I'll try to make this short as it's my first foray into this thread. I feel for those on this thread that are dealing with death and more serious issues. My thoughts and prayers, though I'm not particularly religious, go out to y'all.
My anxiety lately has been through the roof, and I cannot explain it. I read somewhere that one is basically set, personality-wise, by the time they're 25. Until about 5 years ago, absolutely nothing would have caused me any stress or lose sleep. Hell, I went through a 5 year custody battle over my daughter and rarely lost a minute of sleep. It kind of motivated me. I'm very, VERY lucky in that I never get depressed. I have extreme empathy for those that do get depressed when things go south. Thankfully, that's not me.
When I moved back to the Dallas area 7 years ago, I had an incident which seems to have triggered some sort of non-stop anxiety train. I'm a teacher. Long story short, I had a principal that had given me nothing but high marks for 2 years. In the spring of my 2nd year, my writing students took a "mock STAAR" test to prepare for the real one. In a low income school, our results were 1 percentage point below the district average (suburban DFW). (Side note: both math and reading scores in my departmentalized grade were lower than this.) All of the sudden, I'm considered the worst teacher on the planet. Principal chewed me out. I had a nonstop line of school and district folks in my room to teach me how to teach. Since then, I just cannot handle any sort of criticism. I have extremely good relationships with my students and their families. My test scores are always fantastic. In all honesty, I cannot think of anything that would be a negative mark against me. But, I just can't handle anything that I perceive as criticism.
Earlier today I took care of all 3 of the classes in my grade due to illness. I busted my ass and went FAR above and beyond what most would do. I get an email from my principal that has the tiniest hint of criticism, and here I am, up later than normal, drinking bourbon, and typing out personal stuff. Essentially, I sent my class to the computer lab with login codes that didn't work. I didn't need a page-long, fucking email about it. But, JC, how about just mentioning it in passing tomorrow and/or thanking me for taking care of all the extra shit today. According to my new Amazfit watch, my resting heart rate is 53. After receiving the email, it sat at 111 for over an hour. I love teaching, my students, and my families, but this crap is about to make me turn to driving a truck or somesuch. I'll stop the tl;dr now. Thanks for letting me vent.
p.s. My doc put me on something 2 years ago for anxiety. it just made me nauseous for 2 months before I finally gave up on it. I'm not sure pharma is the right path for me.