I Forgot I Have Anxiety!

It's never gone, but lately it's been awfully quiet.

I was updating my medical records for a doctor’s appointment recently when I came across something funny. Okay, maybe you won’t find it funny. But I did!

Under the “Current Health Issues” section was this:

Anxiety

Added 7/9/2014

Anxiety? No shit! Thank you, captain obvious!

Of course, this is my own medical record, so there aren’t going to be any surprises. But it kinda cracked me up to remember that I was officially diagnosed with anxiety at the age of 16. Not that I ever needed a diagnosis to find out I was chronically anxious. (I went to the ER for panic attacks several times in my youth, mind you.)

I kinda love that it’s in my medical record, though. On July 9, 2014, I was officially declared to be a patient suffering from anxiety. I was absolutely anxious before then, but it took over a decade and a half of me existing for someone to write it down on paper.

I’ve had anxiety for so long that I don’t really know what it feels like to not be anxious. Even on days when I’m relatively calm (a.k.a. not disassociating or freezing up in panic) I have trouble figuring out where my anxiety ends and the rest of my personality begins.

The thing about anxiety, when you have it how I have it, is it feels the way water feels to a fish. Fish don’t know they’re in water, right? They couldn’t describe to you what water feels like because they’re always in it.

Anxiety swims through my veins all the time — it’s a way of being, rather than a trait. I can describe symptoms, and I can identify the days when they feel worse or better. But no matter what I do, there will always be the ambient background noise that anxiety creates in my life at all times.

These past few months have been an especially weird time for my chronically anxious self. After losing my part time job back in June and shifting to freelance work, I entered a period of relative calm. This was also thanks to the fact that my partner landed a full-time gig that gives us relative financial stability if freelancing doesn’t work out long-term for me. (Please note that this is a great privilege that many freelancers don’t enjoy. I would not be this calm if I did not have a safety net.)

For the first time in my career, I’m allowed to chart my own path free of expectation from an singular employer. I can take on a variety of work that keeps my mind stimulated and challenged in good ways. And I can go at my own pace, creating a daily schedule that flexes based on my energy levels and works around other tasks on my to-do list.

Having this amount of control has been, honestly, very good for me. It’s given me the space to take care of my physical and mental health before it gets really bad. Like the other day, I was supposed to finish up an assignment but had an awful headache all morning due to a less-than-great night’s sleep.

Lack of sleep and anxiety are very intertwined for me. I’m much more susceptible to panic attacks and paranoia when I don’t get a full 8.5-9 hours. I feel silly (and weak?) mentioning this, but it’s had a drastic effect on my ability to get through the day for most of my life. My focus and productivity plummets. I easily disassociate and don’t feel like “me.” I can’t string together cohesive thoughts. I feel on-edge and sick all day, etc.

If I could have it my way, every job would see needing a nap as a valid reason to call out. But alas, I’ve never had a job like that. I don’t think such a job exists, unless I’m my own boss.

I decided that day to just take a nap instead of brute force-ing my way through the assignment. And I clearly needed sleep because I passed out for two hours in the middle of the day. Then when I woke up, I felt way better and got right to work. (Can you imagine? Feeling better makes you work better? Damn.)

Anyway, I’ve gotten to a point where I can actually address my anxiety triggers before they get out of control. I’m so well-regulated lately that I’ll forget my anxiety exists until it reminds me that it’s there.

It’s kinda crazy that I had to get through four years of high school, four years of college, and four years of being full-time in the workforce before I could find a lifestyle that suited my needs. Maybe it’s because anxiety is so common that many people don’t see it as something that needs special accommodations?

But I’m starting to realize that I actually do need accommodations in order to do more than just survive. I learned at young age how to push my way through panic attacks, mask my paranoia in public, and play it cool when I couldn’t focus because my brain made me feel like I was literally in another dimension.

I figured as I got older that I’d just get better at sucking it up and dealing with it. Now I’m learning the opposite. If I want to be a healthy, happy, fulfilled person, I need to advocate for myself before things get bad. It’s my responsibility to create an environment where I can thrive according to my actual needs — not what other people think I need.

Of course, there will be times where I can’t stop my worst symptoms before they start. I don’t expect to ever live a life completely free of bad anxiety days. Stress will always exist, but as long as it ebbs and flows, I should be able to ride along without falling off the boat.

Living an anxiety-free life is impossible, but a life where anxiety is only a distant drumbeat is completely within my reach.