I often feel like I should stand up, shoulders back, a resigned but calm look on my face, and declare to all those I come in to contact with that my name is Sarah and I wrestle with social anxiety. I'd give a brief introduction, explain how, whilst I had always had some issues, as everyone has, with feeling welcome and present, that it was not until this year at University that I realised that they were a bit more than the average struggle and that it was something that was starting to get in the way of living my life. I'd shortly summarise Helen's quick and necessary intervention, the unhelpful doctor's appointment and the extremely helpful course of cognitive behavioral therapy that taught me how to understand the mental processes that my brain dragged me through. I'd then explain how I came to the end of my sessions and felt that, whilst I wasn't functioning on a wholly normal scale, that I had learnt to cope again, that I felt better. And then I'd crumple into myself a little and pull my shoulders up to my ears as I whispered that some days I don't feel any better, that it still manages to knock me sideways; sometimes when I expect it and sometimes when I don't. I'd apologise to everyone for not being able to control it, for sometimes being hard work, before slowly sitting back down, terrified that they had heard and understood and terrified that they hadn't.
Living with a low level, high functioning and largely hidden mental health condition is hard. It's hard to know when to pretend everything is fine and that you are, for all intents and purposes, "normal", and when to be honest about how hard even basic interaction amongst life long friends is.
By now, I have a support network of people who love and care about me who would be there in an instant, either on the phone or in person, if ever I needed them to be. People who have seen me on my worst days and still love me, people who try their very best to understand what I go through, people who never tell me I'm being irrational or should be doing better. The people who need to know, quite simply already know. Adam, Lucy, close friends at uni, family members. But its the people who don't that I struggle with.
When I'm struggling, when I'm mute and can't string together a coherent sentence, when I'm sat there wringing my hands, my heart beating in my ears, when I can't even tweak my face into some semblance of a smile, I just feel like screaming "This is not me!". I wish I could explain that the real Sarah grins all the time, wildly gestures with her hands, tells a million stupid and insignificant stories about her life and wants to hear other peoples'. But I can't, I just sit there, stuck. It doesn't feel appropriate to talk about mental health, it feels weak and needy and attention seeking to try and explain my silence and lack of energy and communication. So I don't. And it's really hard.
I don't know whether it is the impeding move to America, my recent friendship problems, hormones or simply a chemical imbalance, but at the moment I am struggling. Unlike when I struggled before I was diagnosed and treated, this does not weigh me down each day, but yet I find myself freaking out and worrying and getting myself worked up like I used to over silly things which don't mean anything to anyone. Adam's mother's birthday barbeque, my leaving meal, a party at my house; social events are once again a struggle.
When my therapist first asked me what I wanted to achieve from our sessions, I told her that I wanted to enjoy and not endure social situations. And it is difficult to know that in the past ten months, despite all the progress, I am still not there. In fact, in some ways the knowledge that my therapy has provided makes me even more frustrated about these recent setbacks as I am entirely aware of what my mind and body is doing without any control over my reaction. I don't want to freak out, but I do, and then, on top of freaking out, I get angry and upset that I freaked out. My thoughts go round and round and round. It's so tiring, to have this unseen ongoing struggle rattling around my brain all the time.
I don't really know what the point of this post is, I don't have a neat little summary, no confident conclusion to my stand up confession, just a heartfelt thanks from a weary Sarah for the people who understand, the people who tell me I'm loved and valued, things that I can hold onto when my mind convinces me that I'm anything but, the people who are careful with their words and their actions not because they are treading on eggshells but because they care so much that they don't hurt me. You see, my name is Sarah, and I wrestle with social anxiety, and I'm standing here to tell you that I'm struggling.
