Fear

I'm driving. It's dark outside. My only worry is hitting a deer with my tiny car. And then my mind goes blank. That's when the fear hits.

It starts in my stomach, where I can feel it twist into tight knots. It begins creeping ever so slowly upward. It's getting harder to breathe. I feel as though there is a great weight on my chest, keeping me from taking in precious air. My hands get clammy and I start to take shorter, quicker breaths. Meanwhile, my poor heart feels as though it's about to explode. I worry about it giving out, adding to the anxiety. All while this is happening, in my mind, I know I'm going to be fine.

I turn up the music and sing along, trying to calm myself out of this frenzied state. My breathing finally begins to slow and I take deep breaths as I keep focused on the road. I can feel my heartbeat return to it's familiar rhythm and I no longer feel like I could vomit. I breathe a sigh of relief. Another battle won.

I've been dealing with panic attacks for a few years now, and let me just say it is not fun. I had them fairly steadily for about a year before I learned how to control them. My doctor had put me on Atavan to stop them, and while it worked and felt awfully nice, it was becoming addictive and turning me into a zombie. I just had to learn what triggered my panic attacks and how to deal with them when I felt one coming on. So far, I've been successful. I haven't had a full blown freak out in over a year, although I've come awfully close. It's all about your state of mind, and unfortunately, here lately, I've been very much out of tune with my mind.

The driving scenario I described above has happened a dozen times in the past month. It's probably the worst feeling in the world, thinking you're going to die for no reason. I know it sounds absolutely crazy, but that's all a panic attack is really. They've been pretty unprovoked, too, so I'm not sure what my deal is. I've been more antsy going out in public, as well, and I'm afraid it's going to turn me into a hermit. I've been having to force myself to go out and do things. I get anxiety about my anxiety taking over just one time. Drinking, obviously, eases the senses and for me, that means I won't have an attack. Right, and it leads to drinking too much too often. Don't want to go there again. I wrecked a car, ruined a relationship, and made myself look like a fool more times than I can count (or remember).

I'm hoping I can beat this just like my other issues. It's a bit of a different battle, but one that can be won, nonetheless.

Downhill

I'm sorry to anyone that's actually been reading this. I know I've been bad about writing anything new lately. My emotions have just been on a downward spiral lately, and I'm trying to pick myself back up. I am working on an interesting new blog, though, that I think everyone will like. I'm hoping to have it up later this week if I can find the motivation to actually work on it.

But anyway, I'm not sure my medicines are working. I'm on Abilify 5mg, once a day in the evenings. My doctor also put me on Focalin 10mg, also once a day but in the mornings. This is for the supposed ADD that I have. I was doing well, but now I'm reverting back to how I was before I started the medication. I was on Cymbalta, but I was starting to have bad thoughts. Naturally, the doc took me off of that and now it's just the Abilify.

I'm thinking more and more about changing my diet, specifically changing it to gluten-free. I've read about how gluten has been linked to depression and can worsen it if it present in a person's diet. It looks like it might be a somewhat tough diet to follow, especially since I love breads and gluten is found in most bread products. Won't hurt to try it, that's for sure. I'm willing to do just about anything to beat this.

Death

I'm not sure that there's anything more feared on this planet than death.  People are afraid dying.  People are afraid of other people dying.  People are afraid of animals, plants, and even objects dying.  I know that, personally, death scares the shit out of me, and unfortunately, I became all too familiar with the bastard early on in life.

My great grandmother, who favored me and was someone I looked up to, passed away when I was twelve. She was a strong woman despite her age and was certainly not past whooping us kids if we needed it. She gardened, cooked, cleaned, and did anything and everything. I even miss her yelling at me when I wouldn't eat all of my vegetables because I didn't like them. Why did this have to happen...

The next death I experienced is one that shocked us all. My friend Matt passed away suddenly. Well, he wasn't only my friend, but my very first boyfriend, as well. We were twelve. I remember the night I received the phone call about his death like it was yesterday. I honestly had thought it was an April Fool's joke, as it was April 2nd when his best friend called me, telling me the tragic news. All I could think about was how unfair it was to have someone my age be taken away from us all. We were too young. We still had Pokemon to play and wrestling to watch. It just wasn't fair...

After Matt's passing, my grandmother died of leukemia a couple of months later. This rocked my very being to the core. I loved my Grammy so much. Why did I have to lose another so close to me? I was only twelve. My grandma was supposed to be there to see me grow up, get married, see her grandkids, and live life with her cats. Oh, those cats. I'm not much of a cat person, but I would give both arms and legs to see her happy with those smelly animals again. If it wasn't for Grammy, I wouldn't be who I am. She helped mold me to love animals, reading books, and playing video games. She helped save lives, as she was a nurse, and was just an amazing person. Again, it just wasn't fair...

To add insult to an already injured spirit, my grandpa, married to my Grammy, passed away just hours before she did. He died of a heart attack. Sleepovers with my cousins at my grandparents' house would be no more. One of my favorite things ever growing up were Sunday mornings when Grandpa would bring us donuts for breakfast. To be young again...

Was this a series of unfortunate events? Absolutely. It was after all of this death and sadness that I became depressed and my outlook on life changed. I stopped believing in God and I questioned life. When I turned thirteen, I was put on my first series of antidepressants. At fourteen, I started to cut myself and became isolated. It's been a vicious cycle ever since. I'm not sure if these happenings are what drove me "crazy", but I know they didn't help. All I can do now is accept that what happened happened and learn to move on because it'll only happen again. I just don't know when.

Nowadays, I believe everything happens for a reason. I'm not sure of that reason, but I think there's a purpose to every event that happens in life. Most of it may seem unfair, but that's life and with life comes death, the unnecessary evil. So for anyone that has experienced death, you are not alone. Whether by an illness, an accident, or a suicide, death happens and all we can do is learn to accept it and hope that the soul we lost is now at peace and in a better place.

Be sure to tell those close to you that you love them because you never know when death will rear his ugly face next.