Anxiety A Year Later (Update)

[WestCanada05]

Just a quick overview:

For me my anxiety kicked of about a year ago (M/26). It all began when i woke up one day and on my way to the washroom I began to feel weak, scared and felt like something was really going wrong as in do I call an ambulance or what feeling. it only lasted 3 minutes or so but those 3 min changed my life. After I became extremely exhausted and tired that lasted for weeks after. I had a constant fear of that I may have cancer ect you know the drill. One theory is that I had a sudden drop in blood pressure, along with a panic attack.

For the following months all I could think about was that happening again, but maybe this time in a public space like at work or a train. I began developing nausea, muscle weakness, worry, fatigue and a constant sensing of any changes to my body. It was miserable. I eventually got myself to a doctor and did blood work and a physical. Everything came back saying I was doing great. Know like most of you know this means nothing to me. IF I feel unwell it means my body must be unwell right? I began to do less, I was less physical and spend more time alone.

Now you are probably wondering how am I feeling today? Well not 100% better but I would say 50% better and here is why. I began to force myself to do things even if it was out of my comfort zone and even if I knew it would increase my anxiety. I also allowed time to happen. Now this is a funny one but in reality it does take a lot of time and self discovering to realize what anxiety is doing to you. When you begin to understand and see the patterns you can better cope with your symptoms. For example when I would get a bout of anxiety I would begin to panic, and constantly dwell on the thoughts of everything negative and it would make things 100x worse. Now I have learned to keep the mind positive. So now when I know anxiety is spiking I go to my computer and play a video game that I really enjoyed from the past, I put on a lavender candle and drink 2 classes of water along with some ginger tea, and do some deep breathing. I have also challenged myself more, I have done extreme hikes, did the spartan race and did a long road trip.

The truth is that you have to accept anxiety. Treat it like a good bank investment. If you manage it well you will get rewarded, but if you just let it sit there and nothing with it you wont get anything good out of it.

thanks for reading.

[Carl25]

Just a quick overview:

For me my anxiety kicked of about a year ago (M/26). It all began when i woke up one day and on my way to the washroom I began to feel weak, scared and felt like something was really going wrong as in do I call an ambulance or what feeling. it only lasted 3 minutes or so but those 3 min changed my life. After I became extremely exhausted and tired that lasted for weeks after. I had a constant fear of that I may have cancer ect you know the drill. One theory is that I had a sudden drop in blood pressure, along with a panic attack.

For the following months all I could think about was that happening again, but maybe this time in a public space like at work or a train. I began developing nausea, muscle weakness, worry, fatigue and a constant sensing of any changes to my body. It was miserable. I eventually got myself to a doctor and did blood work and a physical. Everything came back saying I was doing great. Know like most of you know this means nothing to me. IF I feel unwell it means my body must be unwell right? I began to do less, I was less physical and spend more time alone.

Now you are probably wondering how am I feeling today? Well not 100% better but I would say 50% better and here is why. I began to force myself to do things even if it was out of my comfort zone and even if I knew it would increase my anxiety. I also allowed time to happen. Now this is a funny one but in reality it does take a lot of time and self discovering to realize what anxiety is doing to you. When you begin to understand and see the patterns you can better cope with your symptoms. For example when I would get a bout of anxiety I would begin to panic, and constantly dwell on the thoughts of everything negative and it would make things 100x worse. Now I have learned to keep the mind positive. So now when I know anxiety is spiking I go to my computer and play a video game that I really enjoyed from the past, I put on a lavender candle and drink 2 classes of water along with some ginger tea, and do some deep breathing. I have also challenged myself more, I have done extreme hikes, did the spartan race and did a long road trip.


The truth is that you have to accept anxiety. Treat it like a good bank investment. If you manage it well you will get rewarded, but if you just let it sit there and nothing with it you wont get anything good out of it.

thanks for reading.

Great advice I agree with that and glad to hear your doing better. I too had bad anxiety and panic attacks last may/June from a couple of months worrying about my health, I had never had anxiety before so when I started feeling fuzzy It really scared me and made me worry more which made symptoms worse. After several doctors and emergency room visits I accepted it was anxiety but I would still be woken by panic attacks and it took me a few weeks to get back to normal with help of a great therapist.

I still get times on edge nowadays but because I know what it is and to accept it and to use all the techniques I learnt last year I can manage it easier and it usually fades fairly quick.

I always make sure I keep active and avoid doing nothing, remember one point at work last year I had a really strong urge that I can't describe to just get out of there it was the first and so far only time I've felt anything like it but I dug in went and started a conversation to keep my mind off it and was ok