The Word That Cannot Be Defined

It’s the nights I can’t sleep because my thoughts are racing faster than Usain Bolt, but at the same time my brain is empty.

It’s feeling like I am going to EXPLODE, but also feeling like I will soon be compressed into a ball.

It’s wanting to SCREAM, but also not wanting to utter a single word.

It’s having no idea why I feel this way, but also knowing exactly why.

It’s feeling like I have so much potential, yet I will NEVER make it.

I’ll never be good enough. I’ll never get through my struggles. I’ll never not have anxiety and the thought frightens me.

Oftentimes people assume anxiety is all about social anxiety, and that it happens when one is overwhelmed by being in public or having to attend to social matters.

But what about those of us who get anxiety when we are alone?

What about people like me…people that love to be social and have absolutely no problems interacting and connecting with others.

It has nothing to do with other people. I’m hard on MYSELF. And it is involuntarily expressed through extreme anxiety.

Almost every night; like clockwork.

Some don’t believe that anxiety is a real thing.

You’re just being dramatic.

I was guilty of this, as well…until the day I had my first panic attack. It’s real.

It’s so real.

It’s different for everyone.

I get anxiety and have panic attacks that seemingly come out of nowhere, and once they start it is extremely difficult to break free.

Falling into a pool when you can’t swim.

Dangling off the edge of a cliff that is atop thousands of sharp rocks.

It’s a hopeless situation.

Here I am at the end…and I feel as though I have expressed 1% of what anxiety is really like.

There are no words.

Just anxiety.