Trigger Warning: Descriptions of intense anxiety and depression.
It sneaks up and burns my heart like someone poured acid into my chest. This acid is my depression, abandonment issues, severe anxiety, and the fear of both. Most of the time they pop up without provocation. No reason for the anxiety, no cause for depression, and no one around to abandon me.
On top of having OCD, EDNOS, BPD, and ADHD, I also have IDDM — Insulin dependent diabetes mellitus.
Basically, I’m a type 1 juvenile diabetic. And the mental health care system isn’t equipped to deal with that, so every time I go into the hospital, I come back with diabetic ketoacidosis.
Fun.
I would like to welcome the newest member of our writing team, Nic Alea. In their first post with us, they give valuable tips on how to support someone with a phobia or other anxiety disorder. Thanks for sharing with us, Nic!
One thing that has hurt me over the years is my consistent effort to try and tell people that I have Ichthyophobia (Fear of Fish) and people not taking it seriously. Well it’s serious. This phobia, although somewhat uncommon, can trigger me anywhere, whether it’s a picture on the internet or in a museum, a fish market, or walking into a shop with a fish tank, shit can be really scary sometimes. It’s already hard to tell people intimate things about ourselves and it’s even worse when people don’t believe it.
Trigger warning: mentions of alcoholism, relapse, and sexual violence
Failure is built into the punitive, guilt-ridden fabric of AA. An archaic framework of Christian dogma marketed as the only way to get sober. If you fail it’s your fault. If you succeed it’s God’s miracle. Every meeting we recited that those who drink after AA are “naturally incapable of grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty.” According to AA honesty in confession to unscrupulous strangers will keep you from drinking. That and the will of God.
Trigger Warning: Descriptions of eating disorders
It all started when I was 13. I was looking up “how to be emo” on youtube. I can’t even remember why, I just was, okay? “How to be anorexic” popped up in the suggested searches, so I clicked on it, and it brought me to this whole new world, where thin was the ultimate goal, where eating was unacceptable, where “fat” was the point at which nothing was worth it anymore. It gave me something to focus on as I delved deeper into my mental illness. I looked up tips. I looked up thinspo. I looked up extremely dangerous restrictive diets. Anything related to eating disorders, I would find it on the internet.
Over the next 7 months his comments grew more offensive, making hateful comments about my race, about our (perceived) sexualities and even comments about our mental health and what he thought was ‘wrong’ with us. He was messaging my partner constantly, not only offensive things but just irrelevant nonsense constantly. It grew to the point that my partner was having panic attacks every time there was a notification on the phone.
Your pain is in my DNA,
Father,
As real as the shrapnel
Still in your legs
Decades later
Trigger warning: Description of panic attacks and severe anxiety
I had four back to back panic attacks the most severe I walked four blocks past my office stopped wasn’t lost, but said to myself what am I doing here, and started to boil in side as I made my way back towards my office. As I got closer, block by block the boiling of emotion like a volcano started to erupt and it did. It was severe, so severe I couldn’t see the medication I carry in my bag as my mind had left me, my mind had left me, rare.
Trigger warning: Mention of constrainment and incarceration, suicidal thoughts, misdiagnosis
My general care practitioner put me on a low dose of Zoloft. She said that it would take a couple of weeks, that I would start to notice feeling a bit better, just slowly notice that I felt good.
I got better.
Quickly.
I went to see her again a week later, and I was bouncing, happy, excited. I expected a much different reaction than the one I got.
I’ve stumped my therapist and psychiatrist, they cannot seem to find a cause or a cure to stop this behavior. It’s embarrassing in public, but I cannot stop. When I go to see my psychiatrist, I cannot stand up and say, “hey this is not working for me, this is not helping,” it’s always me agreeing on everything they say just to get out of there. Even with my therapist I still keep most things to myself.
