“Anxiety.
As someone who hasn’t struggled with anxiety personally in my life until the last few months, I never understood what people were feeling.
I always assumed it was some excuse or crutch that was used whenever anyone didn’t want to do something.
I thought it was a cry for attention and a way for people to manipulate others into feeling sorry for them.
I had no patience with it, but just recently within the last 10 months, I have begun a deep struggle for my happiness and peace because of anxiety.
I’m not sure how it is for everybody, but I know for me that in a simple moment my mind will be clear, I’ll be happy and hopeful, life will be acceptable even with its difficulties and trials, and then in a split second, it’s all reversed.
Hope isn’t a logical thing to feel.
Peace and happiness are a luxury to be able to experience, but the most overwhelming feeling of all is the despair that I’m unloved and unwanted by the world.
When an anxiety attack comes on, it begins small.
But as my emotions grow and the rejection I feel becomes more of a reality, the most logical thing to allow myself to feel is despair.
It feels normal to be desperate for some kind of human connection because the feelings that arise are due to the lack of love and compassion I feel I’m receiving.
The worst feeling of all though is the pounding in my chest.
I’ve never had a heart attack, but I can imagine it is something like what I have felt.
My chest gets heavy and insurmountable pressure is applied to my ribs, lungs, and heart.
This pressure causes a panic within me that I’m dying and that’s when the self-destruction begins to happen.
I begin to fight for my life; my existence.
I feel so low and so heart-broken that my brain believes that my body is dying and to stop the pain, I develop ways to speed up the dying process so it will go away.
The built up energy from the panic I’m experiencing frightens me and causes me to harm myself in ways I never thought I could hurt.
I don’t understand why that is my initial reaction, because I do love myself and if anyone I loved attempted what I do to myself, I would do anything and everything I could to help them to feel their worth.
And that’s what just doesn’t make sense with all of this is.
I feel inside this sorrow and pain, but I’m clear in knowing that I don’t want to die.
I’m clear in knowing that I’m experiencing pain and that eventually it will leave, but even with that clarity, I feel hopeless that I’ll ever be accepted or loved again.
My anxiety is a result of feeling abandoned, ignored, and punished.
I feel judged and misread along with feelings of inadequacy and shame.”
-anonymous-
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**Trigger Warning: anxiety & suicidal ideology**