Member-only story
Like A Rollercoaster, Without The Drop
Life with Generalized Anxiety Disorder
TW: Self-harm
About ten years ago, I made a mental list to try and sum up my struggles at that time. I named it ‘Things that make me want to cut myself’ and it contained everything from going to the supermarket alone, to having my hair cut, to the first day of my period. At the same time, I insisted that I was fine, and any time I read about anxiety I thought,
Nah, that doesn’t sound like me at all!
It turns out when you’ve grown up with something and it continues well into adulthood, you aren’t the best one to see the signs. It wasn’t until I began to experience heart palpitations on a regular basis, in spite of cutting myself daily, that I began to accept that I might have a problem. That list of things that made me want to cut myself, was actually a list of things that triggered my anxiety. I’d been using that unhealthy coping mechanism for such a long time that I didn’t know the difference. I hadn’t believed my way of coping was entirely sane and stable, but it seemed manageable. It may have been in the short term, but it certainly isn’t sustainable.
What makes me nervous?
When I read the Creator’s Hub Write Here prompts for this week, the first one ‘What makes you nervous?’ initially…
