For days I’ve been trying to write a blog about anxiety. I wanted to write about the fact that it’s a disorder and not just social awkwardness, that it can affect every single inch of your being, that sometimes it’s terrifying and other times it gets better.
And that I’ve lived with it every day as long as I can remember.
I just haven’t been able to find the words for how something as simple as meeting a friend for coffee can take hours of mental pep-talk. Flights across the country equate to a mess of shivering nerves, the future is often characterized by gasps instead of laughs, and speaking in front of groups of people tends to disarm every skill I’ve ever learned.
Granted, I know ways to cope with my anxiety now that may make its existence completely unapparent to a lot of people in my life. But it can be exhausting at the end of the day, when you try to lay down to sleep and your heart won’t slow its beating.
You may not always understand what is going on inside of someone else, but you don’t have to understand to be kind. Find peace in giving others the benefit of the doubt and don’t ever discredit someone’s feelings. Pain and joy are real to everyone, whether you can relate or not. And if you’re struggling with anxiety, don’t let anyone tell you that it isn’t real. Seek out help, be encouraged by others, and know that it will get better. Find little wins in your every day and hold onto them with all that you have.
[Tonight, my win is posting a blog without anxiously reading it over 100 times first. Like I said, it’s in the little things]
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