Growing up, I was prone to anxiety.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I grew up very self-loathing. I was a phobic. I had anxiety. I had panic attacks.
I was not a silly kid or outgoing. In fact, I suffered from quite a bit of anxiety. I used to have panic attacks when I was a teenager, really incapacitating moments, because I had some phobias.
Anxiety has afflicted me all my life.
Even at age 10, I already knew that I was different from most people. My anxiety disorder was still years from being diagnosed, but it affected me quite deeply. I was too afraid to speak out in class, too nervous to make real friends.
There was a point in time where the thought of people even talking about me made me anxious. Physically.
Working with food was fraught with anxiety when I was a girl. Like all farmers, we were at the mercy of the weather, and we lived in fear of crop failure.
I worried too much when I was a kid.
When I was young, I was just about hard work. But as I got older, I did experience anxiety, doubt, judgment, and it's so easy to lose yourself for a second.
In a way, I had a very good and normal childhood. I had loving and caring parents. But I had a lot of quirks or problems when I was growing up. I had phobias and obsessions.
Mum and Dad were very much friends and up for life. There was no anxiety for anything when I was growing up; they just taught me to be me.