Five Days In

I didn’t think I had anxiety.

Not really.

I wasn’t constantly worrying.

I didn’t have panic attacks.

I wasn’t bouncing my leg, wringing my hands, or feeling like I was crawling out of my skin.

So when my primary care provider suggested trying a low dose of medication for anxiety, I wasn’t convinced it would do much.

I’ve tried two anxiety medications before. Both of them simply put me to sleep, so after a couple of doses, I gave up.

This one has been different.

No forced naps.

Instead, I feel like a lighter version of me.

It’s only been about five days, but the difference has been remarkable.

I’ve been tackling tasks I’ve avoided for months. Crossing things off my list and then moving right on to the next one without having to negotiate with myself first.

Things that used to feel heavy now just… feel like things that need to get done.

That has been the biggest surprise.

Because I never realized what I was experiencing was anxiety.

I’ve spent a lot of my life carrying heavy things.

Responsibility.

Single parenting.

Chronic stress.

Crisis.

Leadership.

Loss.

Making difficult decisions when there wasn’t another option.

And somehow, I’ve almost always managed to keep performing.

From the outside, I looked capable.

From the inside, I thought it was normal to have to push through so much resistance just to do ordinary things.

When you’ve lived that way long enough, you stop questioning it. You assume that’s just who you are.

I thought anxiety always looked like fear or panic.

Mine looked like avoidance.

It looked like freezing whenever there was even the slightest possibility of conflict or discomfort.

It looked like endless rumination.

It looked like exhaustion.

It looked like talking myself out of doing things that caused friction on top of my already overtaxed life.

I thought it was depression.

Or maybe a nervous system that had simply been through too much and needed rest.

Maybe some of it was.

But I had no idea anxiety could wear those disguises.

Looking back over my life, I wonder how long I’ve been carrying it.

I suspect it’s been there since I was very young.

I just became so accustomed to living with it that I mistook it for my personality.

For normal.

Part of me wishes I had discovered this in my late teens or early twenties.

I think it could have made some chapters of my life a little easier.

But mostly, I’m just grateful to know now.

Five days isn’t enough time to declare victory.

But it has been enough time to realize something important:

Sometimes the biggest symptom of anxiety isn’t feeling anxious.

Sometimes it’s spending your whole life adapting to it so well that you never realize it’s there until, one day, it isn’t.