An Anxious Rant – Free Choice

it’s 10:06 at night. You tune out of your work and acknowledge the swift silence around you, the fuzzy noise of air. You decide it’s a good time to call it a day. 

 

After finishing in the washroom, you make your way to the bed with a series of dull footsteps against the carpet, seating yourself on the right edge of the mattress. You tug a thin, velvety blanket over the summits of your shoulder (to keep you from experiencing the shock of the cold in the morning) and you tuck your feet under the thick comforter that covers the rest of you. The tensions between your bones moan a silent relief as your muscles collapse into the waves of plush fabric that cradle you. Your eyesight hazes as you feel your body internally rock with the non-existent ocean of dreams that you lay upon, and you feel the kiss of a gentle rolling breeze across your face. And there’s an arrow wedged between your hip and your stomach. Now there are two. The mirage fades and you are at the bottom of a chasm. You feel the searing pain of magma burning the lining of your stomach. And now your eyes are open, and your sitting up in the mountains of blanket that you reside in, panicking because you’ve either forgotten to do something today, or you’ve done too much. 

 

Anx·i·e·ty

noun

a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome.

 

This is what anxiety is like. A sudden firework exploding in the depths of your internal organs, the uncalled-for rush of “ohmygodwhatamigoingtodothisisn’tokayholycrapthisistheendofthelineformeRIP”. Normally, for me anyways, it would always creep up on me when my guard was down, basically sending me into a sudden frenzy of energetic wailing while scrambling to unorganize everything in my path. This is completely normal, a healthy wake up call that screeches at you until you’ve found a way to fix, or tone down the problem. However, it started to become a problem for me when I would wake up at 3 or 4 in the morning with a racing heartbeat and a pot of acid for a stomach. It started to cause issues when I would suddenly lose my memory of a topic mid-way through a test, unable to recall simple things. I realized I had anxiety issues when I would get attacked even when there was no opponent. However, the worst part about having issues with things like anxiety is that we can’t seem to respectfully talk about them with other people.

 

 Now, I am not, nor have I ever been diagnosed with anxiety, so I cannot claim that I have any sort of anxiety disorders. However, it’s worth admitting that I’ve never discussed my anxiety issues with my doctor, just because this has been a more recent development of mine. Despite this, I still think that I have some genuine issues, and just because you don’t have a disorder, it doesn’t mean that you can’t have problems with things like this.  I’ve seen so many people overlook their problems simply because they didn’t feel it was significant enough to be considered a clinical issue, and I think it’s so important that people know that there is nothing wrong with saying that you have an issue, just as long as you aren’t exaggerating it, or self-diagnosing yourself with a serious illness. Saying that you have anxiety issues and saying that you have an anxiety disorder are two very different things that we commonly mix up in our modern, dark-humoured language that I believe needs to be changed. The last thing our world needs is people ignoring their issues for being insignificant, and people making serious issues seem like jokes. We all have problems that weigh differently. The main point is that we all have problems which should all be respected appropriately and equally.

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6 thoughts on “An Anxious Rant – Free Choice

  1. Dear beautiful Simran,

    Thank you for this incredibly insightful post. I have known you for a couple years now and it is amazing to get this new look into your life and personality. I absolute agree with you when you said “we all have problems which should all be respected appropriately and equally”. No matter how ok an individual portrays themselves in public, it is always possible that there is something else going on their personal life regarding family, school, or mental disorders like anxiety. It is truly our job as a society to stop poking fun at these issues and instead support others who find themselves in these serious and compromising situations. One thing I would suggest fixing within your piece is better incorporating the line “to keep you from experiencing the shock of the cold in the morning”, rather than just putting brackets around it. I can’t wait to read more from you Simran, you are such an inspiration!

    Lots of love,
    Juleanna

    1. Dear Jule,
      When you first told me that you had commented on this post, part of me freaked out. That part of me started to panic about how people were actually reading this stuff, and I got really embarrassed all of a sudden. But I can’t tell you how happy I was to know that the person reading it was you. It’s only recently that I’ve started posting really personal stuff like this, and I have to say that it really takes a lot of guts for me to be putting this kind of stuff out there. Comments like these are the ones that make me feel so much more confident in myself, so I can’t thank you enough for taking the time out of your day to read and comment on this post. It really means a lot to me, and it gives me hope for our world. You’re a star 🌟:)
      With lots of love, Simran

  2. Dear Simran,

    I am very proud of you for opening up about this matter because I know how difficult it is to let out your feelings and emotions that society tells you to keep quiet. I believe that, as high school students, we can all relate to a certain level of this monster called Anxiety. It is important to remember that most things have a spectrum, so one person most likely has a different level of anxiety than another, and you did a great job explaining that. I, myself, am currently sitting in a pool of anxiety trying to keep up with this fast-paced life.
    I absolutely loved how you started this piece, actually. I loved how it started with a narration, and the imagery that you gave is phenomenal. I actually completely understand, and am able to feel what you are describing. Congratulations on that, that is amazing.
    imagery

    For suggestions, I would just make this longer. It felt incomplete as I ended reading this. This is such a prevalent topic in your life that I believe you could’ve expanded on it a bit more.

    Other than that, it was great.
    Keep it up.

    Sincerely,
    Tina

    1. Dear Tina,
      It’s so comforting to hear that you understand this struggle, because a lot of the time, this is one of those problems which a person is forced to go through alone, and knowing your not alone can be really soothing. Especially in our lives, our problems are kind of pushed to the side because it’s a “phase” or we are being too dramatic, which was one of the points I wanted to make, so in a way, this post was also really inspired by the poem you presented, a poem that really clicked with my life as well, so thank you for that.

      As for the length of the poem, I actually wrote this post from 10:30 to 11:00 on a school night, and I was only writing at the time because I had just been swept up in anxiety. The imagery in the first paragraph is actually what actually happened to me earlier that night, and for some reason I was inspired by it. For that reason, I kinda had to make it short, but also because this is such a controversial topic about “having or not having a condition”, I really had to watch my wording so that I didn’t say something unintentionally offensive. So for hat reason, I kept it limited, although if I could find the time, I would totally rewrite it into a longer and more in-depth piece.

      On that note, I would like to thank you for taking the time out of your day to read my post, and for being the supportive and caring friend you are.

      Sincerely, Simran 🙂

  3. Dear Sim,
    All I’ve been reading for the past little while are essays and seeing your post not follow the five paragraph construct was a breath of fresh air. The use of imagery throughout the piece is absolutely fantastic. “…the waves of plush fabric that cradle you,” truly provide the sense of being in a comfortable position void of any worries. Whereas, “a pot of acid for a stomach,” made me visibly cringe, to be quite honest, and so I find it fitting for when you are describing anxiety. Speaking of which, actually defining the word and portray the way in which it would show up when you search it (if that made any sense), bravo. Doing so made me simultaneously feel as if there was a stop in time and the scene was going forward with a full force in the background.
    For suggestions, I completely agree with Juleanna, because the brackets around “to keep you from experiencing the shock of the cold in the morning” break the flow of the passage. One other thing that I had on my mind and was bugging me a little, so feel free to disregard this but I had to get it out of me, was the phrase “ohmygodwhatamigoingtodothisisn’tokayholycrapthisistheendofthelineformeRIP”, I do understand that it’s there to illustrate the absolute chaos that’s ensued by anxiety, but having it as one makes it a little difficult to read the words as letters from one word carried over to another, so I would just suggest to hyphenate the words just for the sake of comprehension.
    I absolutely loved reading your piece and enjoyed getting to know you better this year!
    I can’t wait for what’s to come from you writing,
    Lots of hugs,
    Saumyaa

    1. Dear Saum,
      I’m so glad you enjoyed the imagery, it’s honestly one of my favourite paragraphs that I’ve ever written. I’ve also kind of started to love the idea of using dictionary definitions in my writing, just because it stands out so clearly and makes one hell of a transition. I was proud of myself for writing this before, but after reading your comments, I feel even more accomplished. Thank you 🙂

      Regarding my bracket problem, I was kinda stumped as to how I was going to fit that line in (just because it’s one of those weird things that I do before I sleep, so to make it more personal, I wanted to keep it in), and I have a bad habit of just throwing in commas wherever I can, so I decided on using the brackets because it one of those signature things I do in all of my more casual posts. I can see how it can be distracting though and totally understand where your coming from with that. And as for that one quote, I actually wasn’t aware that people would have a problem reading it, cause I can actually read it just fine soooo 😅. I’ll keep that in mind for next time (sorry about that).

      To wrap this comment up, I would like to thank you for reading my post and adding the comment section. I really appreciate it, especially for the more personal posts like this one. I hope you have a wonderful time, and I hope you find something more relaxing to read, because essays can be stressful, and I don’t want you straining yourself 🙂

      Sincerely, Simran

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