Time Flies When You're Having a Panic Attack

By: Mara Chintea, Events Coordinator

It was late at night when I tiptoed into my parents’ room with tear stained cheeks. I couldn’t form a word, couldn’t breathe and couldn’t stop shaking. I don’t remember what had happened, but for some reason, I had suddenly become acutely aware of the concept of time and mortality. It was like I had been dreaming and I was shaken awake. I became consumed by the fear of my imminent death. Normal little kid stuff. I was five years old when I had my first panic attack. Since then, I’ve been living in a race against time, grabbing at moments that pass me by.

I’m all grown up now, and it terrifies me because I’m not too sure when it all happened— but I can tell you how it sort of went. I was 12 when I first suffered from depression and was taken to the hospital. When I was diagnosed with Anxiety Disorder and OCD. I was 13, maybe 14 when I stopped eating to try and change my body. I was 15 when I came home from school and cried every day looking at my face in the mirror, hating that I wasn’t as pretty as the girls online. 18 as a freshman in university, alone, lost and overwhelmed by exams, deadlines and tests, depressed once more. I'm 19 now, and it’s still difficult.

Sometimes I have really bad days. Days where I can’t get out of bed and can’t function, too busy obsessing over all the things wrong about me. Sometimes the thoughts in my head get so loud I can’t hear anymore, and I sit alone, watching the clock, draining time. But then there are these other moments when my brain shuts up for a second. Where I’m with someone I love, somewhere I love and the pain goes away. I’m far from healed, I’m grown, yes, but not healed, and I think that’s ok.

It’s terrifying to grow up. To have another day pass by, another week, another year. Suddenly you’re standing in front of a birthday cake again with a number that seems all too big, and a future that seems all too small. It’s easy to lose yourself between the pages of a calendar.

So I guess all this to say, take your time. You’ll have plenty of awful days but you’ll have plenty of good ones too. We aren’t the little kids we once were, but we take them with us everywhere we go. As we grow, we make mistakes, we fall down, we get up, fail, we learn and we are slowly molded by it all, carrying a piece of our five year old selves into today. I’m not tiptoeing into my parent’s room with my stuffie anymore, but time still scares me. I’m all grown up now, but I’m not fully healed. That’s ok. We don’t have to have it all figured out now, let that be ok. Give yourself the grace of growing, and remember, take your time.