Colin's Anxiety, Mike Tyson's Transgressions - The GameOverGreggy Show Ep. 115(YouTube)

Great show guys. Just saw the end (was away for the weekend and been busy at work) and was surprised to see my name called out as Patreon producer. Happy to support you! Keep up the great work!

Great post and wonderfully articulated. I can relate to everything you've said and have spent the last couple of years dealing with very serious health anxiety (which was brought on by a pretty serious health problem). I am slowing coming out the other side and hearing other people talk openly and honestly about anxiety and mental health more generally has helped me immensely. I commend you and urge you to continue to do so. If you ever want to speak, hit me up. All the best, Paul

Paul Joyce

I've battled anxiety my whole life. My anxiety is mostly health-related, but I've also experienced a little bit of social anxiety and OCD. Basically, I get anxious whenever I get hurt or don't feel well. I don't like seeing blood and gore. I don't like hospitals and needles....I think you get the idea. When I'm explaining how anxiety feels to others, I always tell them to imagine the feeling of almost getting into a car accident. You are afraid that you're going to crash and in that split second you get this huge noticeable rush of adrenaline pouring into your system. Your muscles tense up and you get this tingling feeling in your head and down the back of your neck. This feeling is often referred to as the "Fight or Flight" response. Your body is preparing itself to do whatever is necessary to survive. This is natural and I think most people have felt this feeling at least once in their life. Now imagine having mini bursts of this kind of feeling throughout the day in response to seemingly trivial things. That's what it feels like. It may be more or less severe depending on the person. Anxiety is basically your mind misinterpreting certain things as fear and your body reacting a bit over-zealously with your adrenaline production. I think Tim asked about if stress contributes to anxiety. The answer to that question is, absolutely. Stress, anxiety and other negative emotions/feelings are basically cumulative. Think of it this way, when you are completely at peace you are an empty glass. When you experience stress, anxiety, etc. throughout the day you add water into the glass. All the little things throughout the day add up and if you let it, your "glass" will overflow. In reality, this usually happens in the form of a panic attack. A panic attack, in contrast to the short bursts I mentioned earlier, is sort of like a continuous stream of adrenaline. With the glass analogy in mind, I've found that the best way to manage my anxiety is to limit or resolve the things that make me anxious in my mind before they accumulate. Trying to calm yourself down in the middle of a panic attack is VERY difficult. It's not impossible, but it's really hard. It's like asking you to not think about anything. Go ahead, try it. Stop reading this for a second, clear your mind, and completely stop thinking about anything. Not so easy, right? Now imagine trying to do that while you've got tons of adrenaline pumping through your veins. That said, it's much easier to address and resolve the smaller issues as they come along. I understand why Colin doesn't want to use medication. I was in the same position. I thought I could manage it on my own, but it got bad enough for me where I didn't really have much of a choice. Like the guy who wrote in, the medication helped me tremendously. I took it for a few years during college (A very stressful time) and this year I weaned myself off. I usually describe the feeling of being on the medication as having a metaphoric rubber band around my mind that prevents it from wandering too far down a negative rabbit hole of thinking. The medication made it easier to avoid dwelling on negative thoughts which prevented my anxiety from snowballing into something that was unmanageable. The really cool thing about the medication was that it helped me learn to do this myself and now I no longer need it. That's not to say that I'm never anxious or that I'll never have to go back on the medication in the future. If I've learned anything from my anxiety, it's that it's always going to be there. It's a part of me and how I think and I can't change that. However, I can manage it so that it's not destructive and in some respects, I can use it to my advantage. My anxiety makes me more compassionate, courteous, careful, detailed-oriented, amongst many other things. Those are all great qualities and that's what I try to focus on. Anyway, I think I've rambled on long enough. TLDR: 1. Anxiety is not a mysterious condition. Anxiety is your mind misinterpreting certain things as fear and your body reacting a bit over-zealously with your adrenaline production. 2. Anxiety, stress and other negative emotions are cumulative. Don't let them build up to the point where they are unmanageable. Address the small issues as they come along. 3. Anxiety medication is good. It can teach you how to manage your anxiety and so that eventually you can get to the point where you don't need to take it anymore. It doesn't make you a different person or anything and dependency is not a huge issue.