Anxiety

Anxiety goes hand in hand with depression. It is common that people dealing with depression will have some sort of anxiety. Anxiety is usually a reaction to stress leaving a person to feel multiple symptoms. People who experience anxiety may have a feeling of uneasiness, fear, worry, dread, and many more similar. Everyone is different and our levels of stress can vary; therefore, symptoms of anxiety change from person to person. While one person might experience just a butterfly feeling in their stomach and uneasiness another might have more severe symptoms such as, shortness of breath, rapid heart rate, extreme sweat, and so on.
Because of the depression that I am currently under I am feeling some levels of anxiety. I am not exactly sure what level of anxiety I have and the severity of it. All I know right now is what I feel on a daily basis....and let me tell you, it is a scary feeling. This to me is not just being nervous for a test, an interviewing, worrying about an assignment, or whether or not I am going to be able to buy those pretty shoes I have been checking out at the local boutique. It is a feeling very hard to explain. I suddenly get these overwhelming feelings that leave me short of breath, heart racing, uncontrollable shakes, back pain, and severe headaches. They usually take place when I least expect it and it catches me by surprise in such a way that I panic and a million thoughts start racing through my head. The first time I got an anxiety I thought I was going to die. I felt so short of breath that I became dizzy and thought I was for sure going to pass out. It scared me so much that I immediately grabbed the computer and started searching for a way to fix it. I needed to read something that will tell me that everything was going to be okay.
I searched many websites trough out the course of a couple hours and they pretty much all gave the same ideas. One of the ideas that really stuck out to me was to buy a rubber band and wear it on your wrist. Every time you experience an anxiety attack snap the rubber band on your wrist to take your concentration from the attack to the pain you are inflicting on yourself. I found this very intriguing because thou it might be helpful, I thought it could also be dangerous. I kept thinking to myself "What if I like this pain and I continue to do this for a long time?". I became afraid that I might go from being depressed to one of those people who like to inflict pain on themselves. So, I opted not to follow that suggestion. However, I did find two suggestions that were very helpful. One was to tell yourself that the attack is temporary and it will soon be over, and the other one was to count backwards from 30 to 1 because the attacks usually last about 30 seconds.
I went out on a date with a guy I met online and I figured that the attacks will start coming on like candy pouring out of a pinata. Sure enough I was right. I decided to put the suggestions to the test and every time that I would have an anxiety attack I will count from 30 to 1, and if by the time I got to 1 I was still feeling anxiety I would tell myself that everything was going to be okay. I did it and it actually worked. I might have seemed a little distracted for a few seconds but within a minute I back to normal and chatting away. He didn't notice I was doing all this, so I found the suggestions to be very successful. Now, every time I have an anxiety I just count and breath as normal as I possibly can and everything is alright. I also start singing Bob Marley songs in my head for a few seconds and that also helps as well.
If you have anxiety I suggest that u find something to keep your mind distracted from the attack and onto something else, rather than becoming upset over it. It works....I promise, and in the end you will feel so much better and actually proud of yourself. I know I did!