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theworkingvenus · 5 years ago

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No Seriously, How are you ?

There is an apocalypse going on out there... A silent one — but chaotic. It is probably not one of those times where I would start writing with a punchline or would use humor to grab that first and short-lived attention of the readers just to ensure they stay with me until the blog is over. I would rather start with a fact about myself — I have borderline anxiety-disorder. Do I have anyone’s attention now ? No? Okay :)

Not to be cynical, but I am sure this pandemic has actually taught us a lot of things— to me at least. I have lived a significant portion of my life with gnawing anxiety. And I thought owing to this pandemic, that would actually aggravate. But thankfully enough — it has actually receded. However, just when I thought that my anxiety is depleting, here I am going to share an incident that has happened a few nights back — which should never really happen again.

I have a friend for a long time, but he is probably more than a friend now. He probably has a partner and I probably have no idea about it and if I talk any more about this arrangement of friendship of ours, I would probably get into a drill. But I sometimes think — it is funny how we have been friends for more than 3 years and never asked each other whether the other person has a dating life or not. I kind of think, or rather try to convince myself that may be this deniability is probably for the best, may be this is how we could get to be platonically intimate without getting in each other’s hair — but seriously, who are we kidding ? :)

So we talk almost everyday (*touchwood*) and somehow, I was not in touch with him for a little above 24 hours and I went down a rabbit hole of spiraling and ripping anxiety. At first I just wailed for a while thinking the most inevitable but surprisingly convenient thought of never being chosen by anyone in my life — ever and then all of a sudden the real anxiety started hitting me at the bedtime. It started with a mild breathing trouble and eventually graduated to a mild pain in the upper chest and upper back and neck. The real issue started when my heart started pumping so rapidly that I could practically feel the knocks of the valves and the whooshing of the blood through the veins. I started feeling so … so uneasy that for a better window of breathing I woke up and sat down for a while facing upwards, towards the ceiling so that I can breathe a little bit easily. That night out of the many nights I have had in the past few years, I thought would be the night where I might actually wake up at a hospital bed the next morning. The biggest pain with my anxiety is, it does not let me cry! It just puts myself at that edge on which you would stand and think whether you should jump in that water or you should turn back and keep running and running and running. But it never lets me sit on a bench and let me scream my lungs out and just … cry. It does not make me cry which eventually gets scarier with the time.

I have dealt with severe anxiety from time to time — the last time it was November 2018. But I wasn’t quite sure whether my anxiety was coming back or not. But there was one thing I was extremely sure about. The reason or reasons why my anxiety keeps resurfacing will never stay with me till the end — the use of word ‘End’ being extremely debatable here. However, not to much of my surprise I survived that night and later that afternoon I pinged my friend a meme. He replied as if nothing at all has happened. Everyone was safe and sound and as it turns out almost all the times, my anxiety was for nothing. .. Which actually was a good thing.

Ok — so coming a bit to the effects of the anxiety, there is something I have learnt and I have learnt that in the hard way. A large part of my anxiety comes from the fact that I care too much and also, I overthink too much. I care about people and would jump the mountains for people who would not even take the stairs for me — who would not even jump the puddles for me. I had a horrible accident last year, around December, right before I was about to take a trip for my best friend’s wedding. I was driving a bike and hit a deep pothole while I was on my way towards a guy I was dating back then who just comfortably erased me from his memory after a fight we had, a fight that I have duly apologized for right after. I was lying on a middle of a national highway with legs scratched all over and all I can remember was a beam of collective headlights emerging towards me at high speed. High enough to knock a few bones and squash a few vital organs off my body if run-over. I am not in touch with that guy for above 6 months now and the only thing I have permanently from that relationship is an injured hamstring. I still face issues while kneeling. I don’t remember that guy coming over at my place for more than once, yet I used to visit him once every week at his place.

There was one other incident. I was struggling with anxiety back then. It was November 2018. I was just been told by a guy whom I was head over heels in love with that we can’t be in a relationship. However we both agreed that we should not technically stop seeing each other and do things people do in casual relationships. So that means — even we can text or call each other we should not do things people do in act of love. Or at least I was more concerned about the specifics because I was so cautiously in love. So after all these happened — he flew off to his hometown and from there he flew to Singapore. I knew that he would be off for a few days, almost a week. But one night all of a sudden I started having such anxiety . Since he was away (out of country) and I was not supposed to show my love for him or more precisely be anxious about his well-being which in turn might make him uncomfortable, I did not have a way of contacting him or knowing if he is Okay. That severe anxiety continued for a good 30 hours and in the meantime I started having absolute and extreme thoughts until I finally decided to go and check his Instagram profile. I stalked it. I stalked it for another day and thanks to the public account he had — I saw him posting a story. That brought me relief. The best/worst part about this entire story is — he does not know this. He never will. :)

I should probably start learning, we all should. It has been a long time since I have convinced myself that there is something wrong with me — both physically or behaviorally. Bu now, for the best, I need to start thinking that I am good — just good enough. I probably need to remove the curtains from the window and check that there is a famine going out there and yet here I am — more than contented and well-fed with all goodness. I should really really start learning. :)

#anxiety #mental_health #anxiety_attack #bangalore #being_in_love

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