![]() ![]() According to the National Institute of Mental Health, anxiety disorders affect about 40 million American adults aged 18 years and older-about 18% of the population. The Latin root of anxiety is angere, to choke or strangle-just the sort of sensation felt during a panic attack. In a sense, fear and anxiety have been my greatest teachers, moment by moment prompting me to come to grips with living in a body, living in the world. I can’t remember a time when I haven’t wrestled with fear. ![]() I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t prone to anxiety. (I was up on the lingo for myocardial infarction, aka heart attack, and many other conditions after spending countless hours watching doctor shows.) Inevitably, the ER doc would tell me I was having a panic attack and shoot me up with valium. ![]() In college, I found my way more than once to the emergency room, certain I was dying of an MI. Worries over nuclear war, fire, kidnapping, and tse-tse flies had all come before. The Brain Tumor Episode was not the first-or last-time I believed I was at risk of imminent death. Fifteen minutes later he shows up at our house and puts me through the paces of basic neurology tests-close your eyes and touch the tip of your forefinger to the tip of your nose, walk heel to toe in a straight line across the room-then he promises me I don’t have a brain tumor. Finally, near tears herself, she phones an old family friend who happens to be a world-famous neurosurgeon. My mother tries to hold me and talk me down, but I’m too far gone to be comforted. Still, I’m panicking, gulping at the air, trembling beneath the covers. I’m six years old and no one in my small world has ever had one. How I even know about brain tumors is a mystery. It’s midnight and I’m convinced I’ll be dead of a brain tumor by first light. ![]()
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