Searching for Hope

“What brought you in today?” There it is. The question I wasn’t sure how to answer but I knew was going to be asked.

“I’m having anxiety attacks that lead to me thinking about killing myself.” Those where the worlds I chose to say even though it went deeper than that and the therapist who sits across from me would find out soon enough. Today is March 3rd, 2018, and my life is about to explode without my knowledge. But first, “what are some things that cause your anxiety attacks?”

“Going out of my house, being in or around a large crowd, even the thought of it gets to me. Sometimes nothing triggers them, they just happen.”

My mind wonders to the first time I had an anxiety attack. I mean, I’ve had them in the past but hadn’t had one in a long time. Then all of a sudden, one night, it happened.

It was a Friday evening around 6pm I was supposed to be helping a friend out with her ministry at her place that’s called “The Beacon,” which is a place where kids come on weekends and hear a bible study, do a craft, play games and get a meal and a snack. I started out doing just fine with all the kids and I was helping make sure they weren’t doing anything they weren’t supposed to be doing. My daughter had dance class that night so I had to leave to pick her up. When I got back there was this overwhelming feeling that washed over me and all of a sudden I couldn’t breathe and all I wanted to do was cry. I asked my friend if she was okay without me. She said if I was needed elsewhere it was fine, so I went upstairs above “The Beacon,” which is where we lived at the time, and crashed onto my bed. Maybe this was the reason I am in a room for individual therapy, the overwhelming feeling of fear. But why was there fear? I had been helping with this ministry since before it opened in October 2017.

After crashing onto my bed, the tears started flowing and they wouldn’t stop. “Why and I crying and having thoughts of harming myself?” Then I couldn’t breathe? “What is causing me to be gasping for air? I muscles up the energy to text another friend over to help since my husband was needed to help with the ministry downstairs. My friend came over and had me breathe with her to calm my breathing. I finally got a hold of my fear and crying. But that could definitely be a trigger as to why I’m sitting here today.

“Describe what it feels like when you have an anxiety attack.”

“It’s like someone is grabbing my lungs and squeezing all the air out and then keeping their closed fists around my lungs so no air can return to my body. My whole body tenses up and I can’t move. Like someone pushed the pause button, but only on me.

I remember at one point going to my kitchen to fix a bottle for my youngest and all of a sudden I couldn’t breathe. Someone was pulling all my air out. I find myself bending over with one hand on our black glass top stove and the other grasping my chest. There was nothing to trigger an attack at that moment. “Why was I having an anxiety attack?”

“Mommy, can I have a snack?” The sound of my daughter’s voice in the other room snapped me back to reality. “Yes, honey. Give me just a minute.”