My Struggle with Anxiety
For most of my life I had lived in Fremont, Nebraska up until I was 10 at the end of 4th grade. Once school ended we moved to Eau Claire and, over the summer, it was just exploring Eau Claire.
When school was almost about to start, I started experiencing nose twitches and anxiety, and it was pretty minor during my 5th grade school year. Once 6th grade started my nose twitching and anxiety got worse up to the point of me pulling my hair out. It was subtle at first, but got worse and worse. I slowly started pulling more and more a day without even noticing, and it got to a point where I was pulling my hair out in math class just naturally and people were noticing. As it got worse, my parents started noticing a gradual loss of hair on the left side of my head, and they went right to a psychiatrist at Mayo to see what was wrong.
At the end I got medicine to help. I also started seeing a therapist that helped walk through what causes/caused me pulling out my hair and my anxiety. I slowly stopped with the help and support of family friends and my therapist. I later in life found an “escape” which is video games, and that helps with my anxiety a lot. I still have anxiety, especially since I started high school, but I have found that my dog (my emotional support animal), my medicine, and video games help me remove any stress or anxiety that I have. So I have grown and found good ways to lower my anxiety.
-Liam, Young Adult Advisory Board Vice President
This post is part of a series “Mental Health: Teen to Teen,” written by teens in the library’s Young Adult Advisory Board.
The Young Adult Advisory Board is made up of teen volunteers who desire to help with and be a part of the library’s events and services aimed at middle and high school students. Interested in joining? Fill out an application here.
