't going to let go. On that one night I had never felt more alone in my whole life. I've never wanted my mom or dad to hold me as much as I did then (even though they were 1100 miles away), and I've never hated who I was as much as I did then. I didn't understand why something like that could be happening to me because nothing is wrong with my life; I'm very fortunate and usually very happy. I have a very loving family that supports all of my hopes and dreams, I'm a college athlete, I attend a private university in Florida, and I have more friends that I could ever ask for, so how could I have debilitating anxiety attacks? It only got better when I accepted my anxiety. I only noticed a change when I acknowledged that I needed help and it wasn't going to get better if I didn't help myself.

The first thing I did was go to the doctor and get prescribed an antidepressant, the second was confide in somebody that I trust and both have made a world of a difference. I never thought I was the kind of person that could ever need to be on an antidepressant and my family thought the same. I heard things like "since when do you have anxiety," and "you don't need to be medicated." It was hard to just be patient and realize that I had been hiding my anxious thoughts and feelings from everybody because I didn't accept them until recently, so I had to give my family time to accept it too. I also had my best friend and boyfriend to talk to and they talked me through my anxiety-ridden moments and loved me all the way through them.

If you think you have anxiety or any other type of mental illness, maybe you really do and it's time to talk to your doctor. And if you're not ready to do that? Talk to a friend or family member. Maybe you're like me and you think people will think that you're crazy, but that's not true at all. Anyone that truly loves you will want to listen to you and talk to you and maybe you'll even find someone you can relate to that you didn't know had an issue like yours. Accept your anxiety and you'll realize you can go from looking at it as a demon that ruins your life to a part of you that despite having, you can still live a normal life. You can learn to love yourself even with anxiety, it does not define you or the way you have to live your life.