Oh geez it's mental health awareness day already? I was not prepared for this, hold on *indistinct banging, clanking sounds in the background*

shit shit shit oh geez oh geez I gotta have something back here for this come on isaac just hold it together for one more sec

okay okay deeep breaths deep breaths it's okay if you don't have a thread ready to go for mental health day! it's no big deal! people won't think any less of you, honest

but oh geez this is an OPPORTUNITY to help people and you're completely failing at it! again! way to drop the ball for the zillionth time this week! "high-functioning" my ass

is it just me or is it really bright and loud in here? let me just close all the curtains and doors for a sec. is that a fly? fucking fly, how am I supposed to think when when there's a fucking fly buzzing around my head

where was I? oh right, mental health day. let me eat several slices of leftover pizza while I think about this

Ahh that's better. Okay. Mental health day. Mental health AWARENESS day. I can do this.

Oh dang I did this whole jokey thread in the hopes that people would recognize or relate to or understand better the experience of anxiety, but what if doing it in a jokey self-deprecating way just plays into the whole stigmatization of mental illness????? Fuck

Anyway... anxiety disorders are a thing that people have, sometimes, and it's not fun, and actually quite common (like 15% of the population?!), and it can be serious, but it's treatable, and it's a real thing that's not made up!

So if this experience is at all familiar, you may benefit from therapy and/or medication? For me, I went from feeling anxiety ALL the time and not even realizing it, to feeling it some of the time and knowing how to better deal with it when it gets worse.

Also I find making bad jokes about it helps!! okay end of thread