Dealing with pressures of Adulthood and Anxiety

Some would say it is fairly a more recent concept, one that has emerged more so after the Corona-era. But to people like me, who did not know what to call this feeling earlier - it has been a revelation of sorts.

All throughout my twenties and even during my teenage years, I thought that I was being the rebel and got always tangled up in my angst of my own expectations of life. During school, I was always the studious girl who longed for silly crushes. During college, I was the girl who wanted to achieve everything in a relationship - wanting to be the perfect girlfriend. During the beginning of my career I was the girl who wanted to achieve all her dreams.

Slowly and steadily, somehow I don't know when, but the feeling of panic and anxiety crept inside me and started affecting my mental health to the extend that most of late twenties and at present I became dependent on medicines and doctors for managing my daily life.

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What is Anxiety ?

Anxiety is a feeling of fear, dread, and uneasiness. It might cause you to sweat, feel restless and tense, and have a rapid heartbeat. It can be a normal reaction to stress. For example, you might feel anxious when faced with a difficult problem at work, before taking a test, or before making an important decision. It can help you to cope. The anxiety may give you a boost of energy or help you focus. But for people with anxiety disorders, the fear is not temporary and can be overwhelming.

As stated above, in simple language - Anxiety can be a normal reaction to stress, but when some people extend it to their daily lives and start connecting big/small situations with bouts of panic , fear, restlessness it becomes a disorder.

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As I recall, the first episode of my panic and anxiety attack was related to office work around the year 2014. I have been always competitive with my work and been the over achiever. With greater responsibilities and higher performance , I started to shift my entire focus towards work and building a career. Not thinking much about the personal life. I wanted people to understand that, my work was going to be my priority. My partner luckily was very supportive.

But slowly, when late working hours and performance pressure started giving me stress regularly, I could not understand what was happening mentally and physically to me.

In a period of 18 months I had gained 12Kgs of weight. I found food and mindless shopping to be an outlet for easing my stress over the weekends. I started becoming irritated at everything, including my partner, my lifestyle. If I could not have things going my way, then there would be an outburst and subsequent fight.

By 2017-18, I was married, unhappy with my choices, crying at every big issue and insomnia kind of started creeping in. Believe me, I have personally tried every sleeping technique there is and listened to almost every kind of whale and ocean sounds there are. I even tried to monitor my sleep patterns to find the right fit. There were few months, where I found that I felt good and happy, but rest of the time I was just in a feeling of continuous limbo where I was ready to blame anything and everything for my unhappiness instead of looking inside me.

In 2019, I kind of knew this was getting to be a problem. I was becoming a tyrant in office, being very unprofessional in manner of speaking to my team mates and colleagues. Throwing tantrums at smallest of things and abusing people all around. But just within half an hour I would get back to my old self and start behaving normally as if nothing would have ever happened.

If there would be a crisis at work, I would be the first person to get breathlessness and panic. I wanted to solve it there and then at any cost. Wanting to be the best was always a priority.

I had stopped looking after my health and relationships. I was so out of line with the people who cared and loved me that I kept on ignoring their concerns. My own parents tried to explain. My husband showed immense patience all throughout, immense love and respect for him.

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Then came the day in Early 2021, me and my husband were going to some place when on the way we got into a bad argument over a small thing like getting late. I got so overwhelmed that I could not breathe properly and wanted to just jump out of the running car. I lost control over my body and my thoughts completely and could feel my heart beating fast. It took me almost 20 minutes to calm down and realize what I am feeling.

At last I was ready to acknowledge that this had become a bigger problem than I thought it out to be.

After this realization, I decided I needed to get out of this feeling and it has been a long long time since I had lost touch with myself. I decided on seeking help from a professional therapist who could align with my thoughts and understand what was going on. Luckily enough I could find a good one within a month and that is when my journey of coming back to myself started.

I am glad I can say this, it is a long road ahead and it has taken the whole of last year to come to terms with it, but I can see a newer and better version of me now.

Changes are accepted by not only by me but everyone around me also. Greatest support coming from my husband and parents in all this process.

I am now much more patient, calm, understanding of my goals and possibilities and practical in my expectations. Work is important of course, but so is my personal life where I now enjoy time being with my loved ones on weekends instead of going out mindlessly. I enjoy cooking and have dabbled in couple of hobbies for past few months too.

Looking forward to coming back to this blog more often now, with more experiences and learnings to share : )

Signing Off for this week, see you next week for sure!