I remember the times when I was younger and naive, and would realise that I had not felt anxiety for a some time. A week, a month, a few of them maybe. "I'm cured!" I'd think - pat myself on the back for all the progress I'd achieved over the years, and sigh with relief that I'd overcome such a burden that had plagued me for a long time. Each breath felt lighter, possibly with the illusion that I'd finally be able to live my life fully now. I could do the all the things that scared me in the past - I could be social and lively, like I'd always wanted other people to perceive me as, I could try new activities, even on my own, and not be afraid of judgement! I could be...a different person.
I've since realised (as I'm sure that everyone else on this planet knew the whole time except for me) that anxiety never leaves a body. Some time after my big revelations, it'd sink back in - slowly, or suddenly. I remember the feeling almost physically. The visualisation of my anxiety most often appears to me in the shape of a black void, or a thick, dark cloud, but at these moments, it was some kind of monster digging its long, biting claws into my chest, holding my pathetic body stuck in place. I'd just cry. Curse the universe and biology for holding me back in such a way, from the life I could be living. Because living in society is tricky when you spend a lot of time being held in place by claws belonging to the social anxiety monster.
If you're not alone in a room with absolutely no expectation or even opportunity to have an interaction with another human, you're having a social experience. Even if you were to be left in the room by another person walking out, your choice of not following them, or saying that one last thing, was a social decision. You cannot escape social interactions, because most of the time, you're having them. I've read many books but only stumbled upon one with a character suffering from social anxiety. Even then, it wasn't mentioned directly, hidden behind the character and between pages like a shameful secret. I came to the conclusion that people don't write characters with social anxiety because most often, people with social anxiety live extremely boring lives. At least in my case, this was true. I woke up, greeted by physical panic over the knowledge of having to go to school. My morning routine included lying in bed, contemplating skipping the whole day, procrastinating the eventual acknowledgement that I was too scared to do anything as daring and noticeable as skipping, and walking to school, my heart pounding over the thought of passing anyone on the street. In school, I avoided the cafeteria like going into it was a suicide mission, and my peers' eyes were the bullets. I'd shiver and shake in front of the class when presenting, my eyes full of tears and my heart a drum in my ears. P.E. was most peculiar. It was as if I lost mobility once I stepped into the gym, and during group sports I would pick a spot near the edge of the field and stand there, my feet bolted to the ground. I remember watching the ball come flying towards me, and I could duck, but my feet were immovable from their marks on the floor, pulled by magnetic force. For a while I was terrified of the bus, I would hide my books from my music teacher just so she could have one less thing to ask me about, and I braced myself to go downstairs for family dinners, gulping down the food quickly and quietly before running back to my room - to my safety. I wasn't surprised when I wasn't reading about people like me in books.
Anxiety will never leave my body, but most often now, I keep it at bay. Eventually, I'd had enough and gathered up the courage to seek myself some help, and to this day it is the thing I'm most proudest of. I don't hear other people say it to me, so I like to remind myself: "I am proud of myself for hoping I could get better." Despite only seeing her for a few months, I think I owe most of my life to that state-issued psychologist. I went on to high school knowing absolutely no one, made friends, worked a customer service job, and moved to a different country on my own at 17. But like I said in the beginning of this post: I was naive to think that I could ever live without my anxiety. I take it on every day, yet this time with conscious decisions. "I am going to ask my coworker how their day was." "I am going to smile to people on the street.""I am going to ask this question because I want to know the answer." When I feel the black clouds creeping into my chest, hitching my breath, or flushing my cheeks, I dig in my brain for the methods I learned from that psychologist 4 years ago. For that I am proud of myself. I won't pretend to think any less.
What the quote in the title by Sylvia Plath reminded me of originally was how I've been challenging myself lately. Over the last years, I've been slowly learning to take control of my life - to do the things I always wanted to do, without becoming a different person. Last month, I went to a climbing gym. It was difficult; I felt the clouds engulf me as soon as I walked into the building, but I climbed. I pick at my scabbed fingers at work instead of succumbing to the urge of staying quiet when I want to have conversation. I went to the cinema alone a few weeks ago as well - it was something I'd wanted to do for a long time. It's funny, in my mind a few years ago, it was one of the most horrific and terrifying thing I could possibly have done. And again, it was definitely hard! I had to walk in front of people to get to my seat, and spilled my popcorn on the floor once I got there (absolutely humiliating in my eyes). Every once in a while, I would gain consciousness of the fact that I was sitting in a movie theatre with other people, and the void in my chest would let itself known, but in the car on the way home, I used one of the methods I learned during that time in middle school. I took some breaths, reflected on my expectations before the event, what really happened, and how that compared to my previous thoughts. Although I often don't exactly enjoy it, I am continuing to surprise myself with how I can live my life on my terms, and hopefully one day I will enjoy it.
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