The race to catch up with myself

Sometimes life is weird (and that's okay). Sometimes you feel stuck in a rut even though amazing things are happening all around you (and that's okay).

As I look back over this past year, I’m so proud of many of my accomplishments and remember some cherished happy times with friends. However, this past month has been full of doubt, negativity, and fear.

I honestly don’t remember much of the end of this past semester except for getting very anxious, stressed, sick, and at the very end of my rope. For some reason this past semester, my mind got ahead of myself and seemed to be in a race every day to catch up with all of my schoolwork, extracurricular activities, leadership roles, commitments to friends, and personal well-being. The race to catch up with myself didn’t get any easier as the semester came to a close, and my balancing act started to become very off. I even had a meltdown in the middle of Panera with my dear friend Katherine at 8pm on a Friday night because I was emotionally, mentally, and physically exhausted. I didn’t understand why I felt so overwhelmed ALL the time that even the thought of going to the grocery store filled me with dread because it was another thing to add to my to-do list.

I don’t say that to pretend like my life is OH SO BUSY that I can’t handle the thought of having the privilege to be able to go purchase my own food. In fact, I always felt like I wasn’t doing enough to be able to legitimately complain about how exhausted and stressed out I felt. I kept seeing other people on campus that held multiple leadership roles, maintained amazing grades, had a wonderful circle of close friends, and still had time to go to the beach and enjoy life. Whenever someone asked me what I was involved in, I would always try to list everything I was remotely involved with in order to sound like I was doing enough to warrant being stressed out.

What I didn’t realize was that SURE, other people might be involved in multiple other organizations, but they’re not ME. They have different capacities and skill sets and personalities that might allow them to more easily balance their commitments, but I am not that person. We are all so different; I have to remind myself of this constantly. The idea of comparing ourselves to another person in ANY respect is so inaccurate and unhelpful. Also, some of these people might be going through EXACTLY what I’m going through as I struggle to live up to these unrealistic expectations that I’ve set for myself based on what I think everyone else expects of me. (This is some dangerous thinking, my friends!)

All of these feelings had been simmering in the back of my mind all semester, and finally on May 2nd, they exploded.

I had decided to go down to Newport Beach to work on my various projects at a cute café. After working for a few hours, I decided to drive down a few blocks to the beach and study. As I sat on the sand with my binder, I started to feel my chest tighten and my breathing become very shallow. I figured I needed some water and food, so I packed up my things to head back to campus. I drove about 5 miles before my entire body began to succumb to my anxiety.

I was in the middle of the highway when my head started to get foggy, my heart rate started to quicken, and my arms began to grow numb. I could barely drive straight in my lane, so I moved over to get off on the nearest exit. I saw a firetruck a few cars ahead of me start to exit as well, so I followed them with the hopes that I could flag them down and at least get me some water. I began to frantically flash my lights and even wave my limp hand out the window to try to get their attention. Tears started to stream down my face as I hopelessly followed them down different streets and finally ended up at the back of their fire station.

At that point, they saw me and got out of the truck to ask me what was wrong. I told them about my lightheadedness and heart rate, and they sat me down in the back of my car to start some tests. As they began to calm me down and call an ambulance to take me to the nearest hospital just to be double-checked, I started to recognize the amount of fear that had been holding on to me in the past 30 minutes. My fear of what was happening to my breathing at the beach had increased rapidly as I realized I had no one else around me to help me. This cycle of fear I would later learn manifested itself as a panic attack as I was driving, and took hold of my brain and body. The stress that had been bottled up in the back of my mind for weeks suddenly boiled over and left my body weak and helpless in response.

At the end of the day, I was back on the couch in my apartment drinking water, clear from all my tests in the hospital. However, the feeling from that day has never really gone away. Now that I acknowledge that I get anxious & have been through a panic attack, I have a constant fear that I will go through the same thing again. Sometimes I still feel short of breath while driving but have to stop my brain from reeling back into that fearful state of mind. Ever since then, I’ve felt like I’m having a constant battle with my body and my brain to eradicate that feeling of fear.

I got sick within the last few days of the semester and desperately awaited my last final along with my parents’ arrival in Orange. Without a doubt, I was racing towards the finish line of the semester in order to start fresh this summer. What I didn’t realize, however, was the whiplash effect that I felt as my terrible semester suddenly ended, my parents helped me move out of the dorms, and I moved into a nice new apartment. Suddenly, I was free from all the negativity and clutter of the end of last semester, but I was in a new place with new unknowns. I didn’t have a secure internship yet, I didn’t have a job, and my parents were about to fly back home after a short 4 days.

As I’ve established, I am not a fan of change, especially sudden changes such as these. Within the next week, I had been offered an amazing internship and a job within walking distance to my apartment. GOOD STUFF right? Yes, absolutely. Yet here I was in limbo-land waiting for these good things to start and still getting over the lingering anxiety/negativity from just a WEEK ago. It was just a little unsettling because it forced me to change my mindset so quickly. On top of all that, I decided to go to the counseling center for the first time to work through my panic attack experience, and within the first session I realized I had so much bubbling in the back of my brain for so long.

Now as I look back on my sophomore year, I realize how many amazing things I was able to be a part of and how many good moments there were. It’s so easy for my anxious fear cloud to pop up and make things feel hopeless in the moment. It’s definitely something I’ve struggled with and will continue to struggle with, but there are so many things that I’m working on too.

Self-discovery and self-care.

Over these past two years, I’ve learned SO much about myself. I apologize constantly for things that aren’t in my control. I feel as though I have to be the best at every single thing that I do. My space is so important to me and can alter my headspace so much to the point where if my bed isn’t made, I feel like I can’t get anything productive done. I feel like I should do more in order to keep up with others and their accomplishments. I’m terrified of the unknown. I appreciate my parents more than I ever have even though I’m 2,400 miles away from them. I am impacted so much by the energy of the people around me, positive or negative. I’m anxious about the future. I hate the feeling of not being settled in one place. I’m a super complicated person, as most of us are! But all of my good and bad moments throughout this year have enabled me to understand these things, and for that, I am grateful.

I feel like we never talk about self-care and its importance in our lives, but it’s actually one of the most important things you can do. Whether it’s saying no to a potential commitment because you KNOW you’re not going to be able to put 100% of yourself into it, or it’s taking a walk around the neighborhood to look at those gorgeous purple trees, self-care is something that’s specific to you and IMPORTANT for you, no matter who you are. Understanding yourself is only going to help you in the long run. If you’re the kind of person who thinks spending 20 minutes to watch an episode of Parks and Rec is a waste of time (It isn’t. It’s a great show.), then I challenge you to find one thing that allows you to laugh, smile, or just take a deep breath within your week.

Anyway, this has been a jumble of thoughts because it kind of represents how my mind has been these past few months, and that’s okay. YAHOO for going through some low points in order to better appreciate the high points. :)