My brain feels scattered. Thousands of thoughts are running through my head. All of them have something to do with anything being out of place. I have the constant worry about things happening to the people I love. Obsessions I cannot change or relieve. I fear people dying, or getting into accidents. My mind always rushes to the worst possible scenario. In this case, I cannot pinpoint my exact fear. I just know the panic is coming. My mind goes from scattered to blank within seconds. My leg starts to shake, and I start to feel myself lose control of my own body. I have always had control over my body, and here I am losing it. Next thing I feel is pins and needles. My hands are going completely numb. I officially lose my breath. This is just the beginning. I watch as the world moves on, but I am frozen in time. I can feel all the hairs on my arm stand up. I begin pacing, and my heart rate is accelerating. I truly wonder if I am dying. All my worries are colliding into one big cloud. I fall to the ground in tears. I can no longer move. I tell myself this will end. This has been my reality since I turned twelve.

“20 minutes,” I say

This is how long a panic attack can last. This is killing me. I am still on the ground, unable to move. The tears begin to be too much, and I can feel everything building up in my throat. I get up and begin pacing again, wondering what I can do to feel in control again. I can feel the need to run into the bathroom. My parents notice this familiar movement, and stop me before I can do the one thing that makes me feel better. My dad grabs me and wraps his arms around me, as he was told to do. He tries to hold onto me for as long as possible. Sometimes holding kids, or even just a touch can ease anxiety. At least that is what therapists tell parents. I never want to get too graphic about my illness, and the unhealthy way I use to cope. However if one were to ask I would say:

“I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder, and a compulsive need to be in control. Which is why my coping mechanism is to throw up.”

I want to be able to control my own body.  Every morning is a battle between my head and my body, and a lot of the time my body wins, and I get up. Some days my body loses, and I do not get up; I tell my parents I am not feeling well, and I do not go to school.

People avoid what they do not understand. They slap pretty labels on what they think mental illness is. My anxiety is just me being nervous or overreacting to the normal eye. My constant losing weight due to the panic attacks that result in throwing up, makes me skinny and beautiful in the eyes of others. In my eyes, I see a skeletal version of who I used to be.

After my diagnosis with Generalized Anxiety, I thought I was weird, and waited for the day I would find someone like me. I did not care where I would find this person. I looked in the real world, and  I looked in movies and tv and books.

On TV I found Dr. Miranda Bailey on Grey’s Anatomy, and I thought to myself  “a show about doctors, and one of them has OCD, they definitely need to get this portrayal right!”

Well, I was wrong. The first few episodes with Dr. Bailey’s diagnosis were pretty accurate, but then all of the sudden as the audience we never heard about it again. Dr. Bailey was given her medication, and her world shifted. As this character’s world changed, so did the other 1 in 5 adults around the world, some who probably watch Grey’s Anatomy just like me. This glorified portrayal of OCD, makes it seem like medication fixes everything. It does not.

In fact, medication does not work for everyone. For example, the medication did not work for me as it caused me to have drastic changes in weight. I had and still have stomach problems. These stomach problems affect me all the time. Everywhere I go I have to watch what I eat and make sure I do not set off my stomach. I even struggled in school, and for those of you who know struggling with work is not usual for me. Medication changed my thoughts and OCD tendencies, but it brought on a whole new set of worries. It takes a long time to find a set of medication that works for you.

I then remember feeling better after watching Degrassi. I never wanted to talk about my need to throw up and control my body.  I saw one of Degrassi’s main characters struggle with the same and saw how that was resolved within two episodes. I thought to myself, Emma from Degrassi binged and purged. Emma also had all these people rally around her, maybe if I continue then people will want to rally around me too.  That did not happen for me, I quietly suffered, as I watched people’s happy reactions when I lost a ton of weight. Deep inside I was lonely. Remember how I said Emma’s problem was solved in two episodes? Well, my problem was resolved in a year, and I still work hard to make sure it does not flare up every once and awhile. Also, Emma was already thin, and Degrassi helped the stereotype that already skinny blonde girls struggle with eating disorders. As Blythe Baird said in her spoken word poem “When the Fat Girl Gets Skinny”, “If you develop an eating disorder when you are already thin, to begin with, you go to the hospital. If you develop an eating disorder when you are not thin, to begin with, you are a success story.”  I was not already thin, to begin with, so everyone thought I was getting healthy. What Degrassi did not show was how people with Bulimia will have permanent damage done to their throats, or what happens when you are good at hiding everything from friends and family. The repercussions of having an eating disorder, and lying to the world are seldom shown in the media. No one is educated in what comes after, the recovery.

There is a lot of controversy as to how mental illness should be depicted. There is a magical world attached to TV and movies and various other art forms. However, in magical TV, movie and book land, the problems are solved easily.  Sadly, that is not what happens in real life. Which is why we face today’s issue of What is too much for the media to show?