Anxiety & Depression - The Nice Part

Little did I know that moving back to Enstone was going to be the beginning of my new life.
Throughout my teenage years, I had an obsessive, repetitive, compulsive, almost pathological fear of turning into my Mum.
Moving back home gave me the sudden realisation that I was indeed going down the same route as my mother. A cold sweat covered me from top to toe, and I started shaking. After the shaking came an uncontrollable feeling of anger. After the anger and the demolition of my bedroom came tears. After the tears, I got straight on the bus to Oxford (45 mins duration) and went to the Jobcentre. I didn't die, I didn't throw up, I didn't even have a panic attack.
I can remember getting off the bus with an overwhelming sense of achievement. The buzz was unreal. The first thing I had to do when I walked in the door was to tell my mum. She didn't look as proud as I had imagined she would. If anything, she looked a bit pissed off. I mentally told her to piss the fuck off go away, and marched back to my bedroom, where I remained until mum called me for dinner.

The years went by, my independence grew, I was taking more risks, and I was in control of my depression. I'm not saying that I never had a panic attack during those years, I did. It was how I dealt with them that changed. I had to retrain my brain not to fear the panic attack, because that would be enough to trigger one. Once I could go about my day without fearing the fear, I had to learn to deal with my panic attacks in a controlled way.

• Breathing Techniques - I took up yoga to help me learn the correct way to breathe. That sounds ridiculous, but it's true. I also looked ridiculous, but most of the time we all had our eyes closed, so we couldn't see each other.
• Mental Ear-bashing - When I felt like I was going to have a wobble, I'd give myself a good telling off. I'd say things like, "Come on, you're like everybody else." or "You're not going to die, have a sit down and rummage through your bag or something."

I had discovered comedy, although I had probably discovered it at school. For someone with an anxiety disorder, I was very confident at standing up in front of everybody and playing the clown. Comedy made me happy, and I was good at it. The world was mine.

I was travelling to all sorts of places with work related things. After buses came trains, then I got a car!

I can't expect to live the rest of my life without feeling anxiety, but I know that if I do, then I have all the ammo and experience to deal with it.

That's it.

I'm 25, and a completely normal person in society *twitch*.

Thank you for reading.