I'm not going to say "my anxiety" this or "my disorder" that throughout this whole thing. That's hard to read and I know it's a difficult thing to confront. It instantly makes people uncomfortable and that's not what I want. I want you to understand.

So instead, I'm going to talk about my rain cloud. Because I think anyone who suffers from clinical anxiety can tell you that it often feels like having your own personal storm hovering over your head all the time, that you have to use every bit of sunshine you have to fight off.

I want you to know that I need reassurance and that I'm probably going to need a lot of it. I know it gets annoying but just understand that sometimes my rain cloud chooses to storm at the most inopportune moment, and pulls me into the darkness. And when it starts to rain, it soaks everything. And when it's raining, things like being ignored or canceled on or even an unanswered text message are the claps of thunder that worsen the storm. And while I know it's frustrating that I doubt everything so much that things like that make it storm, the tiniest gestures of love and attention are all it takes to stop the rain. That's why I sometimes get so needy when I'm sad, or make thinly (read: badly) veiled jokes about needing attention. I don't want to outright ask for it, but it helps me so much more than you know. When I hear the words "I love you," or you play with my hair or hug me or even just smile at me, the sky clears almost instantly.

And I wish desperately that I could say gestures of love and attention will clear the sky forever, make my rain cloud disappear and fix me, but they will not. My rain cloud is never going to go away, and that's something I've long since accepted. However, knowing for a short time that I am loved shelters me. It makes me feel warm, safe and protected. Because the worst thing about my rain cloud is that I hardly ever feel safe. I know that it can, and will start raining on me at any moment. But when someone holds me, or plays with my hair, or even just makes an effort to spend time with me, it puts the storm at bay. Clears it, if only temporarily. And for a moment, I can feel the warm sun shining on my shoulders like it's the perfect summer day, and it puts me at peace. The cloud hovers nearby, but I'm not even conscious of it. That's the difference that feeling loved makes.

I want you to know why I go quiet, why it can seem like I'm pushing you away or ignoring you. I never want my rain cloud to cast shade on anyone else, I would much rather bear the storm alone. So when we're in the middle of a conversation and I drift off and stop answering, or I cancel plans, or say "I'm fine!" when I'm very clearly not, I'm sorry. I'm not doing it out of malice, it's that my rain cloud just started pouring on me and it feels like I'm a million miles away from you, trying to calm it so I can go about my day again. I'm not trying to push you away, I need you more than you will ever understand. I just have my own emergency plan in place when it starts thundering, and the work I have to do in my own mind to stop the storm sometimes pulls me away from reality.

I want you to know why I don't usually ask for help. In a moment of brutal honesty, I will admit that my rain cloud is crippling. I know I joke about it, laugh it off and make it seem like something that comes and goes, but don't be fooled. I never want anyone to know how much I struggle, I hate asking for help. More often that not, I will lie and tell you that I'm okay in order to avoid the discomfort it causes you when I admit that I am not. I want your love and attention more than anything, trust me. It's just that I could never allow anyone else to fight my storm for me. Because if I were to allow you to help me all the time, to hold my umbrella for me and chase the cloud away, that would mean I was relying on you. And because the number of people in my life who have said, "I'm here for you," but then left when things got too hard is too high, I can't bring myself to rely on anyone else.

Rain cloud be damned, I have to be able to clear my own skies and let the sunshine inside me be the thing that fights away the storms. I have to know that through the heaviest rain, the loudest thunder and the brightest lightning, the sky will clear and it won't be because anyone else did it for me. I may not love my rain cloud but I have accepted that it is a part of me, and being able to handle it on my own comes with accepting it. So it's not that I don't want your help, it's that I want it too much and I need to be able to clear my own skies first. So while your love and attention may help to clear things up sometimes and while I love the sunshine you bring around, it can't be the only sunshine I ever have. Don't get me wrong, the sun you shine through my cloud is so important. It's one of the reasons I fight as hard as I do against the rain, because I never want to lose you or for my rain cloud to come between us. So never think that I don't want your sunshine, it means so much to me. But at the end of the day, I just need a balance between your light and my own.

So even though I might be an odd balance of too distant and too needy, just know that your love means the entire world to me, and your support is what keeps me going even through the worst of the storms.