There's this little thing called Anxiety that really sucks the life out of you.
Have you heard of it?
I am sure.
Have you experienced it?
There's a good chance.
When I was young, there was my sister and then there was me. We were very similar. We liked the same music, we took part in the same activities, we had a lot of friends, we were friendly, people opened up to us, and we had similar mannerisms. The differences were small, but obvious.
Our mom has always used the same example when describing the differences in our personalities. "If we were by a body of water, and I told the girls not to go in it, Andie would run 10 feet away and stay there, while Ali would dip her toes in it. Not quite breaking the rules, but stretching them." And while I have fought that my whole life, it's damn true. That's how we've always been. I believe part of that was Andie's anxious tendencies, and my attitude of always being carefree everything. I am still this way, and Andie is also pretty go-with-the-flow. But, yes... our whole lives she has been more visibly anxious than I have been, and that caused me to believe that once her anxiety issues started forming in a bad way, I was in the clear of this horrible problem.
WRONG-O.
Lately I have been hit by anxiety in a horrific way. The kind that makes you feel like you're constantly out of control of yourself, and feeling like you have to walk on egg-shells because any small stress could you lead you to a panic you can't recover from. Then I realized, yes, Andie has been anxious and I have witnessed her struggling with this. But my tendencies of dealing with stress my whole life is to avoid at all costs anything that freaks me out. Anxious. Is that the dumbest thing you've ever heard? Maybe. It makes zero sense. I don't even know why I have done that, but that has been one of the strong consistencies in my life. If I am worried about that homework assignment, I am going to wait to do it until 2:00 am before it's due. But don't be fooled, I am going to think about how stressed I am about it for the whole night - while choosing to do nothing about it. If I feel like I am struggling but I don't want to be, I am going to go ahead and not tell anyone until it comes out in the form of a panic attack while talking to your mom at midnight one night. So yes, I have always even anxious. But mine was different than Andie's, and that made me think I just didn't struggle from it.
There is one memory in particular that I think about now, and realize how truly anxious I have always been. In elementary school, it was common for girls to be dramatic and want to cause small and meaningless fights with their friends. However, my anxious self didn't like that. Not one bit. My 3rd grade self used to ride the bus to school with a pit in my stomach actually afraid of drama at school. I used to secretly wish recess would get cancelled. And when it wouldn't, I sometimes found it more enjoyable to sit by my classroom door, knowing that I was steering clear of any problem going on on the playground. I think about this now, and I want to hug my little 3rd grade self and tell her that she will be okay. And that drama won't ruin her life. But she probably wouldn't have believed me. Because for a while she let it. Sundays were her least favorite days, and her home was her sanctuary. These patterns definitely stopped once I was out of elementary school, and I loved being social and having lots of friends. In fact, I was hardly home on weekends. If I wasn't busy, I wanted to make plans. And I think this was to spite my old self. I was happy, I was fine, and I wanted to prove that to me. But of course, I was anxious about new things. My anxiety chose school as my biggest enemy. I was nervous about getting poor grades, and that caused me to sit and stress and stew and feel helpless instead of working to make that not be the case. I got fine grades. But in 7th grade I got straight-A's. The time in my life when I was excited to start a new from my elementary school slump (oh that's so sad), and focus only on school. Stay off the radar with everyone. That's all I wanted. I almost wanted to go unnoticed by people, because that would mean I would never be an issue or have to deal with any issues. Then I made friends. Beautiful, wonderful, life-changing friends. The same ones I call when I need to cry. The same ones who call me when they need the same. The ones I feel whole when I am with, and proudest to be associated with. But of course, that left me avoiding my stresses. Which seemed easy to do, but now I think "Wait, Ali... you were stressed about things so you chose to not do it? That's how you dealt with it?" Yep, mhm... that's it. Nailed it. This has been repeated throughout my life. I wanted to be in Canterbury Belles more than anything. I was worried I wouldn't get in, so I didn't tryout my freshman year. Then last minute, I reeeeeally wanted to, so I prepared one day in advance. Yes, one day. And of course I didn't get in, because you don't learn a whole song and nail it in one day. So one year later, I started early. Really early. And I got in. Weird how that works huh?
I have two wonderful parents who should win the Nobel Peace Prize. I say this because there was a good few years in my life that my anxiety chose them as my worst enemies. Because they knew I was struggling, and they knew I wouldn't talk about it. So they tried to do so for me. But my anxiety didn't like that, because someone was trying to stop it, and Lord knows that wasn't going to make it happy. So during those conversations I was silent. Yes, I knew I should be doing more homework, and I knew that I should face those things that worried me. But my parents didn't understand that it wasn't a lack of motivation, it was a lack of strength to do so. And how should they have known? I didn't tell them! My anxiety didn't tell them! And no one else knew. Not one person. That includes boyfriends, best friends, trusted teachers, anyone... But they continued to try and help me. Even when I pushed away as hard as I could. That goes back to my sassy personality. If they were upsetting me, I wasn't going to try super hard to hide that. I actually wouldn't really try one bit. And while they were mad in the moment, I think that's one thing they grin about now. They laugh at my "spit-fire" ways of living, and that's even more remarkable. A lot of my sassy, spit-fire habits were aimed at them. But they still have grown a love for it. Whoa.
I have just recently come to terms with the fact that this is what I am experiencing.
It's not cool. Or fun. Or easy.
But it sure is real.
Yes, I am talking to you who doesn't understand why you can't just figure shit out.
It is real.
