My earliest memory of a panic attack happened when I was 14 years old. I was at a dance competition waiting backstage to do my solo. My mom was in the audience, but I knew she wouldn't be there long. Right after I preformed she had to leave and words couldn't describe how stressed out I was about it. I remember the breathing changes that happened. Something that was so easy soon turned into something I was struggling to do. My thoughts were scrambled. Picture that one episode of Spongebob where Spongebob has little versions of himself in his brain. Spongebob gets stressed out and everything in his brain is chaotic, that's exactly how I felt. I had to remove myself from the side of the stage because I didn't want anybody to be concerned. I was shaking, I was struggling to control my thoughts and breathing, I was a mess. Thankfully it soon went away and I preformed my solo. I remember that panic attack as clear as day because afterwards I didn't know what to call it. Little did 14 year old McKenna know, it wasn't going to be the last time that happened. A whole storm was about to come.
Anxiety is mental illness in which feelings of worry or fear are strong enough to interfere with an individuals daily life. It is important to note that everyone with anxiety experiences it differently. Please note that in this article I am going off of what I experience. Anxiety comes in many different forms that cause people to feel different things. There's social anxiety, phobias, and panic disorders, even under those umbrellas nobody experiences the same thing. Treatment wise it's the same thing. Nobody is the same. My medications work for me but they aren't going to work for someone else. What I do to calm myself down isn't going to work for someone else. At the end of the day treatment is highly personalized. Some people try tons of different medications before they find the "right" one, for me I tried two and luckily the second one is the one that worked for me.
Dealing with my anxiety has been a struggle not only for myself but also the different people in my life. My coworkers and family unfortunately get the majority of it. I get very angry very fast whenever anxiety comes into play. When I'm with my family and I get stressed out and anxious they sometimes don't know how to handle it and I don't blame them for that. I still don't have a steady hold on my anxiety and I don't think I ever will. My coworkers have seen the good days, the bad days, and just the plain old ugly days. I get this sensory overload and everything changes. I'm quick to snap at people who I don't mean to, I can't focus properly on a task, I get mad over the dumbest things. In those situations I need to get out of my own head, but I can't. I've been told time and time again to just evaluate the situation and get out of my head but in the heat of the moment I find that task to be impossible. One of my coworkers decided to give my anxiety a name, Steve to be exact. Naming has in a way made in less daunting to deal with. Work can be very stressful and that stress just triggers the anxiety. Sometimes its nothing at all. That's where my struggle comes from. When people ask why I have panic attacks it's frustrating to say "I don't know." I'm someone who likes answers and "I don't know" is not an acceptable answer to me. Why do I turn into a completely different person? I don't know. Why did I have 3 panic attacks today? I don't know. Why me? I don't know
When the word anxiety was a new thing in my life I always asked why me. I was a happy kid for the most part. I had a good childhood. So how did I get here. That is another question that has to be answered with I don't know. I've had to come to the conclusion that that's just the way my brain is. I have accepted my anxiety because now it's just another part of who I am. I am in no way accepting defeat in accepting my anxiety. I can own up that I have it, I take medications for it and I do other things to try and lower it. There is no other option other than accepting it. This is how I am and yes sometimes I am ashamed of it because sometimes I hurt other people but what else can I do? Sometimes I just can't control it and that's what happens. My anxiety makes me hate myself. I look in the mirror some days and wonder why. Accepting it is easy for the most part, but some days are really hard. Some days I wake up and anxiety messes everything up. I can't blame anyone but myself and that sucks, but that's part of accepting it.
Anxiety has made my high school experience a whirlwind, and college will more than likely be the same. But I am lucky to have people in my life who understand and people who help. It's hard to admit but without those people in my life helping me and making sure I'm okay, I probably wouldn't be alive. The good days are amazing. The bad days are unbearable. I'm not looking for an end to anxiety. I'm not looking for a destination of complete and udder perfectness. I'm looking for a destination in which the people I love the most are not hurt by my mental illness as much. I'm looking for a destination that has control. Because control is something I long for. In a way it is something we all long for.
