Unpopular Opinion: Just Leave

You can remove yourself from a bad situation

I thought my idea would be a no-brainer when I began researching this topic. But what I found was more or less the opposite of what I wanted to say. It’s not just my opinion; my therapist gave me the same advice I wanted to give here. The problem I had today is that I couldn’t find anything online to support this opinion.

But I’m going to say it anyway.

According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 40 million people in the U.S. suffer from anxiety disorder. So, if you experience something like this, don’t for a minute think that there’s anything particularly wrong with you. It’s life.

That being said, I don’t recommend you wallow in the misery for the rest of your life. You have one life here on Earth and if you must wallow, do it in something more appealing. Happiness, for instance.

I can’t focus on what people are saying and all I can think about is leaving

There are things you can learn to do right now that will help you. Practice meditative art — Zentangle, as I we discussed in two earlier post here and here— or mandalas. There are many options, the main point being to slow down, clear your mind and breathe. Diaphragmatic breathing is another trick to learn and I touch on it below. Having already practiced these things can help you if you should find yourself caught unawares by an anxiety attack.

Do you find yourself in bad situations with anxiety?

I have, in the recent past, found myself in interesting situations due to anxiety. Sometimes I know what is causing the episode, and sometimes it just come over me. The physical sensations are mostly the same either way: Loss of ability to focus. Feeling my heart beating heavier. Increased sensitivity to sound, music for example, even if I would normally like the songs I’m hearing. Fatigue afterward. Being unbelievably irritable for hours after the episode.

And, of course, feeling anxious.

I’ll be the first to tell you that I was as surprised as everybody when I found myself hiding behind a recliner in somebody else’s living room. This was not normal behavior for me. I knew at the time what was bothering me, even if the real-life manifestation baffled me.

The TV was on, which itself is annoying anyway. A movie was playing; in it a man was menacing a woman. I couldn’t take hearing the raised voices — his shouting and her desperation. I tried to be a part of the conversation going on in the living room, but all I could hear was the TV and a woman being attacked. And it wasn’t even a good movie; the acting was horrible.

But there I was, sitting on a stool behind the recliner, desperately waiting for it to be time for us to leave. I was with somebody else and we were in their vehicle, so I was kind of at their mercy.

On other occasions, I’ve just been hanging with friends and I can feel it crawling up the side of my head. Music in the restaurant or grocery story starts to bother me. I can’t focus on what people are saying and all I can think about is leaving.

We’re getting close to where I question the online experts.

There are some things that are consistently advised. One of them is belly breathing — also known as diaphragmatic breathing, for those who can pronounce that — and I one hundred percent support this. It’s more specific than the words “deep breathing” would indicate, and I highly recommend you look into it.

Practice it frequently so that when the need arises your body will know what to do. Your diaphragm lowers to pull air into your lungs; you can instigate this by letting your belly push out. You exhale by pushing your belly in, pushing the diaphragm up and emptying your lungs. There is a lot of information about this online. Here is a video I like.

One thing that I discussed with my therapist was what to do in that moment of anxiety, when everything seems out of control. (Heavy breathing from behind the recliner would only have added to the awkwardness of the situation, and I didn’t have the presence of mind to do it anyway.) He told me that I have to protect myself, to get myself out of the situation. And this was precisely what I was inclined to do, and precisely what the experts that I found online said not to do. Every one of them.

Let’s compromise.

The experts state that you should confront your fears and learn not to be a victim of them. I don’t disagree. They say to resist the urge to run, to flee. I can see their point. They are looking at the long-term solution to the problem, and my that is also my ultimate aim.

But, when you find yourself crouched behind a recliner in a room full of people who think you’ve lost your mind, and they aren’t the type of people who are typically inclined understand mental illness and how it works, I’m going to suggest that this might not be the right moment to take the ‘don’t flee’ approach, particularly if you yourself have no idea what’s going on.

And if you’re sitting with friends in a restaurant and, for no reason that you can discern, your heart starts beating faster, you feel the walls close in, and the music playing faintly in the background feels like a cheese grater on your nerves, I would like to think your friends would understand if you didn’t want to sit there in the middle of all that.

The choice is yours

If you find that you’re tired of living at the mercy of triggers, and you choose to stand your ground, face your fears and grow, I support you one hundred percent.

The first thing that I would encourage you to do is seek professional help. It’s not something to feel shame about. People take their vehicles to professional mechanics on a regular basis. They go to professional doctors and dentists. Professionals in the psychology field are not really all that different.

A psychologist can ask questions, they can see things you don’t see, they are trained in how to interpret what you’re saying, your body language and speech patterns. You can talk to your friends all day about something, but a psychologist will have a better chance of understanding it, asking pertinent questions, and diagnosing it.

In the meantime, as you work through all of this, please extend yourself some grace. You’re never going to be perfect and you need to be nice to you. If you find yourself out of control and hiding behind somebody else’s recliner — or in any other awkward situation — with debilitating anxiety, I stand by my suggestion that you get yourself out of that situation, whatever the cause. At least until you begin working with a therapist and develop a plan to address the problem as a whole.

The world is difficult enough as it is, without subjecting yourself to distress. It’s also a beautiful place and you should totally enjoy it, and that means taking extra time to address mental health issues that might hold you back.

You are the only you that this world has. You have to take care of you, so that the rest of us can enjoy your presence in the world.