Mental Health Awareness Week- Anxiety & Me

Hello everyone, sorry for no posts! Again very busy with revision and schoolwork but I am working on some posts and hopefully can upload every week. This is a much more serious post to normal. As it is mental health awareness week I thought it would be appropriate to do a blog post. I headed over to my Instagram a few weeks ago and asked my followers for some questions related to anxiety. I have finally plucked up the courage to answer them in a post. I am not yet ready to share every detail to do with my anxiety and I hope you understand this is just a glimpse of what I am comfortable with sharing. People can get anxiety mistaken with general worries that are normal such as exam stress, schoolwork and friendship issues. However, if  you think you have anxiety I would definitely recommend you visit your GP. It's better to have it out in the open and be able to address the issue and deal with it effectively. I was diagnosed with anxiety and have found strategies to help me overcome each struggle bit by bit and I have the wonderful support of my family and those around me. Let's get onto the questions!

- What do you do if you have a panic attack at school?

When I first had panic attacks at school, I found them very hard to deal with and was scared as I didn't know what was happening. I simply remove myself from the situation and make sure a teacher is aware that I need to leave the classroom. 

- How do you explain anxiety to someone?

This is a tough one, anxiety is different for everyone and can affect you in different ways. I would just be honest with someone about how you are feeling and explain that way. 

- How often do you get panic attacks?

I used to get panic attacks every week and it was awful. It is hard to say how often as it changes all the time but I have definitely improved. I would say 2-3 times a month depending on the situation I am in. It changes all the time! I had one yesterday, which is the first one I've had in May! 

- What do you think makes people anxious at school?

If it's general anxiety I would say exams and school work. Everyone gets nervous before an exam as it is only natural and people can find going to certain less
ons tough. 

- How do you calm yourself after a panic attack?

I take deep breaths, count to ten and then count another ten and repeat this cycle, it means I am only focusing on ten second intervals. I also take as much time as I need to recover, panic attacks make you fell sick and lack in energy. I also find they give you a headache so relaxing for a few minutes tends to help. 

- Have you had any embarrassing anxiety moments? 

Yes, it's inevitable really. I started to cry when I got told we had to speak in front of a class, my chair got caught in my friends and I tripped over, luckily hardly anyone saw! In my early stages, I walked out of a classroom and everyone stopped and stared at me, it was quite embarrassing but now I don't care. If I need to leave, I'm going to!

- What do you answer when people ask you what's wrong?

I either don't answer because I don't feel the need to respond to someone who I feel doesn't really want to know and if I do, I say I have anxiety and that's that, if they want to ask more questions then I tend to answer if they are genuinely interested. 

- When did you first realise you had anxiety?

I noticed something was wrong and that this anxiety was worse than anything I had felt before when I was constantly leaving classrooms and sitting out of lessons. 

- How do you cope with your anxiety?

I talk to my Mum about it and make sure she is aware of how I'm feeling. I find talking helps, this may be in the form of counselling but for me I've given it up and prefer confiding with my Mumma! Just finding ways to overcome it and taking small steps helps too. Take each day as it comes. 

Thank you for reading this post, I will hopefully get some beauty up next week or earlier if I can but I have two tests to revise for. I hope this helped any of you who were intrigued about anxiety or for those suffering with it too. Remember you are not alone, lots of people experience what you are feeling too. I think it's very important to talk about mental illnesses and put a rest to society's distorted image on mental health. If you want to read more about anxiety or other mental health issues check out this link: 

http://www.mentalhealth.org.uk love Liv xox