TLDR; my boyfriend pointed out to me that I was displaying anxious tendencies and it’s opened my eyes to the fact that I have anxiety. 

So the other day I was out for dinner with my boyfriend and I realised that we were both jiggling our legs under the table so I pointed it out as it was a weird coincidence and they explained they were doing it because of the anxiety of quitting smoking and “I was like oh that makes sense but I wonder why I’m doing it” and he said “I’ve noticed you often have quite a lot of anxiety” 

And it was like the whole of my perspective of my life shifted because he was 100% right but I’ve never thought of it that way before. 

Looking back on it I’ve always struggled with anxiety since I was a teenager and I now recognise that I’ve had several anxiety attacks in the past and a pretty serious panic attack once. 

I’ve also found that it affects my work quite a lot because I often get overwhelmed and need to take a step back or spend 30 mins writing a simple email because I don’t want someone to misinterpret what I’ve written or in case I’ve made a mistake. 

I always just thought that this was part of my personally but now that I know that it’s anxiety and not just me being a failure it’s suddenly like I can start accepting myself fully.