anxiety attack – The April Diaries

I remember after attending a conference in Providence, I had gone to UNO’S with my classmates. Suddenly, I had developed a massive panic attack. I had absolutely no idea how to deal with it, then, other than “deep breathing.” I knew that wasn’t enough for someone like me, who has had an acute anxiety disorder basically since I was born. But I can tell you that I have more effective coping mechanisms than I ever did, even when I had worked with a cognitive therapist.

I wrote 2020: the year people will (hopefully) understand mental health and let me tell you, it took a pandemic just for people to understand what dealing with mental health is like. I’m not undermining anything that people went through during lockdown, but this was where my mindset was in early 2020. I had utter fear of my future and the USA’s future. On top of that, I was finishing college and I was dealing with quite the alcohol addiction.

Now, here I am, coming face to face with my anxiety disorder once and for all. I’ll give you one example of an anxiety trigger of mine: finances. I had gone through this money-mindset transformation stage with Brooke Ritchie during “Path to Freedom” and one of the ways to get out of our limiting beliefs about attaining money was through tapping. (No, I am not referring to sex.)

Tapping

EFT Tapping is essentially, according to HealthLine.com “an alternative treatment for physical pain and emotional distress. It’s also referred to as tapping or psychological acupressure.” It’s been used for people who’ve dealt with anxiety and PTSD.

I’ll link to Brad Yates’ most popular video here, to give you a sense. But once you start doing it, there’s no going back. Tapping uses the fingertips to quite literally “tap” the focal energy points. The most common set-up for a tap session is “Even though I [insert something negative that you’re trying to cure here] I choose to completely love and accept myself.”

2. Metaphorical Rinsing Into The Roots

If you’re standing up, or have the opportunity to stand up, plant your feet firmly on the ground and say “I let go of [whatever is triggering you]” and imagine your body is rinsing that negative anxiety down through the bottom of your feet and into “roots.” It’s as if you’re watering a tree! In this case, you are the tree that doesn’t wilt just because it feels anxious.

Make these non-negotiables for you, as they’ve been for me. You will get your stride back, and you will be motivated once again.

It was almost 6:00 a.m. on a Thursday morning and I felt like I was drowning in a glass tube that only got smaller and smaller, tighter and tighter, and my TMJ was acting up. I’m verbally begging the pain in my left jaw to stop as my tears ricocheted off my cheeks and onto my cotton-candy pink sweater. At the same time, it also feels like I’m on dry land because my throat is pleading for water and Advil. Thoughts of the annoyances of the past scratch dangerously beneath the surface of my skin. Will somebody, please, make it stop! My eyes see something of a pink and indigo Van Gogh painting and I can almost see my blood turning green, right where the scab on my thumb is.

This, my friends, is an anxiety attack I had last week.

For once, I’m able to write down what an anxiety attack feels like for me. Also for once, I choose my choice to be a writer because it’s who I am. A few minutes later, the scab turns into nothing as I sit down at my laptop to write my manuscript for my third book (…which got picked up!).

It’s so easy to feel like we’re never enough, and forget about the ways we’ve grown. Remembering our growth can make us feel more confident about tackling the future. This month, I read more books than I ever did in one month’s time span, saw a dietician, scored a full-time job, kept my sobriety in check (I’ve been sober for one month!), drank more water, and re-started submitting my art and poetry to literary outlets.

I quoted this A Cinderella Story quote in Unstoppable | How I’ve Been After a Month’s Hiatus but the same quote still applies; “never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.” In other words, don’t give up. If people are being negative around you and trying to feed off your positivity, don’t you dare let their negative, growly, bitchiness cross your line of hope for your own future and present. After all, the present is what really matters here.