Anxiety is the churning in my stomach that is connected to the tightening in my throat that is connected to the shallow shortness of my breathing that is connected to my whirling thoughts that are rooted in every fear I’ve ever known and failure I’ve ever feared and every imagined monster under every bed in the world of irrational thoughts that whirl through my head and my throat and my stomach and make me want to scream out but my throat is far too tight.

 

(Because Alyse needed help with homework interviews, and given what is to come in the next, oh, sixteen hours, this was appropriate.)