My office is actually pretty alright. You would think any person would jump at the opportunity to work in an office where you have pretty relaxed hours and freedom to show up late and not have to panic calling in with some explanation. I think the environment is something I should like, but I can't. The second I am in there I can feel my jaw tense up, my heart races. It all feels like a dream. A bad dream - a dream where everyone is pretending. The lights are unnatural, the personalities are not genuine. Meetings are about nothing and trigger the mother of all panic and fear - not on a social or even claustrophobic level but I feel as though my anxiety problems have dabbled very deeply into the existential these days. Existential dread, it would seem - what is this? Why does everything feel so unreal all the time? Why is derealization so terrifying? I feel like Lester Burnham from American Beauty.
Does anyone else have problems with anxiety in the workplace? Like you are separated by a thin shield of paper off in the corner while everyone else appears so blissfully content in all things they do? The staff parties, the meetings - all completely normal to them but for someone like me it's enough to want to scream into a pillow and straddle the edge of insanity.