I'm writing this information down to help both me (when I feel down and upset), and those who may be suffering right now and want reassurance. I think my anxiety is inherited because I've had it for as long as I can remember. It just never completely ruined me or made my life a living hell. It was just something that would make my life a bit hard in some degrees, but not much else. I'll categorize each fear I had as a kid, and how bad they got.
Fear of home invasion:
Once of the worst fears ever, not going to lie. I still have it to this day, but it has gotten much much better. When I was a kid, I needed my mom to sit with me until I would fall asleep. If she left while I was almost asleep, I'd start crying and freaking out. Once, I woke up at night and had to move into my parents room and sleep with them because of how bad this fear was. As a kid, I slept with my grandma because I was super afraid that if I left alone, somebody was going to come into my room and hurt me. This has lasted for a long time, and I think I kind of got over it a few months ago. Before that time, I had to sleep before my parents would sleep because every tiny sound I heard during the nighttime, while no one was awake, would turn into a robber trying to break into my house in my mind. There were some days I'd even wake my parents up and tell them I heard sounds from downstairs, and that I thought somebody was in our house. Obviously, none of this was true. It was my fears taking control of me and making me turn every tiny sound into something far worse than what it was.
Fear of separation from parents:
As a kid, and to this day, I have this devastating fear of being separated from my parents. I'm only 16 years old, and so if I'm out somewhere far from my home, and only got my parents with me, I have to stick to them. If for some reason I get lost, or something happens to them, I'm over. What will I do to get back home? What will happen to me? Those thoughts pop in, and they get to an uncontrollable point in which I get full blown panic attacks. I remember when I was a kid, I had to go to my first day at elementary school. My mom took me to my class, and I got in. In my mind, I was hoping she would stay until school was over, but she had to leave. After leaving, my stomach started to get the butterflies, I felt like throwing up, my stomach hurt, my head was taking a lot of pressure, and I thought I was going to start crying nonstop. I thought I'd never see my mom again, and that scared the living sh** out of me. I cried for the rest of the day at school, and it was terrible. There was this day in elementary where I was in my class waiting for my mom, and it was raining hard outside. I didn't see her at all, and so I started to cry, and the two kids with me were worried and asked me if I was okay. For my first day at 6th grade, the same thing happend as well. I got lost because the school was huge, and after school, my mom came a bit late, and I started freaking out and crying in front of everyone. Every parent sitting there waiting for me probably thought I was psycho or something. Looking back at it, it was so embarrassing and pathetic of me. It happend at 7th grade as well, and the only resolution to this problem was getting a phone. To this day, if I come out of my school and my parents aren't here, butterflies start to form in my stomach. Obviously, I don't freak out much anymore because I got a phone and there isn't an issue. In 8th grade, I went to Las Vegas with my parents and this was super far from my house. When they both left the room to go to the casino, I was left with my grandma (who can't speak English), and my brother. When my parents left, I started to panic and freak out because if for some reason, something bad happend to them, my life would be over. How would I get back home? Who will come all the way to Las Vegas to take me back home, and how will I get the money to at least fly back home? My mind immediately started forming plans on how I could go back home, and this only happend because they left the room. I even had a fight with my parents about this because they got so upset at me for holding them back from having fun. Anxiety is so selfish, I swear.
[B][I][U]Airplane fear, and fear of being super far away from home[/U][/I][/B]A year ago, I had to fly to a different continent for summer vacation, and it got me super depressed. I thought I was going to get lost from my parents, and that the planes would stop functioning and would crash. I had like 6 plane rides, and this made the fear even worse. One of the places I went was Paris, and I thought a terrorist attack would occur and that me and my family would die as a result. I also thought the hotel we were staying at was sketchy and that I was going to be killed during my sleep. Me and my parents sadly got separate rooms even though we booked for a single room, and this made the fears worse. When I was finally coming back home, which was a 10 hour flight, my fear was the worst. Going into this vacation, I thought I was going to die and would never come home. When I was almost back home, the thoughts surrounding me were, "oh now it's going to happen, you'll see. I know for sure something will happen that will prevent me from going back to my safe place." I'd also research the planes we were going to be on, and the history of crashes they had. I still had a fairly good time in my vacation, regardless of these fears.
Parents leaving home and not being back till a late time:
This fear is still here to this day. If my parents are away from home and they go somewhere at night, I can't sleep until they're back. If they aren't back by 10:00 PM, I call them and make sure they're safe. This was especially bad around 2-3 years ago. I'd constantly call them every 20-30 mins after 10:00 PM to make sure they were safe and that they would be back home soon. If they didn't come back, I couldn't sleep because if I heard sounds downstairs, I'd assume the worst, and I'd have no one to reassure me that I was safe. If I knew my parents were going to go somewhere and not be back until late night, I'd try to sleep before they went because I would be hit with worry if they left and I was still awake, and thus making it impossible for me to sleep. "
Fear something bad happend to my parents everytime they left the home:
If my mom or dad went somewhere and they weren't back for a while, I'd call them nonstop until they picked up. If they didn't pick up, boom, they must've died or something bad happend to them. No other explanation. That's it, the people I loved would be gone for eternity and I was left to try and help my family. Just to clarify, if something did happen to them, only me, my grandma, and my brother would be left. I'd lose our house, and would have to move in with a different family in order to keep living. If that family didn't accept me, which my anxiety made me think they wouldn't, then me, my grandma, and my bro would go homeless. These were thoughts that would regularly go through my head when something of this sort occurred.
Super bad trust issues:
I swear, you guys might think this is a joke, but when I was 5, I wouldn't even trust my dad to take me somewhere, I only trusted my mom. One day, my dad took me to a grocery store, and I was scared he'd kidnap me (like what the hell goes through my stupid mind?). I legit was scared and wanted to make him happy, and so he kept asking me if I wanted specific things to eat, and I'd say no everytime. He felt upset that I didn't want to get anything and was surprised. When we went back home, I finally calmed down, but he was still confused as to why I didn't get anything. Obviously, I got over this after that day because it was a stupid fear in the first place. Sadly, I still had trust issues with my cousins. Everytime somebody but my parents came to pick me up from school, the thoughts that went through my head were, "okay, they will most likely kidnap me, and so I have to make back up plans to avoid this. If they try grabbing me, I'll do this .... and afterwards run away from the car." At this point, it's like what the hell man. Just live your life, lol. This stopped bothering me since 8th grade, which was about 2-3 years ago.
Discovery:
At the moment, this is all I can remember. I've had these since forever, but now I developed a new fear. This fear started 2 months ago, and that's when I tried my first redbull. It was the largest can available, and I thought, "what harm can this do? My brother drank it before and nothing happend to him, I have family members who drink this a lot, and so I think I should give it a go." My parents didn't know I tried it and I didn't tell them until my fears got super bad. When I came home, I realized I had the jitters, and that the amount of caffeine and the taurine were having a negative effect on my body. This scared me, and so I did research, and guess what I read about? "Kids are starting to die from energy drinks." "Energy drinks are super dangerous and are the reason many kids are having health issues to this day" "No specific long term effects are known about redbull, and so it's not worth risking anything on the drink." I read about how drinking water would take away the affects, and so I drank sooo much. I then ended up reading that drinking too much water could cause a seizure, and I started to freak out even more. I spent the rest of the 5 hours of that day thinking I was going to die, and that's when I had my first massive panic attack. I couldn't breath at all, I was super dizzy, I couldn't feel my body, and it felt like I was going to die in a matter of seconds. Like I was so out of breath, that I had to consciously breath and that I straight up thought it was a heart attack or something. Later that night, I told my parents and they got upset at me, but also said I should relax because nothing would happen to me. For that whole month, my concentration was stuck on my breathing because of how scared I was about the panic attack I had. I would consciously breath for a month since that day. Later on, I realized it was all a result of anxiety, and so I just let go of the fears as best as I could. That didn't stop the odd ways I would feel at home, the anxiousness, the sadness, and all that. A month ago, I thought that I should elevate my mood by understanding that there are people in this world that suffer with much worse and that I shouldn't assume my life is over just because I have anxiety. Due to that, I searched up ALS and how Stephen Hawkings died due to it, and I was like, "see what this man went through? You should be happy that all you have is anxiety." I decided to read up on symptoms of ALS, and they were so common that I thought to myself, "how could I differentiate this from other disease and issues?" I then went and researched more, and bam, stuck in the ALS rabbit hole. Been a month since that rabbit hole got me in, and I've gotten so much better. Everytime the fear gets to me, I just acknowledge that they're thoughts and nothing more. I feel so much better, and so I'm doing better than usual. Last week, I had a stressful week because I thought I had the illness 100% and so I was dwelling on it nonstop, and distraction wouldn't even help. Either way, this has been my life since day 1. I'd also like to hear if any of you have had anxiety your whole life, but realized recently or later on in your life. Thanks for reading, and sorry for how long this is, lol.
xx
my journey to discovering treatment
My health anxiety just gets worse?
My story plz read and understand there’s hope!
My anxiety related to eating and how I have let it control my life.
If you have time
Please read my rhyme
