I can be just sitting around and all of the sudden my knees go weak. Even when I can’t connect it to something obvious, I know what is likely to follow. My tongue starts to feel too big for my mouth. It’s hard to form words. It seems like there is this big space in my brain where things aren’t going from one side to the other. If others are around me, I can feel their concern as they strain to make sense of what I’m trying to say. It is terrifying. It is familiar. It is the beginning of an anxiety attack.
I reach for something sweet hoping it will subside my shakiness. There is probably no scientific data that supports my belief that candy is the answer, but I’m convinced it will help. I suspect there is a connection between being offered a sucker when I was little and scraped knees. I use food – specifically sweets for soothing. That’s probably worth exploring in another post.
I expect to feel anxious in certain situations. In those scenarios it generally hits me in my stomach. This is why it is best that I don’t watch my favorite teams play live – Notre Dame, Chicago Cubs, Da Bears. Heck, I’m even nervous watching replays of the games they’ve won. But this is something very different and unsettling. It feels like it comes out of nowhere, but I suspect this isn’t always the case. Even though I might not be thinking or talking about something clearly concerning, it’s likely that something in my subconscious is trying to come to the surface.
Sometimes when the crisis of symptoms has passed, I just want to move on. I mean it’s not a good feeling so I don’t really want to go back there. I wonder if the symptoms will return if I try to figure it out. In those moments it is all I can do to slow my heart, stop the shaking in my hands, and sit down so that my legs don’t buckle under me. Usually I’m too weak, physically and mentally, after it passes to deal with it then. But I know at some point I am going to have to consider the "why."
I picture the scene from “Field of Dreams” when the little girl is sitting on the top of the bleacher eating a hotdog. Her mouth is stuffed with it. Kind of reminds me how my mouth feels during an anxiety attack. She is trying to tell her uncle something as he is shaking her. She manages to get out, “It’s not nothing” before she plummets to the ground.
I can’t always figure out the source of my anxiety, but what I am feeling is real. I know my anxiety attacks aren’t nothing.
How does anxiety manifest itself in physical symptoms for you? Please share your thoughts about this or anything else that resonates with you from the post at
allie joyful Facebook group.
#anxiety #fear #unpredictable
