Hello, Anxiety, My Old Friend

I was about 4 or 5 when I remember first having significant anxiety issues. A couple memories stand out:

• My mom had started a job that would require Sarah and me to go to daycare during the day, and I didn’t even make it through the first day. I remember a lot about that day, panicking over being in an unfamiliar place with people I didn’t know and not knowing where they had taken my sister (in a different room). I freaked out to the point that they called my mom and she quit her job that day and came to pick us up.

• When I was in kindergarten, I started to shut down. I didn’t interact with the other kids and mostly kept to myself. I remember going to some type of family doctor/therapist/something and answering questions about how I felt about different things at home and school.

In elementary, I remember just generally being very anxious and shy. I was afraid of new things and unfamiliar situations. And as I got older, that didn’t really change.

Junior high is not typically most people’s time to shine, but when you’re a bundle of awkwardness and anxiety, it tends to be particularly, um, “unshiny.” In English class in 7th or 8th grade, we were reading parts of Great Expectations, and a few of us were asked to stand at the front of the class and read certain roles aloud. I was given Estella’s role. Normally, anxiety would have won, but I looooved Great Expectations and was excited about this. Until we got to this part:

She stood looking at me, and, of course, I stood looking at her. 

Estella: "Am I pretty?" 

Pip: "Yes; I think you are very pretty."

My anxiety flared up as soon as I saw the words. And, sure enough, when I said, “Am I pretty?” I heard a lot of my classmates laugh. Quietly… kind of. I didn’t look up and I tried not to cry. It was a “fight or flight” kind of feeling, but I didn’t really do either. I just finished reading and sat back down.

Those kinds of things happened here and there until I hit puberty and some of the physical awkwardness smoothed itself out. I didn’t get made fun of as much and kind of found a rhythm to life to avoid those types of moments. But I still had that anxiety in my core and I couldn’t shake it.

It hung around in college and afterwards. It still hangs around. I get anxiety over the weirdest things: road trips make me REALLY nervous. I hate them. Diverting from plans or schedules. Not knowing what’s ahead or what’s next.

When someone texts me, “Hey, I want to talk later” or something like that, my heart races! Why? What do you want? What did I do now? What’s wrong?

When I have to make a phone call, my heart races. What will they say? What if I don’t know what to say back? What if they ask me something I don’t know?

I get anxious about going to the post office,FedEx, or UPS. I get anxious asking questions. I hate networking and small talk. I stare down at my phone or notes and pretend to be busy so I don’t have to think of something to say to someone else.

Public speaking? Thanks to my college and job training, I can do it. I have done it. But afterwards, I have to go and just breathe in a corner by myself for a while.

It sounds inescapable and confining and like being shut in a box. It can lead to health problems. Case in point: me. When I started having health issues around age 25-26, I went into complete panic and suffered (literally) for it. So many medical tests and doctor visits and tears and feeling like a hopeless case.

Utter failure.

But not really. =)

I am not a hopeless case or an utter failure. I mean, I am a walking catastrophe sometimes! (Just read this blog)  But in a clumsy, awkward sort of way. Not in life.

Here are some things that I’ve found helpful.

Medication has helped -- I want to be really clear about that. If you are struggling with anxiety, I do recommend considering all options for help, and that may include medical therapy of some kind. I'm on Cymbalta for pain, but it also helps with anxiety. There is no shame in that. I thought there was, but there isn’t.

Honesty about myself with myself and with others has also helped. No point in trying to cover this up. Plus, when you are honest and open about your anxiety, you help others who struggle with anxiety realize they are not alone. That can be very freeing. Our small group at church has been great for me in this area. They’re also great for helping me remember what is true and speaking that to me.

And of course, for me, my faith has played a huge role in this. I had terrible anxiety all through my childhood and teen years, wrestling with some major questions. For those familiar with Christianity, you may be familiar with the “prayer of salvation” which is basically our turning to Christ as our hope, realizing we are imperfect and in need of a Savior, and accepting Him as that in our lives. But in my youth, I didn’t understand this well, which is kind of surprising given all the influences in my life. But still, I didn’t. I “prayed” this “prayer” hundreds of times, always filled with fear and discouragement because I wasn’t sure it had "worked" and maybe I didn’t mean it or wasn’t sorry enough or didn’t say the right things. Despair. That was how it felt. I made myself sick from worry. Eventually, I just kind of gave up on it, accepting that this was my fate.

And then one day when I was out of high school -- I was about 18 -- I heard a teacher say something that made me stop in my tracks and pay really close attention. He talked about how sometimes we get stuck in those ruts of anxiety and worry (that I just described) and the question to ask ourselves is really, “Who are you trusting in right now for your salvation?”

And I paused and thought. And I knew the answer. And that was the last day that I ever had any anxiety about my identity in Christ. That was 16 years ago.

So while I DEFINITELY still struggle with anxiety, even really bad anxiety, this isn’t who I am and it isn’t my whole story. The kid panicking in the daycare, feeling sick with worry, or crying over school problems. The teenager trying to keep her heart from racing after overhearing someone making fun of her. The adult sick (literally) with worry over her chronic pain and fatigue. That’s not me.

Chosen, loved, blessed, confident… I am who YOU say I am. (Lyrics, for reference)

Life often comes full circle. My daughter Alice has anxiety. She struggles with new and unfamiliar places or situations. And I look at her and see this as such a gift. Not her anxiety of course, but the fact that I get to be her mother. I, who have been there and can relate. Her story is her own, but I can hold her hand and walk with her, showing her hope and giving her a safe place to just BE as she navigates these things.