It was the summer of 2004 when I first began to notice symptoms of OCD. I had just finished my music degree and was looking forward to a summer of fun and memory-making with my friends. A few days later, I started to feel a bit anxious but I didn’t think anything of it. Unfortunately,…
I would say I started noticing something was not right when I was 14. I was being bullied, so I was experiencing distress on a daily basis, self-harming regularly and even had suicidal thoughts. Although the bullying was partly responsible for it, I think it was just the trigger of something much bigger. Throughout my…
I knew I was mentally ill pretty early on. I remember being in either sixth or seventh grade, and over one of my summers, I was just hit with my first round of depression. I was crying for hours for no reason and I just could no longer do anything. One of my friends told…
I was really small when I started having (what I had no idea were) panic attacks. I’d worry about tiny things that seemed endless and enormous. I’ve always experienced (in hindsight since a very young age) intrusive thoughts and then the classic OCD symptoms in terms of actions. I have relationship OCD too and it was difficult navigating romantic…
My path to a BPD diagnosis began four years ago. I fell in love with a guy, but he didn’t love me back. He instead started dating my best friend. Then they broke up and he stopped talking to me and I totally fell apart. I started crying every day and I started hurting myself….
I first began noticing something was wrong when I was a sophomore in high school. I started to chatter my teeth (shiver), vomit, and experienced major stomach issues (embarrassing and out of my control). I had a racing heart and this overwhelming fear that I was dying. All of these symptoms came together. It was…
I have both anxiety and panic attacks. Anxiety expresses itself via a lot of physical symptoms and are usually built up, whereas my panic can come for no reason and is more a mental experience. My personal experience with anxiety attacks includes sweating a lot, hot flashes, my heartbeat going up, crying, hyperventilation, and sometimes…