There are so many types of illness one could have, but not all illnesses are visible to the naked eye. When you see someone in a wheelchair, you can see that they’re handicapped. When someone has anxiety, you won’t quite see it unless they have an attack.

I am one of those people with an “invisible” illness. Anxiety was never something that I knew I had when I was younger. I would have little attacks here and there, but my parents just brushed it off, thinking that I was only freaking out because I was literally afraid of everything.

It wasn’t until about a year ago when I had my first serious attack. I began to feel disconnected to my body, like my heart was moving faster than the movements my body was actually making. My mom, who has anxiety herself, began to realize that I may have a serious issue. She took me to my doctor the next day, and we found  out that I had a mild type of anxiety. She explained that if I could try to stay calm and control myself, I wouldn’t need any medication – which sounded great to me, because I did not want to be seen as “sick” to my friends.

I later began to regret not asking for medication, because after my first serious attack, I began to have more. I hated the type of discomfort that these attacks were making me feel, but I had to learn how to control myself. Having mild anxiety has allowed me to bond more with my mom, because she has been my anchor through it all – her anxiety is way more severe than mine is, but she has learned to control it, which made me feel more comfortable to confide in her.

Just because my illness isn’t that visible, doesn’t mean that I don’t have it. Whenever my friends see me starting to have an attack, they think that I am doing it for attention, until my mom steps in and explains to them what is really going on. I just want to bring awareness to the many “invisible” illnesses that exist, because you never know what someone could be going through.