I don’t self-disclose when providing services for people
unless I think my experience/ disclosure could help them.
Hi, my name is Danny, and I have anxiety. There, I said it. Laugh
aloud.
The truth is, as a child, I suffered from severe anxiety.
I had some very
strong irrational beliefs (during the 80s) that the world was going to blow up
from nukes, or we’d have an earthquake that would eat us all alive, or a
volcano was going to melt us, or a tornado from the Wizard of Oz was going to
get us. NOTE: I live in West Virginia (up in the mountains) and far away from
Tornado states (Kansas, Nebraska), earthquake states (California) or volcanoes
(Hawaii, Montana?) That didn’t matter. I knew it was going to happen.
I have the most supporting and caring parents a person could
imagine. My parents are still married and I have had a really wonderful life.
However, I had odd anxieties that my parents were going to die in a car wreck
and we (me, my younger brother Jimmy and my sister Carrie) would not have
anybody. I worried my parents might change their mind if I was bad and leave us
behind.
Onetime my parents didn’t return from a 5-minute trip to
2-john’s short stop (a little general store). I was “freaking out.” I was about
12-years-old at the time. My younger brother and sister were calm and watching television.
I started to look up and down the streets, started calling aunts and
grandparents. I knew for sure they had crashed and died. From time to time family members still bring
up this little incident of me “freaking out” back in 1992.
My parents come home about 30-minutes later. Two-johns were
out of bread or milk, so my parents drove on up to the Kroger on Harper Road. No
major issue. Except, I suffered from anxieties.
I didn’t even know what anxiety was until I went to college
and took an intro to psychology class and I was like: that is it. I have that! Laugh
aloud.
One of my professors (who was from Africa) in graduate
school at Lindsey-Wilson College (Ashland, Kentucky) had told counseling
students in the degree program that “all people have stuff.” One of my cohorts
said, “not Danny, he is calm.” I made a joke that I took it literal/ concrete
and said, “sure, I have stuff. I’m a hoarder. I won’t get rid of my comic book
collections. (which I keep in boxes in my closet). Then I added, “yeah, I have issues, they’re
called comics.” Laugh aloud. But then I did self-disclose with my cohorts in
graduate school that I had anxiety as a child and a teenager and had learned to
manage it much better as an adult.
I think getting in touch with any personal issue (mine anxiety
and low-grade depression from time to time) has been a strength that has helped
me in ways. I feel like I have more empathy for people with mental health needs
because I have experienced it.
Here is a link for an article on how to help children with
anxiety, based on my experiences, it is good:
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