Do you feel like you care about absolutely nothing at all but also worry way too much at the same time? You are not alone.

Anxiety and depression are not things that everyone simply understands. I feel stuck caring too much about everything and not caring at all, but both constantly at the same time. Many people mistake the symptoms as just another case of sadness or stress, which are temporary and normal emotions to experience.

If you don’t understand, I am not really sure how to put into words how anxiety and depression feels. But, I can say that it’s something along the lines of feeling like you can’t physically get out of bed in the morning but also you are way too worried because you don’t want to get an attendance failure.

You feel like you don’t really want to do anything, but you are still too worried about the consequences of failure that lay in front of you. You feel absolutely nothing and everything at the same time and as a person who feels this way, sometimes I don’t even understand it myself.

Now, I know you’re probably thinking, “just snap out of it, it’s not that hard.” But let me tell you something; it’s a lot harder than it looks. It’s hard to feel a constant knot in your stomach because you don’t want to fail, but also feel like you are incapable of doing anything at all.

What people don’t understand is that the feeling is always there and sometimes it makes it impossible to complete simple tasks. It’s difficult to explain to a teacher that you couldn’t complete your homework because you were up all night worrying about everything too much. It’s difficult to tell your friends that you don’t want to hang out because you physically cannot drag yourself out of the house. It’s difficult to have a constant feeling of fear and numbness lingering through your body at the same time. But as someone who feels the constant confusion of fear and nothing, it’s especially difficult to make decisions because you’re not sure which one is the right choice.

If you feel this way or have felt this way in the past, just know that you are not alone. Feeling absolutely nothing and everything at the same time does not define who you are as an individual. If you haven’t felt this way before, I hope it helps you understand a bit more of what it’s like to carry the weight of the world on your shoulders while fear and exhaustion is being thrown at you a million miles per hour.

I wish I had an on and off switch for what I’m feeling, and I wish I could break it so it’s always off. It’s not easy to understand this, but it’s even harder experiencing it alone.