Amanda A.
Photography by Ally Szabo
If you’re reading this, know that whatever you are going through is just a bump in the road.
As I am writing this right now, I have just received my cap and gown for graduation in the mail. That is crazy to think, as a year ago today I wouldn’t have believed that I would graduate at all.
For context, I was diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder and OCD when I was 9 years old and had to go on medication at 10 years old. I have been on various anxiety medications ever since and have always kept that part of me hidden. I was slightly ashamed growing up having to take medication and go to therapy while my friends were able to live their life normally. Part of me was too young to understand what anxiety was, but more than that, it was not talked about back then, especially pertaining to young kids. The medications helped me a lot and I didn’t really think about or talk about my anxiety throughout high school and my early years of college because it didn’t seem relevant to my story and because I preferred to keep that part of me tucked away.
This all changed right before my senior year when my medication stopped working for the first time in 8 years and I was forced to face my anxiety disorder again. It had been so long since my anxiety had been this bad that I forgot what it was like to be paralyzed with fear and unable to leave my home. I was faced with the difficult decision of taking a leave of absence for the first semester which broke me inside because I felt like I was letting myself and my parents down for not going back to school.
I still felt some hope at the prospect of going back in the spring but as the months went on of trying several different medications that didn’t work, my hope grew thin. I developed severe depression as a reaction from my medications but also from being isolated from everyone outside of my family. Seeing my friends at school enjoying their senior year and making new memories left me feeling empty inside and I thought my pain would never end. I was unable to return to school in the spring as I had hoped because my depression grew so bad that I did not want to live anymore. I have never admitted these feelings to anyone other than my mom and therapists so writing this out is scary.
I worked really hard in the spring and summer to work on myself and my mental health, and it was not easy. The path to where I am now was not linear. I had really good days and really bad days. More than anything I felt so alone because some friends stopped reaching out to check on me and I felt like I was the only one going through things. I started to read a lot of people’s letters on the If You’re Reading This Villanova website and it gave me a lot of comfort to know other people were going through similar struggles.
Fast forward to now, I am a few months away from graduating and I’ve just started applying for jobs. Although my senior year is nothing like how I thought it would be, I am grateful in a way for this experience because it has allowed me to understand my anxiety better and in turn understand myself better. I have been more open in admitting I have anxiety which has let me help other people as well. I still struggle daily with my mental health and I wouldn’t say I am back to where I was before. However, for the first time in over a year, I have hope and I know that things will only get better. I want to help as many people as I can who are also struggling so please reach out if you are reading this and want to talk.
Taking that first step to get help is the beginning of getting over that bump in the road.
Amanda A., Villanova University
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