We write a lot here on Anxiety Connection about the latest studies, research, and academic knowledge of anxiety related disorders. Yet all these bullet point how-to lists and statistics don’t really convey the day to day struggles of someone who suffers from anxiety. In this post I am going to delve into the personal realm of anxiety to share what this experience is like for me and how I have coped with my anxiety all of these years. I hope that in return, you too, will share your story. You never know how something you write today may help someone in the days, weeks, and even years to come. The personal narrative is a very powerful thing.

My first memories of feeling anxious

There was a lot in my childhood to cause me to feel fear and anxiety. I lived with my mother, who has paranoid schizophrenia in the inner city. My father died when I was four and this was probably my first memory of feeling fearful. My mother explained to me that my father was “sleeping” but that he would never wake up again. It was an explanation which provoked my first phobia. I would be plagued with sleeping problems for many of my childhood years because I feared that if I too, went to sleep, I might never wake up. I remember night time being an especially scary time as I tried in vain to remain awake. When I did fall asleep I would force myself to wake up every couple of hours.

I would also learn to fear heights and especially open stairs in my childhood. My mother and I lived in an apartment building with fire escape stairs. We had to climb these stairs to get to our home. One day I tripped and fell head first down these stairs. Amazingly I was just a bit bruised and scratched but ever since that day I have been afraid of high places and stairs that remind me of that incident.

What are your first memories of feeling fearful or anxious?

Physical symptoms of my anxiety then and now

My body reacts pretty much the same way as an adult as it did in childhood in response to feeling anxious. Sweating, trembling, and feeling short of breath are physical manifestations of my anxiety. My stomach is usually the first body part to feel the impact of an anxiety attack. As a child I suffered from stomach aches and nausea and as an adult I developed Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS).  Although there is no research which isolates stress and anxiety as the cause for IBS it doesn’t help any. As I have written about previously, stress usually doesn’t cause chronic medical illness but it can make whatever you do have much worse.

What physical symptoms do you experience when you are feeling anxious or stressed?

Triggers for anxiety or panic

It used to be easier to pinpoint the source or trigger for my anxiety. I have phobias which include heights, plane travel, driving, and public speaking. But over the years I have noticed that thoughts alone can provoke me to have an anxiety attack. On some occasions I will get a thought in my head that may go like this: “If I go to the wave pool it may be crowded. It may be so crowded that if everyone left the pool suddenly I would be trampled and I would drown.” Or I remember making plans for a fourth of July party and we would grill out on our deck. I kept thinking that if too many people were on the deck that it would collapse and send us all to our demise. The thoughts were irrational but once I thought them it was a challenge to not only un-think them but to get rid of the fear I felt about the “what ifs.”