Hey! Kind of new to anxiety.

[feliciaxann]

Hello! I guess I'll start off with telling you a little about myself and my life since my anxiety has begun. So, here goes. My name is Felicia. I'm 18 years old. I dropped out of high school my 11th grade year. I repeated the 9th grade twice , then promoted to 11th. I was behind in school because I was always anxious having to leave class, not coming to school, ect. After dropping out of high school I received my GED diploma. I thought things were well. I was in a relationship at the time of 2 years. The relationship was a struggle to keep together and I was always stressed. My anxiety wasn't too bad anymore so other than the stressful relationship I did fine. Eventually around 2 1/2 years , I called it quits. It will be a year since in June. I felt so much stress after the breakup from fear of not having anyone. I finally met a guy a little after the breakup that was there for me through a lot of things! It was great to have someone be there for me, ya know. We had been friends for a couple years , never really thought of dating but we eventually did. I really liked him. He made me happy , I was always excited to hang out. Then , I always had a constant worry about my ex. I couldn't stop talking to him or let go. I always wanted to just stop talking to him and not have to worry. After a while he begged me for forgiveness. Obviously I didn't fall for it as I knew it was best for me to say no and move on. He continued to talk to me , I stressed and even cried because I missed him and thought I needed him. He was my first real boyfriend and was there for me through high school with the anxiety. It was very stressful. I've then stopped talking to him about a week ago because I want to better my anxiety and feel as if he is dragging me down. I feel so many symptoms and have been to the doctor countless times. I feel helpless and am losing hope. I want to get better , WITHOUT medication. My parents are always preaching for me to get meds but I do not want them nor will I ever. I'm scheduled to see a counselor next Wednesday to get evaluated. I just have so many symptoms that scare me so bad. I always find myself feeling weird and just not good in general along with another million things that happen to me. I just need some support because my parents and family do not seem to understand. I've lost all of my friends because I can't hang out with them anymore. They all ditched me because I tell them I can't hang out. It's because I'm too anxious and never feel good. I'm just afraid I'm dying because of the way I feel and the symptoms I get. I just feel helpless because I only have my boyfriend to talk to. I just want to talk to someone. About my symptoms , my fears , and get some hope that I'll be normal again. Sorry for the ramble , hope to hear from someone soon. Thank you. :)

[feliciaxann]

Thank you so much!

[alankay]

Well start counsleing and give it a fair try. In the ned you may come to accept you need to try meds IF you can't get relief other ways and have suffered soo much. I admire you trying to go without but don't suffer so much it does more harm than good. Alankay.

[mouse25]

I suffered a similar experience when i was younger too. Too anxious to be with my friends and i was too embarrassed and shy to tell them what was going on with me so they just stopped asking me to hang out. I was lucky in that my family were (and still are) very supportive especially my mum so i had someone to turn to who could understand and not judge me or get annoyed with me every time i freaked out over the smallest things. i didnt want to take any meds at the beginning and saw a counsellor which really did help but a few years later i did go down the meds route and it helped. so from time to time when i can feel myself getting anxious and the panic attacks start i go back on the meds for a while. sometimes i can go months and months without needing them, once i went for nearly a whole year. i was very reluctant like you about taking pills as i was worried about addiction, side effects etc so avoided it as long as possible but then i realised that i have an illness that needs controlling and i wouldnt think twice about taking a pill for a ´real´ (you know what i mean) illness so why was i so against them for treating this anxiety illness? sorry if this sounds confusing but all i am trying to say is that if you can do the counselling on its own without any pills then great. if not, dont give yourself a hard time for taking meds. i look at them as a crutch that from time to time comes out the cupboard to help me along and that when i am better again it will go back to the cupboard and gather dust hopefully for a long time x

[feliciaxann]

Yeah , it's really hard. I had a family reunion today and got anxious. My head gets all tight and I feel so dizzy and my heart is pounding. I have to quickly rush to the car and go home. It was horrible. Hopefully I'll find some relief with counseling. I'm set on not taking meds , as my mother does and she can't get off of them without taking other meds to ween herself off. I'm just not interested in that.