FIGHT or FLIGHT?
About seven years ago, I found myself in the emergency ward of my local hospital waiting to see the on-call psych team. My GP had sent me there directly from her office as she was concerned that I may be having suicidal thoughts. I wasn’t. Thankfully my Generalised Anxiety Disorder hadn’t taken me down that path - but it certainly was making life close to unbearable. My insomnia was debilitating; the constant stream of loud and intrusive thoughts in my mind were exhausting; the depersonalisation made it impossible to participate in things I’d once enjoyed; and I felt so incapable of functioning ‘normally’ that I’d had to leave my job.
David McLaughlin is a writer and mental health advocate who writes frequently on the subject of anxiety and recovery. In this article he shares his story and knowledge about anxiety.
Even though I’d led what I considered to be a relatively charmed life with few problems to speak of, anxiety crept up on
