I've told myself many times: I should write about it. And just as many times I've told myself: who's asking you to? Who is this going to help? They'll say you're seeking attention and begging for pity. I don't even have a happy ending, a moral, any scrap of a positive message. The only thing I can say is that you get to survive. There are going to be ups and downs, but you get to survive. I've always wondered if people who live a so-called "normal" life realize how lucky they are to be able to leave the house, go to dinner at an unknown place, take a train, a plane, even spend days away from their own roof. Yet I know well that it's possible. This was my life until I was a little over twenty. How much stupid stuff I did when I was a kid: trains taken without a specific destination, buses to mountain areas searching for a girl I'd met a few days before with no other information than "she's from the town Such-and-Such."
At some point I started feeling sick: tachycardia, shortness of breath, the head that stops reasoning and enters a primitive and instinctive mode that generates behavior more similar to that of an animal than a human being. You're convinced you're dying: every single cell in your body screams it at you in a way that's impossible to ignore. It's like experiencing the first ten minutes of Saving Private Ryan in the first person. However, there's no war, you're not even at the movies, you're just an asshole in some random place whose brain has decided to play a nasty trick on you.
A little while ago a friend scolded me for missing an appointment and not warning him. It's unforgivable, I know; in fact, I apologized to him. But how could I explain to him that until a few minutes before I was convinced I was going? Because this is what happens when you're sick: you avoid things. You avoid going out, doing things, seeing friends, even people with whom you feel protected. It doesn't matter. Nothing matters when you're sick. You only understand that you have to protect yourself. From what? From fear, from the irrational. From the fear of fear. Once a friend who saw me in the grip of panic told me "you're funny." And it's true. You're in a burning skyscraper, and you've jumped from a window to avoid a worse death, and you have the absolute conviction that the skyscraper is burning, but whoever is looking at you from outside only sees a person falling into the void, waiting to crash to the ground.
Panic attacks never come alone. They're usually accompanied by depression. Obviously, duh. Imagine how cheerful the life of a person who's afraid to leave the house can be. And depression brings panic attacks. It's a loophole, and getting out of it is only possible thanks to therapy. Getting out... I don't know, I don't think it's possible to get out of it, at least for me. Some time ago I was at my psychiatrist's, and I told him: "I'm tired, I can't enjoy anything anymore since I don't even remember how many years" and he replied: "yes, but therapy has allowed you to live a dignified life." A dignified life, you understand? This is what I'm allowed. A dignified life. In other words: don't complain because at least you still have dignity.
Anyway, the real reason I'm writing is to tell all the people like me who are out there (and there are many, oh if there are many: mental health is destined to become the number one problem for world health in the coming years) that you can feel better. That therapy exists. That therapy is generally twofold: a psychiatrist prescribes medications that help you feel better while a psychologist helps restructure thoughts to avoid falling into the cognitive errors that generate discomfort. But don't have me explain these things to you: go to a psychiatrist or psychologist if you need clarification. And don't be afraid: mental health care no longer has anything to do with One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (although it remains a good film).
You'll say, well, you must have gone through some kind of trauma, you must have had some serious problem in your life, which is why you suffer from this condition. Forgive me if I burst out laughing in your face: I've always had a very normal life, I wasn't mistreated as a child, I'm not a special person, I'm just an asshole who got a fake ticket in the serotonin lottery.
This also serves as an apology to all the people I've told a lie so to avoid a situation that caused me stress and who thought "this guy is stupid, or he's an asshole, or maybe both." Feel free to think so. Thank you. And for all those who live my same condition: I'm sorry, good luck and, if you're lucky enough, find someone who will put up with you and support you because it's the only thing that really makes a difference.