Stress and pressure

For me stress and pressure are linked so it made sense for me to merge them into one post. People get stressed and people feel pressure at some point in their lives for all sorts of reasons. Usually these feelings come at the same time. The main ones being work, family and friends, money and society.

Society has become one that has caused more pressure for a lot of people, myself included. Whilst there are days when I can say:

                   'I am me and shouldn't let other people's appearance impact me..'

That isn't always possible. The media puts pressure and girls (and boys) to look a certain way. So sometimes when I watch films or TV programmes, I feel completely inadequate and a pressure to do more to look 'good'. But I eventually convince myself to get back to a level where I feel even slightly okay about how I look. I mainly do this by talking to friends, or I just let the emotions out which more often then not helps the feeling pass.

Work pressure is another massive issue for people. This could be to do with workload from school/college/uni or when you get a job. Finding work for me has been extremely stressful and slowly felt more and more pressure to get one otherwise I wouldn't have money to do things I enjoyed and end up having to spend the rest of my life job hunting. This attitude isn't necessarily helpful getting you into work. So I had to keep telling myself it will happen soon, it just takes longer for me than everyone else. It doesn't mean employers don't like me, just I tend to lack experience.  

When these pressures build up it makes me stressed. Then I start to stress over the little things which then leads onto getting frustrated very quickly. Even over the little things. So here's a couple examples of one thought train I've had quite alot:

-I could be job searching for a month, then get stressed with not getting anything or one interview and being turned down. This then turns into frustration, then slowly turns into anger. Then anger usually leads to tears. I'm one of those people who cry when they're angry so it tends to lead to tears. This cycle could happen everyday for a week before the penny finally drops and I realise I just need to be patient.

-Throughout school up until university I have always hated not understanding a topic. And there's sometimes I could sit for ages and someone could attempt to explain it and I just can't get it. Which then stresses me out because I have to understand it for an exam/essay. This again leads to frustration and more tears. But it's okay not to understand something, you can't expect to know everything in life because what is easy for you is difficult for others.

xx

What its like to have anxiety

Everyone experiences anxiety differently. By that I mean the triggers and how often it happens are different. Its one of those things that is really hard to describe because your head is constantly busy. But the core feelings or symptoms, if you like, are similar (tight chest, feeling sick, jelly legs, shaking etc). The reasons tend to be similar too: bullying, traumatic events, other mental illnesses to name a few.

There's always quotes all over Facebook saying 'Anxiety isn't just panic attacks'. And that's true. For me, it feel like there's a huge weight sitting on my chest and I cant breathe. My hands shake, I get tension headaches and I dig my nails into my skin. I don't do this to purposefully hurt myself and never break the skin, most of the time I don't even realise I'm doing it. Its just a way to distract my brain from the negative thoughts.  There are points in the day where I feel that stressed and overwhelmed I just cry, sometimes I don't even know the reason behind it.

I constantly feel like I am not worth people's time, which the logical side of me knows isn't true. But when I arrange to meet people there's a part of me that always questions why they would want to. As silly and illogical as it may sound. Along with this, it means I find it hard to 'self myself' during interviews because I don't see my worth. I struggle in crowds, busy restaurants, public transport, just anywhere with a lot of people. My head goes into complete overdrive as I hate being stuck in a place where I can't see a way out, I am looking at everyone wondering what they are thinking when they look at me.

For me personally, it's usually when I withdraw completely into myself its because I've ended up at my low point. I sit staring at one place, or curled up with my knees drawn up to my chest. Everything becomes so overwhelming and I have no way to process it when I'm sitting there alone.

There's days when I feel 'fine', days I feel completely low all day and some a mix of the two. Then there's some days that one thing trigger you and it spirals a good day into a bad one. But amongst the negative there's always something positive. What I have realised is my inner strength, the support I have and the little things in life that keep me going. There's probably a lot I've left out either because I've said them in previous posts, or my brain isn't quite willing to share just yet.

xx

Anxiety: It's okay to cry

Today's been a bit rubbish so I thought I'd put this one up earlier than I'd planned to. Also to point out this doesn't just apply to people with anxiety. Everyone has their bad days, weeks and even months. Sometimes it's okay to have a good cry. I'll give you an example that's really personal to me. I've been bullied, that's no secret I've said it before in previous posts, but I've never given any specifics. In fact a lot of my friends and family don't know about this. Bearing in mind this happened about 13 years ago and it's stuck shows how bulling can affect a person.

I was in Year 7 and coming home from school on a public bus like usual. Only this time a boy from Year 11 decided to shout abuse at me down the bus. This led to a bus load of school children laughing at me. At first I was mortified, then I just was too upset I sat at the front of the bus trying to hide my face crying. As he got off the bus he pulled my hair to try to get me to look at him, when I didn't move he shouted more abuse at me and got off the bus. I was that upset I completely missed my bus stop. I just want to point out none of my friends on the bus helped me. Luckily a girl who lived on the next street from me helped me off the bus and walked me home.

To this day going on buses triggers anxiety, I dig my nails into my hands and have to eat mints, sweets or look out the window to distract myself on the journey. I've also realised I tend to rub my nails (weird and also a reason nail polish never lasts on my hands).

So here's what I mean, my hands aren't dirty its shadow..

Back to my main point, if I didn't cry, letting all the feelings out I reckon I wouldn't be able to talk about it now. So crying is good, it doesn't mean you are weak. Cry it out, watch a film, indulge in some treats, then talk to a friend or family member about it. And if you cry again it's okay.


I hope me sharing this extremely personal story helps someone out there.

xx