I have been a worried child since birth, but I wasn’t diagnosed with an anxiety disorder until high school. From a young age I was constantly worried and obsessing about tornadoes and cavities, but as I got older I learned there were a lot worse things in the world. While most kids were going through their stage of feeling invincible, I was doing quite the opposite. Everything scared me and it was overwhelming. In high school, I started having constant panic attacks and thought I was going crazy. Every time I felt my anxiety levels rising I thought I was having a heart-attack and made my mom rush me to the doctors. After all of my EKGs and blood tests came back normal, my doctor finally explained to me what was going on.
Most people don’t understand why this is such a hard disorder to live with. They think, “Well… you aren’t dying. So why are you scared?” My usual response ends up being something like, “If I held a loaded gun to your head and told you I wouldn’t pull the trigger… are you still going to be scared?” It is often the unknown that scares me the most. I have many triggers, but more often than not panic attacks creep up at unexpected moments. Public speaking, crowded rooms, large bodies of water, medicine, outer-space, and sudden death are some of the few triggers of my anxiety.
Having an anxiety disorder has affected my spacial perception in many ways. Walls begin to cave in and my peripheral vision starts to blacken. I feel everyone’s eyes on me, judging my every move. Everything feels like it is trying to trap me in, which often leads to me running outside where I feel like I can breathe. Time slows down and speech turns to gibberish. It is an extremely scary experience to involuntarily disengage from reality. My heart is usually beating out of my chest while my brain is trying to convince me that I’m dying. This makes going to school very difficult for me sometimes, but as the years go on I am learning to control and cope with my anxiety. I can no longer drink caffeine or take any type of medicine (Tylenol, cough medicine, flu shots, muscle relaxers, anti-depressants, etc.) without it causing me intense anxiety.
Anxiety does not only change my spacial perception, but how I perceive the world as a whole. I am extremely sensitive to everything around me. I use art to express these emotions and turn all the chaos inside my head into a piece of work.
Sample Anxiety Photography Portfolio
Anxiety Drawings
Kendra Carper 