Meredith's Monday Musings: Anxiety

Hi Everyone!

Happy Monday! How’s everyone’s week going so far? Mine is going pretty good. I had a very fun Halloween. I hope y’all did too!

This week’s Meredith’s Monday Musings post is all about: Anxiety! 

I have anxiety with just about everything. I’m here to say that it sucks. Oh my gosh, does it suck big monkey balls. I don’t think I’d wish this on anyone. The constant worrying, the over analyzing of every situation, the physical symptoms from all of this (insomnia, physically getting ill, fingers and toes going numb, the sensation of being about to faint). Needless to say, it isn’t fun.

Ever since I was a little kid, I always worried. I wanted to make sure I didn’t upset anyone, that I got good grades, that my parents were happy with me, etc. It wasn’t until I was in my third year of college that I noticed my “worry wart” tendencies to be getting worse. I spoke with one of my teachers who had very open in the past about her own anxiety issues and with her help, I was able to go talk to someone and learn how to deal with my anxiety. 

Two years later, I’m doing much better than I was. Don’t get me wrong, there are still times when my anxiety is worse than others. For instance, when I got a new job. The first couple of months were hard because I was in a new place, having to deal with a whole different type of clients than what I was used to, etc. The feeling to want to crawl into a ball and hide under the covers came back with a vengeance. But, I knew that wasn’t an option. If I did that, I’d be letting the anxiety win. So, I pulled myself together, did a few deep breathing exercises, reminded myself of what was the worst that could happen, and moved on. I’m glad I did because my job is going great now!

I’m not writing this post to get sympathy. In fact, I hate it when people treat me differently because they know I worry a lot. I’m the same person, I just sometimes can’t stop worrying, even when a situation seems small or not that big of a deal. I shared this post for one, to let others out there who experience anxiety to know that they aren’t alone. In fact, it’s stated that 14 million adults have anxiety. That’s a lot of people! What’s sad is that, it’s also stated that only 36.9% of people who have anxiety, get help from it. Coming from someone who has gotten help,  trust me, it will make a world of difference! 

The second reason why I’m sharing this is because for the people who don’t have anxiety, I want you to understand it a bit better. I don’t worry to get attention, I literally just can’t help it. Trust me, if I could stop worrying about everything, I would in a heartbeat. So please, just be patient and whatever you do, DO NOT SAY “Calm down.” or “Can’t you just relax?” When I hear those words, it makes me want to punch the person in the face because if I could do either of those two things, I would be doing them already. Any person who has anxiety would be doing them too. The best thing a “non-anxious” person can do is: be understanding, ask if there’s anything you can do to help, reassure the anxious person that everything will be okay, and let the anxious person do whatever they need to calm themselves down. These four things will help the most. 

That’s all I got for today. I hope that everyone has a great week!