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Can you think of a time when your anxiety went from zero to a hundred in seconds? It’s good to get it out – I can look back and laugh about it (a bit) now and the more I tell people these stories, the less powerful they seem. No, the less powerful they ARE.

Right, scenario number two:

I am at college and the bus journey was a bit weird, I felt hot and dizzy and things felt ‘off’. When I get to the building, I feel ill and scared and everything looks weird. I panic – but not about anything in particular and that feels even scarier. I make my excuses and leave to go home. That night my head spins as I try to get my brain around why I felt so strange. I tie myself in knots as I explore stranger and more irrational paths trying to make sense of what I’m experiencing. It’s overwhelming doom mixed with a feeling that everything is unreal. And I have no blueprint for that. Eventually I settle on the answer: I must be going mad. Mad like you hear about on Crimewatch. Mad like killers in movies. And it clicks – I am psychotic. I have no proof of this, but that’s where my mind has landed. From that day, I become obsessed with monitoring my ‘mad’ behaviour. I pick apart every thought that pops into my mind – am I paranoid? Did I just think someone was watching me? Do I hear voices? The exhaustion from trying to push back against these thoughts is overwhelming and, on top of all the thoughts which keep coming, I’m experiencing a million physical side effects of anxiety too – adrenaline courses through my body, I feel sick constantly, I can’t sleep, I can’t eat. The mental and physical go hand in hand and egg each other on – it’s a vicious cycle.