For those that are lucky enough to not have to deal with the anxiety or depression, it can be hard to understand what it's really like. If you know someone with anxiety or depression (or both) you may not understand why they say the things they say, do the things they do, or don't do the things they don't do. Please know that it's (usually) nothing you said or did. In fact, it usually has nothing to do with you or how the person feels about you.
Please understand, it's nothing personal.
All anxiety is not the same. It's different for each person and sometimes each episode is different for one person. We all react to it differently and have different ways of coping with it. I don't claim to speak for everyone, but as someone who has struggled with anxiety attacks and depression for most of her life, this is what some of those moments are like for me:
Most days for me, it's just dealing with endless ridiculous thoughts. Analyzing and agonizing over every single detail of everything. Every conversation I've had. Every decision I've made. Beating myself up over things I've done. Beating myself up over things I haven't done. The simplest decision feels like I'm trying to decode some long lost language and the existence of the entire world is relying on me to get it right.
Some days, I wake up