White toast smothered in butter, please.

It’s 10:04 on Monday 8th June 2015 and I’ve just come round from 

come through the other side of

beaten

recovered from

about managed to stop shitting, being numb, my chest from feeling like an overweight, pregnant, giant elephant has set up camp on it, any adrenaline that’s actually left in my body from speeding around and punching parts of my body like an angry small child in the playground, and my mind and body from being in the most intense stand-off with each other since….well…since the last time I had a panic attack.

I don’t get them often. Anxiety attacks are my forté, my jam, my homeboy. They’re different. I know my anxiety attacks. I don’t know my panic attacks. They’re like the family members you see once a year, if that, who say, “Look at you! I haven’t seen you since you were THIS small!”, which is funny because panic attacks make you feel like the most small, fragile, muted, snotty little shit who just wants to cling on to your mum’s leg and run away from those family members who insist on invading your personal space and getting to know everything about you.

Is that a good metaphor? 

I’ve just finished an English degree, I should know. I should be good at them. I should just be good, I have a degree. That makes you good, doesn’t it? Isn't that how it works?

I had so many writing plans for when I moved out of Bournemouth and back home. I was going to dig out this blog, dust it down, give it a shake to wake it up, give it a makeover, and write so many brilliant posts. The big comeback! Jazz hands, my name in lights. I was going to plan them all, have some themes, a posting timetable, some main focuses, a logic to it all. I was going to feel wonderful again. Confident, and believe in myself. Determined. Okay. Just okay, really.

But panic attacks, and anxiety attacks, and any form of your mental health slipping off track, don’t abide by logic, or reason, or planning. Nor does this post. I’m tired of waiting to feel good, optimistic, calm, organised before I start writing again. It’s not going to happen. This will not go away. So here I am, sitting in bed and breathing normally, 352…353 words down.

I don’t know if it feels good or not.

I never liked planning anyway. 

I probably sound pretentious. I’ve already backspaced enough to make the arrow fade on the backspace key, because all I’m thinking is, “Sound like a twat”, “No one cares”, “Why are you bothering to blog, they’ll laugh at you”, “God you’re boring, change the tune”, “You’re no good at this anymore”.

Just realised I wrote that in the second person. I was going to change it, but no. Because that IS what it’s like. It’s not me thinking and saying those things, it’s something else. And that something else doesn’t exist. 

IT’S SO HARD TO WRITE ABOUT YOUR OWN ANXIETY.

AM I MAKING ANY SENSE?

Maybe I should have planned it.

I’ve written it now, so. Whatever. I did it, guys. I wrote something. I’m doing that thing again. Hooray.

This is how I’m feeling now, and that’s all that matters. Some truth. Something real. 

I want breakfast.