All my life, I’ve been fighting through mental illnesses since far before I was aware of it. The first battle was learning how to function with bipolar disorder and depression. Then I jumped right to dealing with my eating disorder. Trichotillomania was next. When I finally had everything sorted out this summer, I felt myself sighing in relief. It was hard, but I could live now. Sure, it’s still extremely difficult, but at least I have a little bit more of a handle on life than I ever had.

And then anxiety showed up.

Everyone feels anxious from time to time, but Generalized Anxiety Disorder is absolutely next level. Feeling so innately anxious pretty much constantly is difficult mentally, of course. But these feelings manifest very physically for me as well, and I don’t think a lot of people talk about that aspect. Recently, before getting a medication adjustment, I was experiencing overwhelming, constant anxiety. I had a minimum of two panic attacks a day, most of the time more. I couldn’t get to my classes because going on the highway was a harsh reminder of how many people there are in the world and that freaked me out too much to be able to drive. I was in the counseling center hyperventilating in between classes, or sobbing as I screamed in my car.

Thankfully, with a new medication, I’m doing a lot better. My anxiety is still pretty not great, but I’m not having panic attacks every day anymore. This distance from this experience has led me to realize how much of anxiety affects me physically, long after the actual panic attack is done. During the several weeks that I was living like this, I was passing out the second I got home from school out of pure exhaustion from hyperventilating all day. My head was constantly hurting from the amount I was crying. Typing became difficult as my hands cramped from fidgeting all day long.

As a society, we are surely becoming more accepting of mental illness (not to dismiss the long climb we still have to go), but emphasis goes on the mental part. The uglier, more physical side effects of mental illness that grab on to so many of us still go unspoken. I caught myself dismissing these signs that my anxiety was worsening because they weren’t specifically mental symptoms, but it’s so real and almost the realest sign our body could ever give that we need to seek help.

Listen to your body when it cries out to your mind. So many mental experiences manifest physically, and it’s so important to feel those things and proceed to take action about them, but make sure you also accept your physical maladies as just as valid as the mental things that “fit” with your diagnosis.