Jo-Erin, Thanks so much for your note. It helps to see there are people who are dealing with something similar to what I am, and still manage to keep a forward-looking and relatively upbeat attitude.
Sometimes I think this all would be easier if I could just sit around my house alone all day. But I have a family to support, a very busy and relatively high-stress job with a lot of responsibility, business travel, social commitments, etc. And that stuff all needs to get done with or without anxiety. Life, and the responsibilities that it entails, don't take a break for anxiety. But I guess maybe that is a good thing, in some ways -- keeps me preoccupied.
I do find the anxiety to be a lonely experience, though. I can be in a room with 20 people, all of whom I know well, but when I am suffering anxiety, I am alone -- even when I am not alone. HW is a good antidote to that because, while we all come from different backgrounds and spend our days doing very different things, and suffer from different issues (many of which I realize are far worse than my own), we all have something in common, and we can relate -- or at least we are willing to try to relate. And, perhaps because of the anonymity of the internet, we can all be honest with one another -- even if we feel we must keep secrets from most or all of those we know in person.