Living with anxiety, incredible things can still happen...

Thursday 14th July 2016, just another day? Well kind of anyway.

On Thursday I pushed myself a little in the hopes of being able to meet Olly Murs...

I've never been the kind of person to try and meet celebrities. In my opinion they are just like you and me, with a little (ok a lot) more money and less privacy. I'm still not the kind of person to stalk celebrities or turn up at events for the chance to meet them. Infact if anything, I'd go to an event and be too scared to approach them and ask for a photo. 

As soon as I found out though that Olly was doing a radio tour and would be at a station just over half an hour away I just had to go. I mean come on, it would of just been rude not to. Within minutes of finding out I asked my boss if I could leave work early that day and thankfully she said yes. Hooraaayyy for the nice people in the world! 

The location of the radio station was in the exact same city where a few years ago I was meant to be attending my first ever blogger's meet up (it was a no go for me, it ended with me crying in my car in a side street). Oh, how things change and improve.

After being able to attend this radio tour, I got a big urge to write about it in hopes it will give someone hope. I mean we could all do with some hope, hope that things will get better. They will, trust me! These things just take time, there is no quick fix. Trust me, I'd been hoping for a quick fix for a long time. Eventually all the little steps and hard work pays off.

Maybe I should explain a little about a radio tour. This is my first ever one so I don't know, maybe each one varies? But here is my run down of what happened. We arrived at the location a little before Olly was meant to arrive, we arrived about half an hour before. Other people however had been there since lunch, his expected time was four. Once Olly had arrived he said a quick hello and told us he would catch us afterwards. About an hour and a half later, Olly reappeared (I'm sure times all vary for how long they are in the radio station for). Before Olly was due to come out to see us, his bouncer (I'm guessing, I don't know who he actually was) came out and told us to have our phones in our hands ready on selfie mode, give Olly the phone cos he's good at selfies, one photo per person and then step back. It was very well organised and it went very smoothly, I'm sure all radio tours don't go that well but for my first time I was very impressed. It would of been nice to have been able to have a little chat with Olly cos he is only human after all but there just wasn't time for that or time to have anything signed. 

Right then, maybe now I should explain a little about the process of attending this event, the anxiety I felt and how I managed to stay til I'd seen Olly. 

Waking up, I felt siiicccckkkk! Hello anxiety at a very early time in the morning, thank you for showing your presence, I know you're there. Instead of getting annoyed with my uneasy feeling I just accepted it for what it was and went about my day. Had breakfast, got washed, ready and went to work.

1pm, I finished work early so I could go and hopefully meet Olly. I'd seen on Twitter that some people had waited hours and not been able to meet him so I wasn't 100% sure if I'd get to meet him or not. I'd also seen comments about his security being really rude and mean. I was also starting to worry because I wasn't sure how many people would be there, what they would be like, what the whole situation would be like.  Moving forward anyway in hopes that I would get to see him and be completely fine too, me and my mum got ready and headed over to Lincs FM. Before travelling my body decided it absolutely needed to wee about a million times (ok, more like ten but it feels like a lot more). I've started calling this nervous weeing, apparently it is quite common with anxiety.

3.30pm (ish). We arrived at Lincs FM! Lincoln is filled with one way streets, you know making the journey soooo much easier (I'm kidding). I did a trial run the day before cos I knew I'd find it easier if I'd been before. Car parked up, out of the car... I wanted to get straight back in the bloomin car and go home. But instead I thought 'no, Anna you've got this! You can do this'. Self belief and a little bit of encouragement from yourself makes things so much easier. So I sat on a wall outside the station, filled my face with a mixture of Bach Rescue Remedy Lozenges (I highly recommend these)!, spearmint polos and ginger biscuits. Plus a bottle of water to wash the taste of the three away. Admittedly they aren't a great mix altogether so I ditched the polos and lozenges. Eating ginger biscuits helps me with feeling sick and unease, they help ease my nausea and my stomach. Some therapists class this as 'safety behaviour' but I would much rather eat a few biscuits, drink some water and be able to meet Olly Murs than not and be stuck at home. 

4pm (ish), Olly shimmies on into the studio! At this point anxiety levels had dropped and we managed to move over to the other fans waiting too.

5.30pm (ish) Olly reappeared. He took a photo with each and every single person stood waiting (well what I saw anyway, we left after our turn). 

6pm (ish) on our way home, getting lost on the way after taking a wrong turn. Really hungry, ready for home but one very happy girl.

I've learnt that you've got to push yourself if you want to achieve things and live life. But I've also learnt that sometimes it just isn't possible and that is absolutely fine. Me and my mum go to watch football and a few times now I've arrived and had to leave pretty much straight away and I remind myself that's ok. Sometimes I go and I'm fine within 20 minutes but before that I just can't settle and relax. Life with anxiety is weird but also wonderful too.