Stress, Anxiety, Eating Issues, and Acid Reflux?
So, for the past couple months I've been having really bad anxiety and some panic attacks. I finished my associate's degree and moved out of my parent's house and the transition has been really intense. I've never had the best eating habits but it seems like during finals week I just spiraled into this ditch I haven't been able to get out of. Everything fluctuates but recently, it's gotten worse. I've had a really overwhelming week (my boyfriend and I adopted a one month old kitten as a companion to our two year old cat, someone nearly drove their car through our house the other night, my boyfriend had a minor workplace injury, my mother-in-law got laid off from her job [while she was at the store with me], plus the implications that come with Thanksgiving, what with the emphasis on eating and seeing family [I had pre-Thanksgiving dinner with my boyfriend's brother and his wife's side of the family, in which I was surrounded by about fifty or sixty strangers]) and the symptoms seem to have only gotten worse. I get acid reflux every time I eat, mainly dinner because it gets really bad at nighttime. As a kid, I used to have panic attacks nightly because I had this irrational phobia that nighttime coincided with vomiting and so I'd refuse to eat after dark for fear that whatever went down would come back up. I feel like this phobia is starting up again and I am not okay with it. I want to find a way to stop it, I want to get back to eating normally again and stop having anxiety like this so I can actually enjoy what's supposed to apparently be "the best years of my life" (which I honestly think is kind of a bogus concept anyways because it pins way too much expectation on what I feel is really a daunting and intense period of your life). I've even been considering going to the doctor and asking about all of this once my insurance gets sorted out so I can get a professional opinion but in the meantime, I just really want to figure out how to fix this. My anxiety hikes up when I go almost anywhere (even the grocery store), my eating habits have completely plummetted, I've even lost some weight which concerns me because I'm already skinny enough and I can't afford to lose anymore weight (which for all I know could be connected to an eating disorder, even-- I've humored the idea but I feel like I don't even fit into any of the categories so I feel lost and confused about that). If anyone has any advice for handling these sorts of symptoms, any and all advice would be greatly appreciated <3
I'm hoping I can get to the Wellness Center soon, and ask them for some help. The thought of taking antidepressents is nerve-wracking but I know if I meet with a doctor and that's what they recommend, I'd trust their judgment and be more than okay with working with them to figure out what would be the best route to take. As for self-care, I feel like ironically enough school kind of keeps me on track in some ways like it forces me to get out of bed every morning, and I have a morning routine I try to stick to that helps to make sure I get dressed, eat, brush my teeth, etc. Luckily, the sleeplessness isn't as bad as it's been just because my school schedule forces me to get up earlier so by default I feel tired earlier than I used to, I just don't feel very energetic on most days but I'm hoping to fix that. One other thing I've been doing for self-care is trying to pack lunch every day so I have something to eat without spending any extra money or worrying about eating something that might me make sick because I have full control over what's in my food and what I'm consuming. There are days when I will eat out, though, like my boyfriend and I get takeout a lot and then just today we went to this little cafe on my campus to pick up some late lunch after I got out of class, which was nice.