Standing in my power

*autistically speaking

Here I discuss how my struggles with anxiety and depression interact with my autism to trigger an embodied, agoraphobic-like fear. I also discuss ‘standing in my power’, which helps me with these conditions quite a lot.

Powerful Woman - OpenclipartImage credit: @j4p4n openclipart.org

This is what the NHS says about agoraphobia:

Agoraphobia is a fear of being in situations where escape might be difficult or that help wouldn't be available if things go wrong.

And here is what Wikipedia says:

Agoraphobia is a mental and behavioral disorder, specifically an anxiety disorder characterized by symptoms of anxiety in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no easy way to escape.

I don’t think I’ve always struggled with agoraphobic-like symptoms. In fact, I’m not certain I can accurately call it agoraphobia. I do perceive my environment to be unsafe with no easy way to escape, and it can be very difficult to leave home without being with someone. I do feel fear when I am out alone, and often uncomfortable, but it’s not a fear of being hurt or of something bad happening to me.

It’s a social fear. Anxiety. When I’m out by myself, I tend to space out big time. I’ll linger in an aisle at a supermarket for a long time, trying to decide which product I want. I’ll return to an aisle multiple times, too, because I forgot something. My fear in this situation is that my behaviour appears odd or suspicious. Strangers sometimes ask me what’s wrong, if I’m ok. And so I fear those questions. Because I would have been perfectly fine if no one ever asked me that.

So, I feel that my agoraphobic-like symptoms stem from these kinds of interactions. I fear someone mistaking my own normality for something bad or weird or wrong. I think this fear has become so embodied over the years that now I only feel the fear and hesitation in my body rather than as a conscious thought. I can’t bear the thought of going outside alone. I dread grocery shopping and skip it as long as possible. I sign up for exercise classes and then cancel at the last minute. I even dread going on walks alone. And then I’m completely exhausted when I do go out for trying to put on a ‘normality’ that isn’t my own.

I’m beginning to suspect that this embodied fear or anxiety has a lot to do with the severe depression I’ve felt over the last few years. I can’t link my depression to anything concrete or tangible. I just feel it. What is wrong with me? Why can’t I do all these really normal, everyday things that other people can do without any problem? And I start to sink into despair.

However, there is a new type of interaction I’m experiencing now that I had never experienced before. It kind of changes things. It leads me to the idea of standing in my power and the ways I might do so in situations like this one:

For example, I went out Salsa dancing with a friend one night. While at the club, this cute guy asked me to dance. After dancing and chatting a bit, he asked me to go for a walk with him. I was happy to go because I liked him. But on the walk, he kept asking me to go home with him, like right away. I was still in my happy place (because dancing puts me in a happy place), so I simply said no and that I wouldn’t abandon my friend. He argued that my friend wouldn’t mind and kept asking me over and over again to go home with him. Like he was begging me or something.

At this point, I’m like, what the hell is wrong with this guy?! It does take awhile for the reality to settle in so that I can figure out how to respond. And for the first time in my life, I figured out exactly what to say.

When we got back to the club, and he begged me once again to go home with him, I looked directly into his eyes and said very calmly, “I already told you no.”

I can’t begin to describe how amazing that felt. To stand in my power. I felt so elated… so invincible… so proud of myself.

I gotta say that I love this new feeling of standing-in-my-power. It is what helps me the most with agoraphobia and depression/anxiety.