Don't Let It Bring You Down- A Post About Anxiety

For a long time, I have been very closed off about feelings I get when I'm anxious. I haven't actually told anybody how bad it used to get. Anxiety and stress take over a lot of peoples lives and it can be scary and cause different emotions during the time.
 I wasn't going to do a blog post about this, but even if I help one person, that is more than I can ask for.

My anxious feelings first started when I was about 13. I was always an extremely shy child, which progressed on to my teenage years too. It was during the summer holidays when this started. I think I left my house 1 or 2 times during that 6 week period. The feeling of leaving my house made me feel nauseous and as if there was a knot in my stomach. I wasn't sure what these feeling were. Nobody had ever spoke about anxiety at school before so it was scary. It got to the point of not sleeping because I had a lot of different emotions whizzing around in my head. I felt a pounding in my chest, I thought my heart would break through. I didn't want to go out and see people I knew. For a lot of people, this can be because they fear they are going to be judged by other people. I think this was defiantly the case I was in. At the time, I was thinking 'Everybody gets anxious, this is normal.' I kept it to myself.

When school began again, I used to get up and get dressed into my school uniform. I went downstairs about 8.00am. I used to leave my house at around 8:15am. I was 14 by this time. (I have a summer birthday). I remember for about the first month of school, I used to cry everyday about how much I hated it and didn't want to go. I used to get to the school gate and I felt as if I would pass out at any second. Anxiety can effect people in different ways. With mine, I stopped eating. I felt pushed out a lot at school. I thought this would help people to accept me and also and nausea ruined my appetite. I was never overweight. I was a healthy weight. But the thoughts in my brain made me feel as if it would help. I lost a lot of weight. It also came from the fear of people seeing me eat. I ended up fainting during a PE lesson. (Which I didn't complain about at the time, I hated PE anyway). That's when I had to begin eating properly again, which brought back the pounding of my heart and the dizziness.

It took me a while to learn how to cope with the anxiety. I'm 17 now and I have left school. I still get the feelings sometimes, but it's not as common now. I didn't go to a school that openly helped people with these sort of issues. If you are going through feelings of anxiety, there are a lot of people that can help you. The first step is talking. If you can't do that, self-help is a good way forward. A few years back, I made a positivity book. I wrote quotes and sayings that kept me positive when I wasn't feeling good about myself. I still pick it up from time to time when I need a pick me up. Find remedies that are right for you, whether that be drinking lots of water or taking deep breaths while counting to ten. Try anything and everything until you find the right choice.

Always know that you aren't alone in these situations and don't let it bring you down. Keep your head up and keep going. It will be okay in the end, and if it isn't okay yet, it will be, give it time.

 -HappiestEqualsPrettiest xx