If I ever have to go to an ER again, it will be wearing a t-shirt that says in big, bold letters IT IS NOT ANXIETY https://twitter.com/greenecharmer9/status/1263988975347421186

The only time I’ve ever truly experienced full-blown, panic attack anxiety was when I had a trauma response while attending an academic lecture in which someone described to a room full of people what they objectively measured happened to my brain when I stopped breathing.

It has been suggested to me that I had “anxiety” by PTs, nurses, PAs, doctors probably sixty times over the last six years.

It was never once correct.

It was always a predictor of poor care.

It always portended misdiagnosis.

Things that have been misdiagnosed as anxiety: anaphylaxis-like mast cell reactions, severe tension on my spinal cord due to tethered cord syndrome, thoracic spine subluxations, dangerous reactions to prescribed medications, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome...

... the way my neck would sometimes get extremely stiff, and it would feel like my eyes were bulging out of their sockets, and if you tried to turn my head, I would scream (“Aw, are we having a little bit of anxiety today?”)

Or, when things got really bad, and you turned my head, I would become completely paralyzed, unable to move, speak, think or breathe. (“It could be anxiety....”)

I don’t know when medicine took “humors” and “vapors” and replaced them with “anxiety.”

We have got to stop empowering nurses and doctors to make off the cuff assessments of “anxiety.” (When do you guys get taught to do this?) It’s ludicrous. Sure, it moves us along and out the door, but it doesn’t diagnose us or make us better. And sometimes it kills.