; 1 in 5 ;

1 in 5 five people are affected by mental illness.  I am.  I am 1 in 5.

I have generalized and social anxiety.  I fight through depressive episodes.

It took a long time for me to get to the point where I felt safe enough, but also sick enough, to talk to someone about what I was dealing with.  Anxiety is complicated and confusing and hard to explain.  It's different for everyone that experiences it.  My anxiety my not look or sound or feel like someone else's anxiety but that doesn't mean it isn't completely real and relevant.

When I tell people I have anxiety, a lot of times their response is "oh you'd never guess that from looking at you!" and in equal parts it comforts me and it bothers me.
For one, I feel my anxiety so big and it's shocking and surprising and a little reassuring that it doesn't look like how it feels.  Because it feels unbearable.  It feels like I am going to jump out of my skin.  It feels like I can't breathe.  It feels like I'm teetering on the brink of passing out and screaming at the same time.   It feels like every person in the world is looking at me, scowling at me, hating me; even when I'm surrounded by strangers.  Even when I'm surrounded by friends.  And to some degree, I am glad that it doesn't look as bad as it feels.

On the other hand, when I'm told that no one ever would've guessed it because I don't LOOK sick, it makes me angry.  It makes me feel invisible.  It makes me feel like they don't take me seriously.  It makes me feel like they don't actually see me at all.  It makes me want to scream that you can't SEE diabetes or sore joints or cancer.  But when someone tells you they have arthritis you don't say "oh you'd never guess that from looking at you!"  Because you can't actually see illness.  You can see symptoms.  And you can see mine.  You can see me bouncing my leg and popping my fingers and picking at my split ends-anything to keep my eyes off of the people around me and keep my mind focused on one thing.  You can see me sign my ABC's as I walk to give my brain something to think about other than the panic.  You can see me bite my lip until the skin comes off.  You can see my symptoms, you just don't realize that's what they are.

Anxiety, for me, is a voice in my head that is negative all the time.  It is a series thoughts and feelings that roll through unannounced like "you're not worth anything"
"you're too emotional"
"you should just shut up"
"no one cares"
"no one wants you here"
"you're in the way"
"move, move, move, get out of the way!"
"you're taking up space!  You're wasting space!  Just move!"
"You're too loud.  Don't breathe.  Don't talk.  Don't move, just be still and silent.  Don't draw attention"
Anxiety is the feeling that I am somewhere I shouldn't be all the time, in every situation, in every second.  Anxiety is the feeling that people don't want or need me and that they wish I was elsewhere.  Anxiety is the feeling that no mater where I go, or who I am with, I will never fit or be welcome.

Anxiety is not stress.  I am not stressed.  I do not need to relax.  I am at war with myself and I am FIGHTING every single day just to exist.  Sometimes I pull into the parking lot at Target and have a panic attack and turn around and go home without ever getting out of the car.  Because the anxiety says I can't go in and I don't need to and all those people will see me and that can't happen.  It happens whether I am alone or with strangers or friends or family.  It happens when I am with people that I know in my heart love me, but that voice in my head says otherwise.  I am not stressed.  This is different.

Some days are easier than others.  Some days I feel unstoppable and brave and the war is not so hard to fight.  Some days, I wake up and I feel like I have a purpose and a plan and that the day is one big possibility.  Some days feel like bottled sunshine has been poured in my veins and I can do anything.  And then there are days when getting out of bed is literally all I can do.  Days where I feel empty.  Days where I wish I could just sleep and sleep and sleep.  Days where I sit in my room with a lump in my throat and tears burning in my eyes for no reason; because I'm just so incredibly tired of fighting.

I used to live at a 10.  Anxiety was a 10 every second of every day, even at home.  I had panic attacks almost every night before school the entire time I was in college.  I felt like I was going to fly off the handle all the time.  I felt like I was holding on to this sliver of sanity and the thread that kept me tethered to the world was about to snap at any second.  And then I started therapy.  I was skeptical and I was skittish and it has been the best decision I've ever made in my life.  Because of the things I've learned and figured out through therapy, I live at a 3 or a 4 most days.  Leaving the house spikes my anxiety but for the most part, I live with a controllable level of panic all the time.  The panic is always there, bubbling under the surface but it's gone from a rolling boil to a simmer.  It is never a 0.  No matter how much I want 0, I haven't found it yet.

Self care is an over used term, but it is an important tool for coping.  Some days, for me it looks like productivity.  It looks like laundry and healthy food and loud music and running errands.  And some days, like yesterday, it looks like me alone in my room, wrapped in blankets with the lights off, eating ice cream and crying through another episode of Greys Anatomy.  Some days it looks like taking a forty minute shower just to sit in hot water and feel nothing.  Some days it looks like maintaining and holding on however I can.

I don't want pity from people.  I don't want people to take this the wrong way and think I've written this for attention or for drama.  I just want awareness.  I want sensitivity.  I want to see the stigma around mental health change.

People don't come up to my brother and ask "how diabetic are you today?  Have you tried not eating sugar, I read somewhere that cures diabetes" but people do ask me "How anxious are you today?  Have you tried relaxing?" and I need it to stop even though they think they're being kind.  I need the people who don't understand why I hate big groups and small talk to understand that it's not personal; it's just HARD and sometimes I physically can't do it.  I need people to stop saying "I never would've guessed it by looking at you" when I tell them I have anxiety and start saying "wow, thank you for trusting me and letting me know."  I need people to stop thinking that I cancel plans because I don't want to see them and understand that sometimes I'm canceling plans because  the thought of leaving the house and seeing people is making me nauseous and making me hyperventilate.  I need people to stop telling me to calm down when I'm overwhelmed because I'm not in control in those moments; I physically cannot calm down.   I need people to stop telling me that they "get stressed too" because it is not the same thing.  I need people to understand that there is not always a reason for my anxiety.  Sometimes there is a trigger and sometimes I just wake up in panic and cannot escape it.  If there were an explanation behind it, believe me I would also love to know what it was and how to fix it.  I need awareness so I don't have to write things like this.  I need to feel safe enough to talk about it without the fear that people will then put their kid gloves on and treat me like a broken, fragile little bird.  I need people to stop acting like mental health isn't just as important as any other kind of health.

Since May is Mental Health Awareness month, I just wanted to say my piece.  It's something I care about a lot, something that's part of me and it's something that doesn't get the right coverage, and sometimes the coverage it does get is misleading and regressive.  Like I said, it looks different for everyone but if you or someone in your life is struggling, please realize that it is very real and you are not crazy or broken or weak.  If someone confides in you that they deal with something like this, please realize that it took so much bravery for them to do so and please, please don't dismiss them.  Mental health is real.  Just as real as heart health and gum health and joint health and we have GOT to start treating it as such; if for no other reason than to help the people affected by it.  To help me.

From your 1 in 5 friend
-M