The Hard Truth About Anxiety

The reality is that dealing with mental health is never easy.

“Anxiety was born in the very same moment as mankind. And since we will never be able to master it, we will have to learn to live with it — just as we have learned to live with storms.” — Paulo Coelho

I always had anxiety, but I didn’t always understand it. Growing up in Eastern Europe, I didn’t hear people talk much about mental health — unless they were discussing someone being crazy. “Crazy” was a term that I heard almost always in reference to mental illnesses.

Not only was mental health always talked about in a negative way, but there was an almost complete lack of awareness.

The mental health stigma is present almost everywhere in the world. But after coming to North America, I realized how much worse we had it back in Eastern Europe.

Before that, I hadn’t even heard of anxiety. I didn’t understand it and when you don’t understand your illness, you can’t treat it.

I lacked the support and knowledge I needed, so I spent years figuring things out on my own. I had to learn some hard truths about anxiety — but they were important to learn in order to begin recovery.

There is No Cure For Anxiety

This is the hardest truth to accept at the beginning — but once you do, you’ll be much better off. As I said, you have to understand your illness to get better.

Anxiety exists for a reason. Believe it or not, it’s actually not meant to hurt us. It’s meant to help us and protect us through dangerous situations by alerting our bodies to become defensive.

Having anxiety is not the problem — it’s having anxiety about imagined dangers. That’s when we need to manage the anxiety and make sure we control it more than it controls us.

When I first accepted anxiety as being a permanent part of my life, I felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I knew I was a step closer to getting better because I was not going to waste any more time on the wrong goal.

Instead of trying to get rid of it, I turned my attention to managing it. Until then, I had been fighting a futile battle.

Anxiety is a Part of You

We all talk about anxiety as if it’s this separate entity. Perhaps because it feels like we’re in a constant battle with it. That’s why we’re led to believe that it’s not a part of us. But that would be wrong — in fact, the battle is within ourselves.

Anxiety is a part of you as much as your brain is a part of you. You know why? Because anxiety is actually your mind and body in a state of alert.

When having a panic attack, I would feel like an outside force was attacking me. Now I know that it was my own mind launching the offensive.

It’s kind of like when we get sick — we feel unwell not because of a virus invading our bodies, but because of our own immune system attacking us in order to protect us. With anxiety, it’s not our problems that make us unwell — it is our minds.

Just like with some disorders that cause the immune system to attack for no good reason, so does anxiety. That’s my understanding of how an anxiety disorder works.

It’s unfortunate, but that’s what happens.

The Battle is Never Over

You may have heard that an alcoholic will always be an alcoholic. That’s true even if a person has been sober for decades because the possibility of relapsing is always there.

Just like the battle with addiction is never done, neither is your battle with anxiety. You can be doing well for years and then have a relapse.

Yes, you can manage it, you can be rehabilitated — but that’s not guaranteed to be permanent either.

I’m not telling you this to discourage you — I’d like to do the opposite. I believe that realistic expectations can help a person cope better with mental health. It’s better to know that you may fall so that when you do, you can be prepared to get back up.

Final Thoughts

Although the truth about anxiety is hard to hear at the beginning, there is a silver lining. Understanding anxiety and accepting the hard realities that come with it are the biggest steps you can take on your way to getting better.

Look at the bright side moving forward:

• You don’t have to feel bad about not being able to get rid of anxiety because it was not meant to hurt us in the first place.
• The good thing about anxiety being a part of you is that you can’t control everything that happens to you, but you can learn to control what’s within you.
• Although there’s always a chance of setbacks, you’ll be able to get back up on your feet and keep going.

Learn more about managing stress and anxiety to regain control of your life by downloading my FREE eBook.