Mental Health and the Value of Being (as Stubborn as Humanly Possible)

There's a lot about anxiety that I don't know, but I do know that no matter what variety you're dealing with, it's tough. I can't afford to just sit around and let the waves roll in, no matter how much that might seem like a good idea sometimes.

But I want to resist. I want to fight and struggle and get free, somehow. I may not know exactly how, or even if I ever truly can. And I may not be the best at planning ahead but I am stubborn. I'm guessing most folks I know have caught on to that one too, by now.

Growing up, I heard a lot about virtue and vice. The more I heard about that kind of thing, the less I felt like I knew what I was doing, or who I really was;

The world felt distant, because I wasn't sure that someone who had panic attacks, PTSD flashbacks, and sat around staring at the walls yet not really seeing anything, I wasn't sure someone like that could be anything like other people.

Maybe I was from Titan? (It's a small frozen rock near Saturn, charitably called a moon.)

Living with Anxiety

There were times when I looked in the mirror and I didn't see much of anything, found it hard to care. So there are days I'll wake up and I just won't understand how I got here. Then I remember, oh, right - mostly because I'm stubborn, and lucky.

Somehow, I didn't give in to those terrible days, weeks, months. Somewhere I decided that yeah, life is a lot of trouble, but it's mine anyway. Even if I'm an anxious mess. At least I'm here.

And with impeccable logic I can always state that I am always exactly where I am: That much is OK. It has to be, because you are who you are and you do have a place, and a part to play, no matter how often the world reminds you that you're 'mentally ill'. Maybe that's all they see?

But so what if you come from a small frozen rock? Icecaps melt, people heal. They really do; About every 7 years all the cells in our bodies change.

Nothing stays the same- even if it looks that way.

Treating anxiety and mental illness is about getting way beyond the surface

Anxiety recovery requires a lot. It means taking a look at what you are, then deciding what you want to become.

No matter how worthless, awful, anxious, terrified, numb, alone you may feel, that's a something. You can work with something. You can make things from something. So long as you keep going; That's the pill I wish I could pop when things are too hard, too much, too off.

People will go ahead and try to tell you who they reckon you should be anyhow. That you've got the wrong idea, that you should just get over these pesky emotions, keep calm, and carry on. And I'm sure you can. At a cost. The cost you've been paying for years, where you get up and nothing much seems different. Where your heart sinks a little at the thought of another day stuck wondering how 'well' you are, and by which definition.

While you're wondering that, you can also think a little more about what you want. Care just a little - each day - for that small, true self that gets lost in the busyness, stress and pain of these lives we lead. These quiet, all too lonely lives spent reaching for things labeled Tomorrow, When I Win the Lottery, When I Am Well.
You don't have to wait.

Mental health is an everyday thing.

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