Another anxiety story

[Maliri]

Hey. I'm new here and I'm hoping to find some people like me, some people to talk to.
I have had anxiety for as long as I can remember, but it's gotten really bad the past few months. I can't sleep well and have trouble eating. I have nightmares almost every night. Sometimes I can't tell the difference between my dreams and reality anymore. My thoughts bother me. I keep thinking bad things. When I have alot of tasks to do, I panic. People keep telling me it's just stress, but I cannot function well and I have panic attacks.
Sometimes my brain starts making up all sorts of things. I'm very insecure and have no trust in myself. I'm afraid of the dark, I'm afraid of being around people, I'm afraid of many things, I'm afraid of being alone. I always feel very alone, even when I'm around others. It feels like I'm in a bubble and nobody can come into it and I can't get out of it, and everyone and everything feels so far away from me, like I don't live in this world but just a little bit outside of it.

People around me don't understand me. They always tell me I'm overreacting. They always say: "It's just stress, calm down". People often get mad when I panic or cry. I've been to doctors and psychologists but haven't found anyone who can help me yet.
My partner tries to understand me. But it's difficult. He thinks I don't trust him for I am always scared when he leaves. I always ask him what he's going to do, if he won't find someone who is better than me, if he will please be careful outside because I don't want anything to happen to him, and I always ask many other things to reassure myself that everything is still okay. This annoys him though, and it often causes trouble.
I always need reassurance, because I will panic when I don't get it. It annoys people when I ask them something multiple times. But I just want to be sure.

Can anybody here relate, or can anybody just understand me? Is there anyone who feels the same and who wants to talk? Thank you for taking the time to read this.

 

[Cuchculan]

Welcome to the forum. I think people never understand fully because they have never been through what we have all been through. They can tell us to cop on. Tell us it is only stress. We know it is much worse than only stress. So never expect others to understand what you are going through. For this same reason, many people never tell anybody what they are going through. Only a select number I know, know about my anxiety. I don't even expect them to understand fully. More or less told because they kept inviting me to things. Things I could never go to.

As for your partner? Have you ever thought of inviting him along to a therapy session? You talk. He listens. He talk you listen. Then the therapist talks. It might give your partner a better understanding of what exactly you are facing on a dailt basis. That it is more than just stress. That you are almost anxious 24 hours a day. Hence not liking been left alone in the house.

Not sure if you have any hobbies at all? Anything you like doing at all. Something that can maybe help you to stop thinking inwardly. Give your mind something else to focus on. If we have nothing to do but sit there, we tend to let the mind run wild. That is never a good thing. Distraction does work. I am big into jigsaws. Just something for me to do. To pass the hours away.

The symptoms you mention to begin your post are all very common with anxiety. Probably the most common of all symptoms out there. Take a guess that you are on medication? Or have even talked about medication with a doctor. There are some that come with side effects that may include lack of sleep. Even nightmares.

You are far from alone with your problems. We all suffer from one thing or another here on this forum. So we at least fully understand you. We are here to help if we can.

 

[Maliri]

Welcome to the forum. I think people never understand fully because they have never been through what we have all been through. They can tell us to cop on. Tell us it is only stress. We know it is much worse than only stress. So never expect others to understand what you are going through. For this same reason, many people never tell anybody what they are going through. Only a select number I know, know about my anxiety. I don't even expect them to understand fully. More or less told because they kept inviting me to things. Things I could never go to.

As for your partner? Have you ever thought of inviting him along to a therapy session? You talk. He listens. He talk you listen. Then the therapist talks. It might give your partner a better understanding of what exactly you are facing on a dailt basis. That it is more than just stress. That you are almost anxious 24 hours a day. Hence not liking been left alone in the house.

Not sure if you have any hobbies at all? Anything you like doing at all. Something that can maybe help you to stop thinking inwardly. Give your mind something else to focus on. If we have nothing to do but sit there, we tend to let the mind run wild. That is never a good thing. Distraction does work. I am big into jigsaws. Just something for me to do. To pass the hours away.

The symptoms you mention to begin your post are all very common with anxiety. Probably the most common of all symptoms out there. Take a guess that you are on medication? Or have even talked about medication with a doctor. There are some that come with side effects that may include lack of sleep. Even nightmares.

You are far from alone with your problems. We all suffer from one thing or another here on this forum. So we at least fully understand you. We are here to help if we can.

Thank you so much for responding. I don't tell many people about it either, only when I need to.
I will consider your idea about the therapy session, though I don't really see my therapists anymore for they couldn't help me. I will try and find a way to make my partner understand.
I don't have many hobbies because I'm often busy with my studies. That gives me distraction in a way, but also stress and panic at times. I do play games or reads books sometimes, but it never gives me 100% distraction from my thoughts. If you have any suggestions, they're very welcome.
I'm currently off medication, I only take pills when I need to do something important such as making exams in university or meeting important people. The pills don't help much but it gives me a bit more reassurance. The nightmares and lack of sleep are something I have had since I was very little, and it just gets worse with time. Nothing has really been able to fix it yet.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who has these problems. I really hope people here can help me and I can help them. Sometimes just talking or being understood is enough to calm me down for a bit.

 

[Cuchculan]

Most of us would have been through the whole therapy thing. I don't see now either. Been a long time with anxiety and I guess I simply ran out of things to talk to them about. Maybe start a journal. It can help. I have years of them. Another thing I gave up after many years of doing it. Just to give me an insight into my own thoughts and my own life. Might write for months on end. Then read it all back. Look for patterns in things we do. What makes us worse. In a way it is like a self therapy. I am on a lot of medication. At times a regular amount of the same medication can help to steady the ship. I think of most of it we have to try and work out by ourselves. We learn as we go. 30 years later and I am still learning.

 

[Maliri]

Most of us would have been through the whole therapy thing. I don't see now either. Been a long time with anxiety and I guess I simply ran out of things to talk to them about. Maybe start a journal. It can help. I have years of them. Another thing I gave up after many years of doing it. Just to give me an insight into my own thoughts and my own life. Might write for months on end. Then read it all back. Look for patterns in things we do. What makes us worse. In a way it is like a self therapy. I am on a lot of medication. At times a regular amount of the same medication can help to steady the ship. I think of most of it we have to try and work out by ourselves. We learn as we go. 30 years later and I am still learning.

I've tried and write a journal many times but I always give up after a few weeks. Sometimes I just have nothing to write about and I stop for a long period of time and forget I wrote a diary. I do write a lot of other things such as poems or short novels. In those, the main character always explains the feelings I have when I'm anxious. It's my way of writing down my feelings and thoughts. I haven't really tried a lot of medication because my parents didn't trust me with pills or anything and now I just keep procrastinating seeing a doctor. Also in my country it's pretty hard to convince a doctor to give you anything at my age. I'm pretty young so maybe I'll do it later. I'm trying to go through life without too much medication but lately I've been feeling like I can't keep doing that for much longer.

 

[Cuchculan]

We all need to let out what we are holding inside of us. If you can do that writing stories, then good for you. That is one way to do things. Poetry is good too. Again you put your feelings down in words. When you do that, do you think it helps you? I see people like ourselves as maybe having a lot of emotions bottled up inside of us. It might be anger at the world. That we can't take part in some things the way we might like to. It might just be frustration. Is that we have to try and release. I know you said you cried at times. That can be a release too at times. I know I once told a person to find an isolated place and just scream as loud as they could. Crazy? Maybe. But a great release.

Different countries have different ways of looking at medication. Here in Ireland they throw them at you. Ask for what you want and they will give them to you. Other countries are not like that. Younger doctors are not like that either. The older the doctor the more likely we are to get medication very easily. Medication is only part of the answer though. We have to work hard too. Push ourselves. Challenge ourselves. Is never easy. But we keep on fighting because we are strong people. Remember that. You are a strong person.

 

[Maliri]

We all need to let out what we are holding inside of us. If you can do that writing stories, then good for you. That is one way to do things. Poetry is good too. Again you put your feelings down in words. When you do that, do you think it helps you? I see people like ourselves as maybe having a lot of emotions bottled up inside of us. It might be anger at the world. That we can't take part in some things the way we might like to. It might just be frustration. Is that we have to try and release. I know you said you cried at times. That can be a release too at times. I know I once told a person to find an isolated place and just scream as loud as they could. Crazy? Maybe. But a great release.

Different countries have different ways of looking at medication. Here in Ireland they throw them at you. Ask for what you want and they will give them to you. Other countries are not like that. Younger doctors are not like that either. The older the doctor the more likely we are to get medication very easily. Medication is only part of the answer though. We have to work hard too. Push ourselves. Challenge ourselves. Is never easy. But we keep on fighting because we are strong people. Remember that. You are a strong person.

I do think it helps me when I write down my feelings, it just doesn't satisfy me. My anxiety will not just go away when I write and it is not really distraction, just analysing my bad feelings. I do not feel angry at the world, I just feel I am very unlucky being uncapable of many things that are normal and easy for others. Like, why does it have to be me? I do cry sometimes but not because I want to, it happens when I panic. When I need to let everything out I sometimes go and bike for a few hours with my headphones on and some nice music. I bike until my legs can't bring me any further.

What used to help me a lot were weekly trips to foreign countries I took. I went every weekend, by train, and just went some place where I could forget all about my life at home. Since covid-19 I can't take these trips anymore though, and it's hard to escape my life here now. These trips were almost all I had and it was the thing I looked forward to the entire week. I hope I can continue these soon again.

I know we are strong. Actually the weakest are always the strongest because their life is so much more difficult but yet they keep on going and make life the best they can. People like us can be very good at appreciating the positive things that are given to us. We appreciate every good thing and we cope with the bad things. We are much stronger than many others, I'm sure of that.

 

[Joshua1]

Seek spiritual help and confront your fear of the dark. This is what i did when i was afraid of the dark.