About two years ago I was suffering from a debilitating and possibly deadly illness. Sadly, I was suffering because I was refusing to get treatment. I had seen others get this illness treated with medication and some of them had suffered from bad side effects, which scared me. I convinced myself that I could beat my illness without medical attention. But my condition worsened and it was affecting everyone around me.
If I told you that condition were cancer or Parkinson's or some other obviously physical ailment, I'm sure you would be scratching your head as to why I refused treatment for so long. However, my ailment wasn't obviously physical. Instead, it was mental. When I finally sought a diagnosis, I learned that I was suffering from an extreme anxiety disorder and moderate depression.
When I tell this to people who know me well, they're almost always surprised. This is because I was generally pretty good at hiding my symptoms. It was only when I was alone that I w…