Anxiety • part 1

1 • breathe

'I'm going to be fine' I repeated the sentence in my head a thousand times as I stood in the busy crowd. I've been waiting for this since 7am for a reason, standing in the cold and rain. I'm not giving up now. 

But was I really going to be fine? The fans behind me were pushing around, arguing and talking loudly and I felt stuck. Stuck between the fans behind me and the fence pushing against me in front of me. I was having trouble breathing and every second they seemed to push harder. Their opening act hadn't even started yet, and I was already feeling suffocated.

"Hey, are you okay? You look a little pale." The girl beside me asked, I didn't know her or ever even talked to her but she noticed I was suffocating, she noticed I wasn't okay.

"I'm okay." I lied before looking at my sister on my other side. She looked so happy to be standing front row, it made all the waiting worth it to see her that happy.

And while she had already made friends with the people standing around us, I was terrified and my mind was racing, unable to focus and unable to slow down.

They couldn't kill me by pushing too hard. I couldn't fall and be trampled because I was squeezed so thightly against the fence.

And nobody would come in with a bomb. Nobody would try to kill us.

I tried to repeat it in my head and tried to calm myself down but it wasn't working.

"Sam. What are you going to do?" My sister asked as she grabbed my arm, I was about to run. I was about to run until I saw how the arena had filled up with people behind me. There was no easy way to leave, no way to return after running.

"Just have to go to the toilet, stay here. If I can't get through anymore I'll just stay in the back." I said and she nodded, a little worried. She knew it was a lie but she knew I'd be fine. I'm her older sister after all.

I started pushing through the crowd, people weren't eager to let me in between but with the tears starting to run down my cheeks, they let me through. I was starting to struggle with breathing, every intake of breath became more exhausting and followed the previous one faster. I was having an anxiety attack, on a day that should have been a happy day.

I ran to the restrooms to be able to isolate myself from the crowd but when I saw a line out there, I ran back to where we entered. I needed fresh air but the entrance was blocked. It was still crowded and there was no way out.

"Excuse me, are you alright?" A man asked me. I turned towards him, looked at his sweater and immediately noticed the security name tag.

"I need to get outside." I said while I was hyperventilating and crying. He nodded before taking me by my upper arm and guiding me through the crowd around the food stands and the merch.

I had to get out. I had to get out.

When I was finally outside I thought I would be able to breath again and slow down my racing mind. But the worry of being suffocated made place for worry for my sister. I just left my 16 year old sister alone at the front row.

I had front row places and I left, knowing I could never go back there. Knowing nobody would let me pass once it started.

I started hyperventilating even more and the guard beside me started calling for a medic. While I felt his hand placed on my arm, his voice seemed miles away.

Not much later my legs gave up underneath me, and my body hit the ground harshly. The world turned black and my mind finally went silent. It stopped racing and overthinking, it finally left me alone.

I don't know how long it took me to wake up, but when my eyes started opening, people had gathered around me again. Three medics and three men from security.