Healing Anxiety From The Inside

Tremors. Dizziness. Confusion. Fluttering feeling in the chest. Feeling like you are dying. These include just a few of the many symptoms clients who come to me for anxiety use to describe a panic attack. These symptoms were also my introduction to my first panic attack back in 2015. 

From as young as 10 years old, I had severe social anxiety. Agoraphobia according to the medical community. In fact, up until my mid twenties, I found myself getting tears in my eyes due to fear and anxiety walking around in public. Fear that if I made eye contact with someone I didn’t know that I would get bullied and teased. It seemed so strange to have that fear in my mid-twenties walking around the Pentagon. Where I was working at the time. 

It was winter 2015 when I found my blood sugar plummeting after trying intermittent fasting. I had just completed my most recent bodybuilding show just two months prior. And like a lot of women, my self-esteem was heavily tied to how my body looked. I had been feeling woozy weeks leading up to that night. But it was that night I found my body sinking to the floor and then being hauled away by an ambulance to INOVA Fairfax Hospital. And it was that night that I experienced my first ever panic attack. And over the following months, searching for help to get control back over my life.

Often when I see clients coming in for panic and anxiety, they all have a very similar story, background, experiences. But the one thing that stuck out from all of them. One thing that they all had in common. And that was emotionally abusive or narcissistic parents. These were grown adults coming to see me because they were trembling throughout their day. Afraid to talk about themselves. In fact, had never even connected to who they are because they had spent their entire lives trying to be somebody else. And if it’s one thing I noticed, was that any time there is a gap between who you are and who you think you need, should, or ought to be, there will always be anxiety. Anytime you aren’t being your authentic self.

Much of this behavior I found coming from the need to manage parent’s emotions at a young age. Including myself. A type of person we would refer to as a “people pleaser”. These people are trained to be highly in tune with the emotions of others around them. By creating a charade of a character on the outside, they could blend in, please, or seek approval in others. You could also refer to these people as “empaths”. Kind of like chameleons, these people seek safety with others. And have no connection to the things they like, dislike, etc. They also often complain of depression as well as anxiety. Typically the feeling of “depression” follows the anxiety over a period of time because the anxiety becomes so debilitating that the gap between their current lives and their ideal lives gets bigger and bigger. And helplessness serves as a major contributor. 

What is actually happening with this type of “people pleasing” mentality, is that there is a disconnection with self. And therefore, are seeking safety in approval from others. What this safety could be from could be anything from physical to emotional abuse. A fear of being seen could even be a threat to these people. And by the time these people get to me, they’re on all kinds of prescription drugs. However, there is no drug that can fill the void of having no connection to one’s Self.