College with Anxiety

I'm fairly sure that by now it's general knowledge that I have anxiety and panic attacks. Maybe for those of you who knew me in high school, it was a little more obvious, but I'll tell you what: it got a lot worse in college.

For the past three or four weeks, I haven't been able to leave my room without my heart pounding in my chest and my lungs fighting a little harder for breath. The sheer volume of my roommates' voices is enough to send me careening into a steady downward spiral. It's like my life is a video game and the boss music is on all the time but there's no danger in sight.

Most of the time, I get small anxiety attacks. They are happening multiple times a day. These small anxiety attacks don't look like a lot from the outside. I stop talking, my muscles tense, and I stare blankly at the floor as if I've simply spaced out. In my head, though, there's a steady blanket of mind-dulling, deafening white noise. It's like I'm trapped in my head and I can't get out. Though these can be caused by stress, worry, or overthinking, mine are more commonly caused by increased exposure to social situations.

A few times a week, though, I get panic attacks. My panic attacks are characterized by hyperventilating, uncontrollable shaking, crying, occasionally the absence of breathing, and, rarely, passing out. These are the debilitating ones, the ones that I can't postpone for more than an hour. These are the ones that send me darting back to my apartment to take shelter in a mound of blankets, the soft pillows muffling the sounds of my frantic gasps. Panic attacks aren't triggered by anything. They show up randomly like a really ugly, really irritating house guest who somehow got a copy of your key. They are the worst.

Some days are better than others. Sometimes I can go an entire day being around people and I'll barely feel any anxiety, and no panic attack will show up. Other days (these "other days" are becoming more and more common), even saying a word out loud, or being looked at in class will send me into an anxiety attack, as was the case a few days ago. I literally said "thank you" to my professor and that's all it took to knock me into a tailspin. "Other days" also feature random panic attacks.

Anxiety is really diverse and this is only my experience with it. Many people have anxiety to different degrees. It is a mental illness, which means those who have it will most likely deal with it for the rest of their life. It's important to continue finding coping methods in case of a panic or anxiety attack. I'll post some other time about my favorite coping methods.

Thanks to you who actually read this (which, to be honest, I'm guessing is a solid 0).