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Being an independent person
Being an independent person
Anxiety among college students
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Being an independent individual with anxiety has been my most significant challenge in achieving my educational goals. I have had to be my own motivation, and cheerleader to continue pursuing my dream of graduating from a university. It has been challenging because my anxiety is severe. Panic attacks and depression have been major side effects. The experience feels like a tornado. Everything seems to get caught in this big swirl of craziness and is never ending. A tornado is disastrous and extremely dangerous. Most of my life I pushed people away and out of my life because I did not want them to be a victim of my tornado. My faith remained in the little knowledge I knew about tornadoes. I know that they eye of a tornado is calm. I thought that
I’ve read that statistics show that those who are the first in their family to go to college will get more discouraged and think that they can’t do it because their parents weren’t able to do it for some reason. However, since reading part of Cox’s book and doing other research I know that I can do this because I know how to manage my stress and for the most part I am able to keep my stress levels down and keep up with school. When I feel stressed I get too distracted from the assignment at hand, when this happens I typically have to step away from the assignment or essay and go take a walk or pray about the situation. I always pray about whatever situation I am in before I even do anything but sometimes I do have to take breaks from an essay because I typically get frustrated thinking that I am a bad writer or something. The student anxiety and fear management are the sections that really stood out to me in Cox’s book because I know that it relates to me especially when she had put some testimonies from other college students, this is relatable to me. From reading the fear management section and going over this book excerpt in class, I know that I am not going to avoid any formal assessment just because I am too afraid my writing will suck because I know that some peoples strong suits is in writing but some is in other areas, mine is working with
I am an undocumented student at UC Davis. When I am asked a simple question such as, "describe your personal experiences", I ask myself: Where do I begin?
Those whom are living with anxiety often are fighting it alone and have no one by their side. Often times those people will put a wall up so that others can't tell that they are suffering, they act like everything is fine and they are indestructible. In reality their anxiety is eating away at them.
Do you know what it feels like to have your palms sweat, throat close up, and your fingers tremble? This is the everyday life of someone who lives with anxiety. As soon as I wake up in the morning, I hear my brain freaking out about the day ahead of me. What do I eat for breakfast? What do I do first when I get home from school? What happens if I get in a car crash on my way to school? A million thoughts at one time racing through my head. I never have the time to process all of them. Most mornings, I lay in my bed and have to take a few deep breaths to begin my hectic but not so hectic day. That’s just the beginning. It’s safe to say that I feel that I 'm an anxious person and that I have an anxiety disorder.
Some people like to stay in control of their life and avoid any amount of extraordinary risk to protect their self-disclosure. Other people don’t shy away from challenges as they are confident that certain obstacles are nothing more than just another thing standing in their way from living life to the fullest extent. Through personal experience, I’ve realized that personal comfort is nothing more than a variety of fears that limit me from challenging myself.
If you told me four years ago that I was in college, away from home, and thriving, I would not have believed you. My freshman year of high school, I was having a rough time coping with my anxiety. My anxiety became so out of control I refused to go to school, I stopped eating, I could no longer sleep. I was a zombie, I did not laugh, smile, or hang out with my friends anymore. I tried to smile and be content, but nothing worked. I was convinced I was going to be afflicted forever, thankfully there were others who knew the real me was still there. With the help of my mother, getting professional help, and a change of perspective I was able to conquer my anxiety.
Many people confuse the experiences of anxiety with a life that knows nothing but anxiety.
Most people tend to let ones anxiety control him or her, their fears scare them and their obstacles get in their way. If one lets this get in his way, then there is no possible way that he will be able to overcome their obstacles. For example, a great artist named Phil Hansen was diagnosed with nerve damage and he let his obstacles get in his way of creating art. In addition to this, a journalist named James Collier suffered of anxiety and he let his anxiety control him. Hansen had to embrace his shake, Collier overcame his anxiety and I had to overcome anxiety at a certain point in my life as well. Overcoming obstacles will allow one to surpass his or her fear.
My First Try Have you ever had to do something that you have never done before? My Dad always told me there is a first time for everything! Well, this was one of those times. “What is she sick with?” I asked.
I used to have a lot of trouble with Anxiety and Depression, these troubles caused me to feel handicapped through life and felt like many things I did were just too hard to deal with, even the most simple of things. In the past year I learned that you cannot let Anxiety and Depression control your life. These things can only control your life, if you allow them to control your life; and after being on anxiety and depression medication for years, I am finally coming off of the anxiety medication.
I am able to cope well with most emotions and circumstances that come my way, but there are times where the bottled up emotions I’ve suppressed for so long comes out on their own. The ability to control every emotion and have a counteractive precaution for it is rare. Most of the basic emotions, I can handle quite well, such as being happy or sad depending on what situation I am in. Emotions like anger and anxiety are a different case. Handling anger is not always a problem, but there are few instances in my life where the littlest of things made me angry. Anxiety, on the other hand, I have to control over when it comes to taking exams, such as Organic Chemistry. I try to calm myself by saying that everything is fine and the exam is not as fearful as it seems, but it does not work on most cases and throughout the exam, the constant feeling that it is possible for me to fail surrounds my thoughts.
Anxiety is a normal reaction to stress. Every person experiences some form of anxiety in his or her lifetime. Anxiety helps us deal with tense situations like using our flight or fight reaction, study harder for an exam, or keep focus on important deadlines. Anxiety can be useful until it gets to the point of interfering with everyday life. Some people explain it as not being able to shut the anxiety off. When anxiety becomes an excessive, irrational dread of everyday situations, it becomes a disabling disorder (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009). Each year, anxiety disorders affect about 40 million American adults age 18 years and older (National Institute of Mental Health, 2009). There are five major Anxiety Disorders they include Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), Panic Disorder, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and Phobias.
I am by myself wearing my blue jeans and an old flannel shirt. It is cool outside but I decided to leave my gloves at home, feeling comfortable with my warm shirt and my sturdy boots.
“Why don’t you use your locker? You’re going to have back problems before you even graduate”. These are words that are repeated to me daily, almost like clockwork. I carry my twenty-pound backpack, full of papers upon papers from my AP classes. The middle pouch of my backpack houses my book in which I get lost to distract me from my unrelenting stress. The top pouch holds several erasers, foreshadowing the mistakes I will make - and extra lead, to combat and mend these mistakes. Thick, wordy textbooks full of knowledge that has yet to become engraved in my brain, dig the straps of my backpack into my shoulders. This feeling, ironically enough, gives me relief - my potential and future success reside in my folders and on the pages of my notebooks.
During my freshman year of college, I had met one of my best friends, who go by name Jill. (She lives in New Jersey and while I live in Pennsylvania) I found it to be strange that sometimes, it feels like we have grown up with one another but in reality we have only one another for four years and I couldn’t be more thankful. I can remember when we met at school as if it was yesterday.