The Way Girls With Anxiety Get Ready In The Morning

It feels like my mind is only doing half of what it should. My mind should be working on overdrive, right? Isn’t that what anxiety is about? But it only works overdrive for the things it wants to.

I can tell you every single thing wrong with my body, twenty detailed scenarios of what can go wrong at the next social event, and every horrible thing someone has said about me. Hell, I can tell you every horrible thing I’ve said about myself.

But right now I can’t tell you why I’m laying on my bed avoiding every responsibility. Maybe it’s because I’ve become overwhelmed with everything I need to do. Or maybe it’s because I know that if I get back up, my mind will work on overdrive again and make me feel like shit about myself and I don’t have time for a mental breakdown.

Actually, I don’t really have any time at all. I don’t have time to be lying on my bed. But anxiety reminds me of everything I need to do. And depression reminds me that I don’t really care about anything at all.

Then I try to remind myself “it’s just getting ready.” You’ve done it thousands of times. So why is it so hard to get up, get dressed, and put on makeup? No clue. But that only makes it worse because it should be easy, yet for some reason it’s not.

The struggle of “what to wear” is so common, but when you mix anxiety in there it becomes a special kind of hell. My mind will go on to think of every possible thing.

What is everyone else wearing?

Do I wear something really casual or something cute?

What do I even have that looks cute on me?

Nothing.

Fuck.

Okay, I’ll just wear my go-to outfit.

But I always wear that, people are going to think I don’t own any other clothes.

Do I have anything that looks good?

Do I have anything that doesn’t make me look fat?

No.

Fuck.

And then I break down.

I should get up. I should continue getting ready. I feel like in these times I need to choose between anxiety and depression.

If I stay lying down, I might just text my friends and say I’m not coming. I’ll feel horrible, but I’ll sleep it off right? That’s the fucked up beauty of depression, I can always sleep.

Or I could continue getting ready, then obsess over everything — again — that could go wrong, and how I don’t look good, then text them and say I’m not coming anyway. I’ll still feel horrible, but I just break down anyway so does it really matter?

I need to go, I remind myself. I need to get my ass out of this bed and force myself to get dressed, put on makeup, and pretend like everything’s okay.

I’ll just breakdown before I put on makeup so they won’t know. The fact that I have to do that is screwed up.

It’s like a battle of which mental illness is going to fuck up my life today. It’s just a reminder that today I’m not okay. Today’s a bad day. I knew from the moment I woke up.

Want to know what makes today a bad day?

Nothing.

The sun is shining.

I have plans for the day.

I got enough sleep.

I had a good breakfast.

But today… it was a bad day. Not for any reason. And that just makes it worse. Because I should be happy, but I’m just not.

I’ll force myself to go. I’ll show up and pretend everything is fine until for a moment, it actually feels like everything is fine. Then I’ll ask myself why I was so god damn worried in the first place. I’ll ask myself why I let myself waste that much time, and think about how stupid I was for breaking down over nothing.

And then the never-ending cycle of hating myself and picking myself up, just to crash again, starts all over.