I need to tackle this subject. Luckily nowadays it is rightly seen as a big deal rather than a lame excuse to be lazy. To me it is a big deal. A very big deal. So here we go...
According to the National Health Service, Anxiety is described as “… a feeling of unease, such as worry or fear, that can be mild or severe.”
This is different to Depression, which the NHS describes as “…feelings of unhappiness and hopelessness… Losing interest in things you used to enjoy and feeling tearful… Feeling constantly tired, sleeping badly and having no appetite or overeating…. At its mildest, sufferers can feel persistently low in spirit, while severe depression can make them feel suicidal, that life is not worth living.”
To try and explain to people who may not know about these issues, or believe they are not real conditions, I can sum up how my anxiety/depression feels: -
Imagine being in the water and somebody is holding onto your foot, pulling you down. The surface of the water is a half-inch away from your nose. You can hold your hand out of the water and occasionally scoop a handful of air down to your face, enabling you to take just a sip of oxygen. But you cannot get that full breath you desire. That is what, for me, it truly feels like.
So how does this affect my day-to-day life?
Imagine that you have your worst enemy in your pocket all day every day. This villain constantly puts you down, calls you the worst names, tells you that people don’t like you and that they think bad things about you. That nemesis is constantly there in the back of the mind. It has been impossible to go out into society without constantly worrying that people will sneer at me or that I will hear them whispering about my size. That when I go shopping it’s obvious the Fat Girl will buy all the goodies and most of the rest of the food in the store and leave the Normal People with nothing but fruit and veg. Knowing how big my arse is means I must cover it with a coat, even in the height of summer.
I can tell you this. It’s exhausting. It’s upsetting.
And I can also tell you this: it’s all in the mind.
I can count on one finger how many people have actually sneered at me or called me names or studied my trolley contents in Asda. In fact the opposite happens. People are lovely. It would be more difficult for me to count the number of times people have given me a warm smile, or told me a sweet story, or say a funny one-liner.
So why then do I still feel like I’m on the verge of drowning?
Because it still could happen. People could still embarrass me. I could still sit down and have the seat shatter beneath my weight. I could still stoop to pick something up and split my pants.
And that is why the struggle with this particular subject continues. In a later article I will list the ways I deal with various matters and how I stop myself from going completely mad in the middle of a shopping centre. I will also discuss the techniques I use to combat the negative thinking and the intrusive thoughts.
But if you can relate to anything I have said above, understand that you are not alone. Recognise the symptoms and seek assistance.
Because you are worth fixing.
Until the next post, Big Love xx