Sandoval 1

Taelar Sandoval
Profile
Camille Pack
02/22/2015
Anxiety Speaks
Light, that was all I saw. Screeching is all I heard. I kept thinking the same thing over and
over again like a broken record. Im going to hit it, Im going to hit it, Im going to hit it. I hit
it. It was 4:43 am one morning in June. My heart was racing. My mind was fuzzy. I couldnt
register that my car was being scrapped for parts until the man at the junk yard started tearing
parts off of it. The horn obnoxiously honked repeatedly as if to remind me of my stupidity. This
was it. The undoing that was to conclude my reckless year. My parents didnt know how to
handle me anymore. For the next few months I was stuck down in my room alone, my days were
plagued with flash backs and night sweats to a point that I could hardly function. My senior year
was just about to start and my life was a wreck.
A few days into the summer of my junior year, my friends and I set what would become a
fairly unhealthy? pattern. We would sleep all day, sneak out in the dead of night, and find
ourselves in some sort of predicament before finding our way back home. We were
troublemakers and we werent going to be stopped. Being defiant became a part of who we were.
We were young and carefree, and we did what we thought that we would enjoy without letting
anything get in the way until something made a real impact. The impact for me was the front end
of a yellow Suburban demolishing my small white convertible. If the passenger that Id had in
the car nearly ten minutes before was still there, Id have never forgiven myself. After the crash,

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I felt hauntingly numb to all stimuli. I couldnt find myself to feel the fear of what could have
happened. I could hardly make out the muffle of voices warning me of my choices.
To my surprise, once senior year started I grew away from the friends that I swore were
going to be in my life 10 years down the line. I was very sensitive to any type of stimuli. I could
feel the fear and apprehension slowly becoming more intense and I could not figure out what was
happening to me. It worsened in social situations.
A few months later, my mother wanted to cheer me up, so she took me shopping. I
appreciated the gesture, but I was still absolutely shaken by the idea of being surrounded by so
many people in the mall. I told her that I was feeling anxious, but she couldnt understand why. I
had a hard time understanding it myself, so when other people didnt understand, it didnt upset
me. It seemed like people didnt grasp what anxiety actually is. The stigma that comes with
anxiety is that the person is making a choice to be anxious about something that makes them
uncomfortable, or that they can control it. This is not the case, but I didnt know how to tell
people that. Despite the way I felt, Id decided that shopping with my mom could be a good
thing. After all, I love clothes and I didnt have to worry about my bank account. I decided that I
would try to enjoy this.
Im in the dressing room when all of a sudden my heart is racing and my body is
overheating. I feel an overwhelming sense of frustration creeping in and I cant think of how to
stop it. I dont want to tell my mother because I feel like a crazy person. I feel as though no one
understands what this is like. My breathing quickens. The sales lady knocks on the door
wondering if I need a different size or a new color. Shes only trying to help and to do her job,
but somehow it makes my encounter in the dressing room much more overwhelming. The walls

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are going to swallow me up. My head is light and fuzzy. I cant see anything but a bright, bright
light. I sit on the stool wondering, when the crushing feeling will subside? My mind raced with
different scenerios. I couldnt help but think that this could just be how I would react to anything
negative for the rest of my life. My mothers soft knock brings me back to reality. She suggests
that we go to a new store. This reminds me that I need to be normal, to act normal. (why are you
needing to act normal, what prompts this thought in you?)Being in a crowd of people while I was
anxious would only make me more anxious because I felt like they could all see that I was acting
strange. I climbed up from the ground ready to tackle the next store until I find an outfit for my
new year of school. I am happy to find an outfit that will work well with both my new school
year, as well as with the many football games that I will be attending, as my parents got the
whole family season tickets.
The stadium is laced with red and white. There is an endless amount of chanting. The
ground shakes beneath my feet. My head rings with the excitement of the cheering crowd. The
announcers voice came roaring into the speakers, Its the Utes for the win! The crowd storms
the field glorifying in the success. Im jumping down from the bleachers and suddenly, I am
engulfed into a sea of people. The fight song comes on interrupting any trace of introversion that
I was having. I sing along and soon find myself again being swept away by the crowd back to the
tail gate. My heart is racing. My senses are heightened. My muscles are pulsating. The whole
world falls away. I know this feeling. The frustration grows as I unfold what is about to happen
in my head. I cant think of how to stop it or solve the problem. My body is reacting. I feel an
overwhelming need to be explosive. I need to run and jump. I need to exhaust myself physically
to distract my mind from the current situation. Hold on, I feel something new, so new I need to
take a second and register what is happening. Im dizzy. Really dizzy. And oh, Im nauseous. I

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find my way back to my tailgate somehow. Right there in front of hundreds and hundreds of
people I am huddled over, vomiting. My mind feels so cluttered with an overwhelming amount
of emotions such as fear, confusion, worry, and defear My body is crushed under the impact that
I have now been feeling for several months. This is physical, and my mind is completely
boggled from what is happening. I cannot imagine why I am reacting physically to the mental
and emotional stimuli. Much to my dismay, I always thought it was all in my head, but here on
the concrete lies the physical proof that its not. On the drive home, I am completely taken aback
by the nights events and need to know more about the physical effects of anxiety. I am
completely captivated and excited to see what I can find out from my anatomy and medical
assisting teachers.
I ask my anatomy teacher about the previous night the next time we had class, and he
explained this very thoroughly. He talked about how the body reacts to fear with the Fight or
Flight reaction. He said that my anxiety was an irrational fear that my mind had gotten so
consumed by that my body reacted physically. The nausea was a coping mechanism for my body.
It shuts down systems that are not necessary in the moment. This is similar to when an athlete is
injured during a game. The body pushes through until the game is over, and then the physical
affects take their toll. This is caused by adrenalin which is also present in fear. There are a few
fairly common responses to anxiety, all of which I have felt in my anxiety attacks. These are
increased heart rate, light headedness, muscle tightening and nausea. These responses are all
logically explained by anatomy. The increased heart rate is the bodys preparation for some form
of confrontation. The heart is working harder so that the body can react in the way that it needs
to. The light headedness is a result of blood draining from the head in order to circulate to the
muscles more rapidly thus aiding in any physical activity that is to take place. The muscle

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tightening or pulsation is caused by the increased blood flow to that part of the body, and the
nausea is as explained above, is the result of shutting down an unnecessary function (digestion)
for the task at hand. Understanding these symptoms helped me to feel somewhat more in control
of my situation. I am still fairly anxious, but now I dont feel as helpless when my anxiety peaks.
Understanding that my body is coping with the stress helps my mind to cope with the situation,
and I have had a much easier time dealing with stressful situations because of this. My heart is
racing, and now I know why. My days are no longer plagued. My senior year is just about to end,
and its finally all falling together.

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Works Cited
Hoonakker, Richard. "Physiology of Stress." Advanced Human Anatomy. West Jordan
Highschool, West Jordan. May 2014. Address.
"Fears, Phobias, and Rituals: Panic, Anxiety, and Their Disorders." APA PsycNET. N.p., n.d.
Web. 23 Feb. 2015.
"Anxiety and Panic Disorders Center: Panic Attacks, Phobias, and Treatments for Anxiety
Disorders." WebMD. WebMD, n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2015.
"The Physiology of Stress: Cortisol and the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis." DUJS
Online. N.p., 03 Feb. 2011. Web. 25 Feb. 2015