My Anxiety Has a Name

I didn’t notice it at first.

Anxiety, I mean.

It was just… there.

Like a constant buzzing in the background of my mind. A low hum that I had learned to ignore. A feeling that sat behind my ribs like a small animal pacing in a cage.

I told myself I was just stressed.

I told myself everyone felt this way.

I told myself it was normal.

But it wasn’t.

It was more than that.

It was a shadow that followed me everywhere.

It sat in the passenger seat of my car. It waited in the bathroom when I was getting ready for work. It hid in the corner of every room, whispering things I didn’t want to hear.

What if you mess up?
What if you embarrass yourself?
What if they don’t like you?
What if you’re not enough?

The thoughts came like a flood.

And I had learned to live with it.

I had learned to function.

I had learned to smile.

But inside, I was breaking.

It wasn’t until the day I met him that things began to change.

His name was Simon.

I was at a coffee shop, waiting for a friend who was late. I sat at a small table near the window, staring out at the street. My hands were shaking slightly as I stirred my coffee.

I didn’t know why I was shaking.

I didn’t know why my heart was racing.

My friend hadn’t even arrived yet, and already I felt like the world was closing in.

Then Simon sat down across from me.

He didn’t ask if he could sit there. He just did.

He was wearing a simple black hoodie and jeans, and he had a notebook in his hands. He looked like someone who didn’t care about being noticed.

Which was strange, because he was the most noticeable person I had ever met.

His eyes were calm. His voice was quiet. His presence was… steady.

He looked at me and smiled.

“Hi,” he said. “I’m Simon.”

I smiled back, but it felt forced.

“Hi,” I said. “I’m Mia.”

He nodded, and then he did something I didn’t expect.

He looked at me like he could see inside me.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

I laughed, but the laugh sounded hollow.

“I’m fine,” I said, too quickly.

Simon didn’t say anything for a moment. Then he reached into his bag and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper.

He slid it across the table.

“What’s this?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Just something I wrote.”

I unfolded the paper.

On it, in neat handwriting, was a name:

“Ansel.”

Under it, a short sentence:

“He’s been with you for a long time.”

I looked up at Simon, confused.

“Who is Ansel?” I asked.

Simon smiled, like he had been waiting for me to ask.

“Your anxiety,” he said simply. “You’ve been calling him ‘stress’ or ‘fear’ or ‘nerves’ for years. But he has a name. And when you give him a name, he becomes something you can talk to.”

I stared at the paper.

I didn’t know what to say.

It felt strange. It felt… childish.

But something about it also felt strangely comforting.

Simon leaned back in his chair.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked.

I hesitated.

I had never talked about my anxiety with anyone. Not like this. Not honestly.

I had always been the one who pretended everything was fine.

But Simon looked like he wasn’t going to judge me. He looked like he understood.

So I started talking.

I told him about the way my mind worked. The way it would jump from one fear to another. The way I would replay conversations in my head for hours. The way my chest would tighten when I walked into a room full of people.

I told him about the nights I couldn’t sleep. The way my thoughts would keep me awake, spinning like a wheel.

I told him about the panic attacks I had tried to hide.

Simon listened.

He didn’t interrupt.

He didn’t try to fix me.

He just listened.

When I finished, he said, “Do you want to meet him?”

“Meet who?” I asked, confused.

“Ansel,” he said. “Your anxiety.”

I stared at him.

He laughed softly.

“Okay, I know it sounds weird,” he said. “But it works. Sometimes the best way to deal with something is to give it a face. To make it real.”

I didn’t know what to do.

But something inside me—something that had been buried under years of fear—wanted to try.

So I said, “Okay.”

That night, I sat on my bed and stared at the ceiling.

I thought about Simon’s paper. I thought about the name. I thought about how I had always felt like anxiety was something that happened to me, something outside of me.

But what if it wasn’t?

What if it was a part of me?

I closed my eyes and tried to imagine Ansel.

I pictured a small figure, not terrifying, not monstrous. Just… there.

A shadow with eyes.

A presence.

I didn’t know why I was doing this. I didn’t know what I hoped to achieve.

But I began to speak.

“Ansel,” I said quietly.

Silence.

My heart was pounding.

I waited.

“Ansel,” I said again, louder this time. “I know you’re here.”

The room was quiet.

And then, in my mind, I heard a voice.

Not loud. Not dramatic. Just a whisper.

“You called me,” the voice said.

My eyes flew open.

I stared at the room, terrified.

But there was nothing there.

Just my bed. My walls. My lamp.

I sat there, shaking.

And then I realized something.

The voice wasn’t real.

It was my mind.

But it felt real.

And that was the point.

I was giving my anxiety a form so I could understand it.

I was giving it a name so I could talk to it.

I sat there for a long time, speaking to the empty room.

I asked Ansel questions.

I asked why he was there.

I asked why he didn’t leave.

And the answers that came were not the answers I expected.

He wasn’t there to hurt me.

He wasn’t there to ruin my life.

He was there to protect me.

He was a part of my mind that had learned to be alert. To watch for danger. To keep me safe.

But he had become too loud.

He had become too strong.

He had become… controlling.

I realized then that my anxiety wasn’t an enemy.

It was a misguided protector.

It was a part of me that had been trying to do its job, but had forgotten how to stop.

I continued to talk to Ansel every night.

Sometimes he was angry. Sometimes he was scared. Sometimes he was quiet.

Sometimes he was even gentle.

I began to notice something strange.

The more I talked to him, the less he controlled me.

The more I acknowledged him, the less power he had.

It was like he had been hiding in the dark, and once I turned on the light, he had nowhere to hide.

One night, I asked him a question that changed everything.

“Why do you always make me feel like I’m not enough?”

The silence was long.

Then the voice came, soft and almost ashamed.

“Because you were never taught that you are enough,” Ansel said. “You were taught to prove yourself. To be perfect. To be safe.”

My chest tightened.

I realized that he was right.

I had been living my life trying to prove myself.

I had been living my life trying to be safe.

I had been living my life trying to avoid pain.

And my anxiety had been doing its job.

It had been protecting me from pain by keeping me from taking risks.

But it had also kept me from living.

The next day, I went to therapy.

I told my therapist about Simon. I told her about Ansel. I told her how I had started talking to my anxiety like it was a person.

She smiled.

“That’s actually a very powerful technique,” she said. “It helps you separate yourself from the anxiety. It helps you see it as something you can manage.”

I felt a wave of relief.

I wasn’t crazy.

I wasn’t weak.

I was learning.

I continued to meet with Ansel.

And over time, I noticed changes.

The panic attacks became less frequent.

The thoughts became less loud.

I started to feel like I was in control again.

Not completely.

Not always.

But enough.

One day, I was walking down the street, and I felt the familiar buzz of anxiety start to rise.

My heart began to race.

My breath became shallow.

I felt the old fear.

But instead of letting it take over, I whispered, “Ansel.”

And then I said, out loud, “I know you’re here. Thank you for trying to protect me. But I’m okay. I can handle this.”

The feeling didn’t disappear instantly.

But it didn’t grow either.

It stayed small.

It stayed manageable.

And for the first time in a long time, I felt something I hadn’t felt in years.

Control.

Not over my anxiety.

Over my life.

I realized then that giving my anxiety a name hadn’t made it disappear.

It had made it visible.

And once it was visible, I could finally talk to it.

I could finally understand it.

I could finally heal.

That night, I wrote a letter to Ansel.

Dear Ansel,

You don’t have to control me.

You don’t have to protect me all the time.

You can rest.

I’m here now.

I folded the letter and placed it on my bedside table.

I didn’t know if he would read it.

But I knew something else.

I had finally found a way to live with him.

Not as an enemy.

But as a part of me.