The Anxiety Problem

Hello again. Here I am. So soon, you say? I know. I'm surprised too. But I feel like I may need to write more. And well, the trigger for this writing is my anxiety. For those of you who don't know, since the end of January, I've had this constant feeling of anxiety, almost every day. You know, your throat tightens and you feel like you have something stuck in it. Your chest feels tight and you almost feel like you have a hard time breathing. Well, when it gets really bad, it affects my breathing. But most of the time, I don't notice the breathing difference. I only realize it when I start burping a lot. Like I've been constantly swallowing air and not even realizing it. So here I am, with a tight chest and throat, and a paper to write. Argh....

I would like to say the anxiety is due to school, but it's not. I've been in the education system for like.... what...? 16 years now? Give or take, not counting pre-school and such. And I've never experienced this before. And I've never experienced this prolonged or daily. There are days where I feel like it's gone. I rejoice slightly at the full relaxation of my body. The oxygen flows through my body easily at those moments and it's almost euphoric. But most of the times, those moments are short lived. A few hours later, the anxiety will come back again, without me even thinking about anything. It's quite troublesome and I'm not sure what to do about it.

I tried seeing a counselor. Only went for 2 sessions. She was OK. I mean, the meetings in itself were nothing to brag about. Afterwards, I would feel some of the effects. Get upset and cry and such. Crying actually feels amazing. OK. Maybe not amazing, cause it hurts. But what it does to my heart and chest, it just feels like I'm relieving all this pressure that I've stored up. My heart will feel free for just that time I am crying. Someone said to me "Tears are the safety valve of the heart when too much pressure is laid on it." It's supposedly by Albert Smith. I like it.

So here I am. With this stupid anxiety that won't seem to leave me alone. *burp* Yep. Still there. And I have a paper to write on 19th century American Art. And with the difficulty of breathing, it's hard to really care about the World Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 when you're just trying to get oxygen to your body. I'm tempted to just go up to my Art History teacher and say, "Look. I got bigger problems." But alas, I'm a stubborn good student and will finish this paper. Probably stay up all night. Perhaps I will blog again later tonight to continue on with the procrastination?

It's interesting how emotions and the brain work. I've recently become very fascinated by it all. Mostly because I'm watching myself and trying to take note of what is going on inside of me. I literally felt myself go numb. It was very interesting. I had just broken up with my boyfriend, a couple weeks ago, and realized that I did not feel that sad about it. That began to worry me, because just the day before, I had been in tears with a sick stomach. That, to me, was normal. Be upset and grieve about someone in your life you just lost. That is normal. But not feeling sad kind of scared me. I even whipped out a picture of him and stared at it. I felt the sad emotion begin to tip toe in, and then all of sudden, BAM! It was shut down in my heart and I didn't feel anything. Whoa.

It felt nice... to not be sad. But it worried me. I wanted to deal with this break up properly and not run away from the problem. Yet, I felt my body and my emotions stating otherwise. I really didn't understand it. Still don't.

Then, with the brain. It's amazing how it can divert its thoughts on its own accord. There were a few other things that have happened to me in the past few months. Not small things on any accord. They were rather very big things in fact that would shake anyone up. I'm beginning to wonder if it is those issues that I haven't confronted yet. I find myself wanting to confront them and think about the issues, but I can't seem to. I mean, I do want to, but something seems to say 'nope' and I can't seem to access any of the thoughts.

I find my brain and heart emotionally protecting myself. This has never happened to me before and I'm worried that it may have worse effects on me later on. I want to face my problems head on, and not run away or shut them away. It just seems so cowardly and not healthy. But I feel like it may have to wait till school is over. That'll be Tuesday and I can maybe try to face things head on a bit.

I kind of also wish that I had someone to really talk to about these issues. Someone to really just listen to me and maybe ask me questions and help me dig further. I mean, I know I have God and we're working on it. Talking all the time. But it's still not working. So that's why I'm left here, to writing. To writing all my thoughts and feelings down and hoping that somehow, this helps me. That somehow, I can ease the pain on my chest just a little bit and breathe normally for more than 5 minutes.

We'll see. I sense another blog post coming on as more thoughts flood into my head.