Anxiety

Anxiety and fear came calling when I was diagnosed with NF2. That’s not to say that I had never experienced them before then, it was just that the depth was now limitless and there was no horizon as far as I could see.

All the questions that plagued me, at all hours of the day and night.

“What’s going to happen to me?”

“When will I lose the ability to hear?”

“What are the tumours doing to me each day?”

“Do I want to risk passing this on to a future child?”

Hannah standing in a dark studio, under bright spotlights. She is staring up at the lights, with her hands tucked into her pockets.

I had to work hard to slow the pace and allow myself to feel other emotions during this time. Trying to give myself a break from stressing was a tricky task, and I wasn’t always successful at it.

The nonchalance of others also grated on me in a way I couldn’t understand at the time. A common reaction was “oh, thank god it isn’t cancer”.

I get it. I do.

I was thankful the tumours growing throughout my body weren’t malignant.

But they still weren’t good. They were in tricky spots and growing into important areas of my nervous system. I felt like I didn’t have the right to be scared because others saw it as dodging a bullet.

Some people had good intentions and meant to alleviate any panic, but by dismissing serious conditions as ‘not cancer’, leaves people feeling powerless and despondent.

I knew deafness was looming large, but I didn’t know when it would turn up, or how. It was incredibly confusing and surreal.

Over the years, my anxiety has taken the reins a few times. It comes crashing through and strangles all the goodness and hope inside me. It stops me eating, it stops me sleeping, it causes me unease and unbridled panic.

I have managed to wrangle it back into its box each time. It’s exhausting but I relish the peace that comes when my strategies work and my medication holds.

Sometimes I worry that people think of me as some Teflon-coated woman who never gets down and bounces up straight after a knock.

This isn’t true.

I have slow days. Dark days. Flat days. Sad days. Stuck days. Good days.

When I’m having an especially hard time, I love to look at this photo of me. I like to think of it as me staring defiantly back at the inner beast of my anxiety. Calmly. Strongly. Pulling myself away from the anxiety and seeing it as separate to me.

Remembering that I am in control.

Hannah standing in front of a vertical red light. She is strong in her pose, a little curious perhaps. The light is casting a long shadow.