The best way I can describe why anxiety was so hard to understand is the contrast between the things I’d been scared of throughout my life and the things anxiety suddenly made me scared of.

Bungee jumping off a bridge? A little nervous, but excited.

Jumping out of a plane? It felt too surreal to even be scared. The adrenaline rush afterwards was incredible.

Snowboarding down a double black diamond? Challenging, yes. Terrifying, no. Let’s do it.

Even seeing a man dying on the street after being attacked, my mind didn’t go into panic. It went into problem-solving mode. How do we help him? What do we need to do?

These are the sorts of situations most people would expect to trigger fear.

Yet I handled them.

Then anxiety arrived.

Suddenly I was terrified of brushing my teeth, standing in front of the mirror shaking like a leaf, thinking I could drop dead any second.

I sat in the bath gripped by panic, convinced I was going to pass out and drown. How ironic is that for a swimming instructor?

I sat at my own dining table eating dinner, certain I was about to pass out and die.

I lay in bed at night afraid to close my eyes because I was convinced I wouldn’t wake up. As i did fall alssep I would jolt up in a panic, literally screaming Helppppp!

How?

It Wasn't the Situation, It Was My Nervous System

How could someone who had jumped off bridges and out of planes be terrified of a toothbrush, a bath, a plate of food, or a bed?

It made no sense to me whatsoever.

Until I learned something important.

It wasn’t the situations I was scared of.

It was my nervous system.

My body was constantly sending danger signals, and my mind was desperately trying to explain them. I was analysising every uncomforatble sensation in my body.

The racing heart, dizziness, shakiness, breathlessness, strange sensations and feelings of doom were all being interpreted as evidence that something terrible was about to happen.

I tried to turn them off or at least kept asking myself how I could. I just wanted to make them stop, maybe if I could figure out what is causing it, I can fix it.

The brain has an ancient survival system though, called the fight-or-flight response and it's job is to protect us from danger. It's harwired into us and you cant just turn it off.

The problem with anxiety is that this system gets switched on when there is no danger.

And worse, it stays on.

The Anxious Fire Alarm That Wouldn't Switch Off

Imagine a chef finishing work for the night and accidentally leaving the oven on.

Hours later the smoke alarms are blaring throughout the building.

Everyone is awake.

Everyone thinks there’s a fire.

People are running around trying to find the danger.

But there isn’t a fire.

The alarm system is responding to something that should have been switched off hours ago.

That’s what anxiety is like for me.

The situations aren't dangerous.

The alarm system was.

And recovery isn’t about fixing the toothbrush, the bath, the dinner table, or the bed.

It was about teaching my nervous system that it is safe again.

Because when the alarm quietens down, the fear of those everyday situations disappears with it.

Anxiety Is Like an Annoying Neighbour

Some days are good, some days are bad. Some days I can cope with it, sometimes I can't.

I still wish it would just fuck off.

But it doesn't.

It's like having the world's most annoying neighbour. The one who's always complaining about something, always sticking their nose into your business, and never seems to take the hint that they're not welcome.

You lock the front door.

You pull down the blinds.

You hide inside hoping they'll eventually go away.

Then you glance out of the window and there they are, peering over the fence just to remind you they haven't left.

So you start adjusting your life to avoid them.

You leave the house at different times.

You check outside before opening the front door.

You change your plans just so you don't have to deal with them.

But every time you step outside... there they are.

If you try to ignore them, they only bang louder.

If you argue with them, they stay even longer.

Eventually, you realise the only thing that works is opening the door, smiling, and saying,

"Morning. I know you're here... but you're not running my day."

They might still follow you down the street for a while, muttering away in the background.

But little by little, you stop changing your life because of them.

That's what recovery has started to feel like for me.

Anxiety still turns up.

It still tries to get my attention.

But I'm learning that I don't have to stop living just because it's standing on the other side of the fence.