Let me explain anxiety to you- an open letter

Unless you have either experienced anxiety personally or been witness to another’s anxiety attack, it really is a condition that is unimaginable.

Strangely, many people who have anxiety are high-functioning and you would never even know. But bubbling beneath the surface is often a lot of pain and suffering.

We have asked one of our editorial team to share with us, to help others understand, what living with high-functioning anxiety really feels like.

What to know about anxiety

To whom it may concern,

The best way to support a loved one through anxiety is to be able to try to understand anxiety. It comes in different forms, its escapes through different outlooks and manifests in different reactions.

For each sufferer, it can be vastly different, but fundamentally, anxiety looks and sounds the same.

If you look close enough you will see it in the nervous habits. It’s the nail biting, the foot taping, the pen drumming. It’s in the hair pulling, the touching the face, the nervous laugh.

It goes unnoticed in the unanswered texts, the flakiness, the self isolation. Often it manifests into an unexplained anger, a lack of tolerance.

It is the fear of the unknown. The terror of the known. The loneliness of being alone, but the sadness of being surrounded by people.

It is the analysis of every day. Questioning the unanswerable and answering the unquestionable.

Anxiety screams an intolerable and repetitive song

I’m not good enough.

I’m a bad friend, bad mother, wife, daughter sister.

I am no good at my job.

I am wasting your time, I am wasting my time.

I’m boring. People don’t like me. I have nothing to offer.

It is doubting your connections, your worth, your relationships. It is believing you are too much clutter, you are not important, it is self doubt.

I will just let you down.

I’m not good enough.

I’m not good enough.

It’s looking for an outlet, something to release the nervous energy. A mindless task, something to keep busy. To distract the mind from the screaming, the self-deprecating chant.

It is needing to run, scream, move. It’s moving on the spot or dancing in your bedroom. It is going to the gym, or swimming, drawing, writing… all done with the facade that you do it for fun, when really you do it simply to move forward.

It is constant punishment, why did you say that? What are you doing with your arms? Stand straight. Move away, your too close. Don’t look at them. Look away. Stop being weird. Just be normal. Why are you even here?

Anxiety is hidden by a smile and suffered alone

It is silent anxiety attacks hidden by a smile. It is debilitating panic attacks, suffered all alone.

The pain in the tummy that confuses the body in to believing it is unwell. The tightness of the chest that is so constricting you simply cannot breath.

It is the hyperventilating, the gasping for air just to cling on to one last chance of life.

Anxiety is insomnia that keeps you awake all night, but it is also the sleeping away of the days just to survive until the next.

It is living without living. Breathing without breath.

It’s days without reason, nights without rest.

It is exhausting, tiring, sufferable. A constant battle of wits.

Criticisms and affirmations, just to save you from losing sanity.

It is with you, even when you think it is gone. You can survive it, but you will always battle it.

It is never gone.