Drowning

It feels like I haven't written in forever.  My life in Boone has gotten significantly more chaotic in the past month.  I began working as a graduate assistant this semester with the Learning Assistance Program, specifically with Academic Services for Athletes.  I lead study halls 15 hours a week and work with athletes to help them maintain their grades (and eligibility), work on homework, and plan projected weekly schedules.  Additionally, I am taking 10 credit hours, training for a 10-miler at the end of the March, and trying to maintain some sort of social life.  It has been challenging, but I am thankful for less idle time. 

Guys.  I have been seriously struggling.  My life significantly changed when I moved to Boone.  While I liiiike living in Boone, I miss Kyle, my family, and my friends on a daily basis.  As you know, I was teetering on the borders of depression when I first made this move and was struggling with feelings of intense loneliness.  While I am no longer sad, lonely (praise), or bored, my anxiety has reached new levels.  Seriously.  I have never known anxiety to the extent that I know it now.

In attempts to pacify myself yesterday afternoon, I read something that I could finally completely relate to:

"The cyclical nature of anxiety is one of the reasons that anxiety can be so hard to treat without some type of outside intervention.  You experience anxiety, then you experience very frightening symptoms, and then you experience anxiety over those symptoms."

Yes.  That is my life.  I am officially losing control and I am in the process of being okay with the fact that an outside intervention is necessary.  Maybe you guys can relate.

The root of my anxiety is my hypochondriac nature.  It is a spiraling, deep, dark pit and sometimes I just can't crawl out of it, or even see the light at the top.  I will lie awake at night tossing and turning, convinced that I have contracted either A) radon poisoning from my basement apartment, B) breast cancer (probably stage 4 and I've had it for like 2 years), or C) heart disease.  I mean it isn't even limited to these things.  It's truly anything.  I can't even actually believe I am writing this ridiculousness in a blog post, but I think it's important.  Maybe you also have unreasonable fears, or you recognize that you are being irrational, but you need someone to reassure you.  I get that.  Seriously.  I have gone so far as to look up case studies on radon deaths on PubMed, only to find that cause of death is usually lung cancer, not heart disease, and then I will convince myself that I have heart disease.  I'm not lying.  Even typing these words I am fearful.  I have to constantly remind myself of the facts.  I am 23 years old, I exercise 6 days a week, my heart beats at 53 bpm, and I have a resting blood pressure of 100/60.  I am okay, I am okay, I am okay, OH MY GOSH I AM NOT OKAY.  Begin panic.

It's awful.  I have never experience panic in the way that I have this year.  The worst part is that I feel like a failure.  At night I lie awake pleading with Jesus to take my thoughts away.  Thanking him for giving me control over my mind, but to please rid myself of the darkness that I face every single night.  I hate the night.  Nights are hard for me, it's when I am alone and when I struggle the most.  I frantically and desperately pray, yet I can't find peace.  I am frustrated, so incredibly frustrated.  I feel like I should be able to handle this and I know that my feelings of failure in my relationship with Christ are not from Him, but I am struggling to shake the feeling.

Yesterday was painful, but I am on the upward slope.  The anxiety that I feel has been clouding my ability to find joy and it takes away the hours of sleep that I need to be getting at night.  After a sleepless night on Saturday, a public panic attack at church on Sunday, and about a gallon of tears later, I am feeling peace.  I spoke with some of my favorite people in life and I received some great insight, as well as prayer.

I need help.  Anxiety-related hyperventilation, chest pain, and night sweats are not okay.  I am reliant on my savior, but He has blessed us with individuals who are trained in the medical field and who can help.  I don't need to feel like I'm drowning in darkness. 

Last night I began taking Melatonin and I slept through the whole night (minus when I woke up to my mouse traps snapping in the closet - win, the tally is up to 4).  I have a doctor's appointment next Tuesday, but I just really need you guys to pray for me.  Anxiety is real and I am so sorry to all of you who experience it on a regular basis.  It's miserable, but you know, a good friend told me that it's not forever and there is hope.  There is always hope.  My mom sent me some awesome scripture that has just soothed me so much over the past 24 hours.

I won't post the entire chapter, but if you're struggling with anxiety, please go read Psalm 139.  Actually, go read it no matter what.  It is so good.  These verses in particular have helped me so much:

⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit?
    Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
    if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
    if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
    your right hand will hold me fast.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
    and the light become night around me,”
¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you;
    the night will shine like the day,
    for darkness is as light to you.
²³ Search me, God, and know my heart;
    test me and know my anxious thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any offensive way in me,
    and lead me in the way everlasting.

To know that He is the Lord of both the dark and the light is so comforting to me.  I must have told myself that 100 times in the past 12 hours.  Anxiety is all over the bible.  He knew that our human selves would struggle, and man, was He right.  I'm struggling, but I am excited to move beyond this.  Everything is going to be okay.  If you're struggling, it will be okay.  I'm praying for you and you are heavy on my heart this morning. 

Thanks for reading, friends.  You are all so special to me.  Relax.  The mind is one of the wildest beasts to tame, but there is peace all around us.