Season 2 Episode 02 Show Notes: What it's Really Like Living with Anxiety
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In this episode, we dive deep into what it’s really like to live with anxiety, from my perspective and personal experiences. We chat about what anxiety feels like and the ways we can combat the presence of it in our daily lives.
Defining Anxiety
For me, anxiety can hit anywhere, anytime. It doesn’t matter if I’m comfortably at home or at work scrambling under an intense deadline. Sometimes I just wake up with a tight chest and I can’t even identify what might be causing it.
anxiety.org states that an anxiety disorder results when the fight or flight response becomes triggered too easily and too frequently. The human brain responds identically to both real and unreal danger using our fight or flight response, which causes a surge of adrenaline to assist with either fighting or fleeing. While we experience physical reactions to the surge of adrenaline (like heart rate and blood pressure increases and senses becoming hyper-alert, it is also up to our brains to determine whether the trigger is real or the trigger is unreal. Both anxiety and fear produce virtually identical physiologic responses, so our mind is in charge of making sense of it all to react appropriately (which it doesn’t always do perfectly).
When our fight or flight response is triggered too frequently, the brain starts to perceive the world as more dangerous than it actually is and the body overreacts to stressors that are not life-threatening, like traffic jams, work pressure, and family difficulties.
That has been my experience — that my body and mind overreact to both existing and perceived stressors. And I believe this stems from my need for perfection. I’m constantly trying to do the very best I possibly can, even at a detriment to my relationships and mental and physical wellbeing. And I think that’s the key — I don’t think doing my best is inherently negative; it’s when it becomes obsessive and wreaks havoc on other aspects of my life that it becomes a problem.
Anxiety is Not One-Size-Fits-All
The symptoms I’ve experienced living with anxiety have run the gamut — sometimes I can easily tame them and other times all I want to do is veg out in bed or on the couch. But that’s the reality of living with anxiety — I just take it day-by-day.
And I think that’s the misunderstanding of people who live with anxiety. We can’t generalize that everyone feels and experiences it in the same way, and we also can’t assume that anxiety is debilitating for everyone who experiences it. Affecting nearly 40 million American adults, it’s the most common mental health condition in the country — you may not even realize you know people dealing with anxiety.
A Few Things That Have Helped Me Cope
While I go into more detail about each of these on the podcast, none of the below are earth-shattering. But I think that’s the point. Sometimes it’s the smallest daily habits that are the most impactful — at least in my experience.
Working out on a regular basis.
Leaning on my person.
Eating real food.
Practicing self care and yoga.
Switching from coffee to Matcha Tea.
Tune into the podcast for more about my struggle with anxiety, and more tips for coping with it from a few great resources. And remember, let’s not generalize the experience of living with anxiety, but rather, let’s offer help and love to each other the best way we know how.
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