I have had a few times in my life where I have experienced what I like to refer as “crappy yet defining moments.” You know those moments – where you think, “Why the hell is this happening to me? What did I do to deserve this?” You want to shake your fists at the heavens and demand an answer from a higher power. Those times when you feel so horrid that you are – in that moment – absolutely positive that nobody on God’s green earth has ever felt as horrible as you do right then. You know those moments?

When I look back on my 24 years, two of those moments smack me in the face with cringe-worthy memories. I will now share those two moments and the perspective I have gained from them.

I can’t exactly classify the first moment as a moment…as it lasted for approximately ten years of my life. From age 11 to age 20, I had quite bad anxiety and panic attacks. Most have experienced anxiety at some point or another – something I didn’t realize in the throws the turmoil that was my teenage years. However, most don’t get a panic attack several times an hour and become convinced that something is seriously physically and/or mentally wrong with them several times a day.

Ah…the memories.

I don’t have memories of middle school and high school that aren’t accompanied by my panic and anxiety. I built my world around things that I could do that didn’t cause me to panic. Of course…the majority of the panicking happened at school. I couldn’t get out of school. I tried. Pretending to be sick, crying in the morning, but my mom booted my teenage butt out of the car. [I know that it was hard for her to do, by the way, and I am grateful that she didn’t coddle me.]

I had trouble sitting through a class without pretty much hyperventilating. These episodes weren’t evident to anyone else when they were happening. Outwardly, it was nothing more than my fingers tapping the desk or slightly faster breathing. But it my head it was a cacophony of “I’m going crazy. Why is my heart beating so fast? Am I going to faint?” [Intense fear of fainting…even though I have never fainted…though perhaps that’s why I’m so scared of it?]

Then, during my second year of college, I decided I’d had enough. I began devising strategies to keep myself from having an anxiety attack. If I felt one was about to happen, I would begin evasive maneuvers immediately. I’d take a few deep breaths, focus on a spot on the floor, wait for my vision to uncloud. I began exercising to lower my anxiety level. I ate healthier food. I did a complete 180. It took a few months, but I was almost panic and anxiety free.

So you’d think things would be better, right?

Oh…if only …

When I became less of a slave to my panic attacks, I suddenly able to do anything I wanted without leaving the house with an escape plan – i.e. excuses for why I had to get up frequently during classes or leave a party early. But, I was left with very few close friends because…when they called me to go somewhere I said no. I was left with hobbies that meant I was cooped up inside my room alone – writing, reading. I didn’t know how to date or have a relationship. I was, socially, way far behind.

I had friends, don’t get me wrong. I think I’m quite a pleasant person to befriend. However, beyond talking at school, I didn’t speak to most of them. Only a select few. I was so closed off.

During this time, I remember how leaving my dorm to go anywhere and not having to worry about panic attacks made me kind of…angry.

“Why? Why couldn’t the past ten years have been this way? I have barely done anything with my life. This is pathetic. I am absurd. I am so mad at myself. Were all my friends living like this the entire time I was afraid to do anything? That is completely unfair. I’m mad at everyone but it doesn’t begin to approach the level of anger I feel for my ridiculous self.”

However, it has been about…let’s see…four years since I had to worry about panic attacks. For a while – I mean at least two of those four years – I was dumbfounded. I didn’t understand why my life was “so terrible.” [I’m dramatic.]

But I realized recently that…had it not been for my panic attack years…there’s so much that I’ve done recently that I wouldn’t have ever dreamed of doing. Travel to Korea? Heck no. That’s ridiculous. Get a job teaching? Speak at meetings? Make friends with people from all over the world – friends who feel as close as family.

I hadn’t ever had friends who felt like family until I went to Korea. I wouldn’t have gone to Korea had I not gotten panic attacks all those years. My biggest motivation for going to Korea was not wanting another second of my life to resemble what those ten years had been. It worked. I changed.

I also find that I am much more empathetic than I would have ever been had I not experienced all that. I care about people – the clients I work with on a daily basis these days, the students I taught in Korea, the friends from Korea who are my language partners. Even people I don’t know well. I know I have an interesting story and I like to figure most everyone does. I don’t know who else could be going through a crappy yet defining moment, so I try to withhold judgment.

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Okay, readers, are you with me so far? I am about to take this in the direction of my second and most recent crappy defining moment. It is so recent that it’s difficult to write about…yet I am me, which means I can also see the humor in it. Are you ready?

Here goes.

When I was living in Korea, I had a serious boyfriend. Remember that thing I said about having no serious relationships in high school and college. Well, that changed in Korea. I met a guy and fell for him and was head over heels. He was funny and cute and interesting to talk to. I hadn’t ever met someone I could talk to for hours a day that way.

When we had been together around three months, he told me he loved me. I was ecstatic. I loved him, too. However, on the same day, he told me, “Yeah, it’s funny…because when we met I was just curious about what it’d be like to…you know…sleep with an American. But I guess at some point I started to care about you.”

That should have been a red flag, right? Well, I’m an idiot, so I looked at it more like, “Aww I won him over with my awesomeness.”

Ohh…silly Amber.

After we’d been together for about…I think eight months, it was August of last year. 2012. Oh yes, the memories are fresh. He decided to have me meet his parents. This was when it all began to fall apart – no, not during those other moments that it should have fallen apart. Like…when he told me to lose weight and grabbed my stomach like I weighed 5 million pounds. Or…like…that time he told me I couldn’t hang out with certain male friends because they seemed to like me. Or…like…when he would get mad at me for not speaking to him in a cute voice and hang up the phone and ignore me for a day or two.

Nah. It fell apart when I met his parents.

I heard from him that his parents had differing views about me, but the common theme in the views was that they didn’t like me.

Oh, excuse me. Wait.

They thought I was smart and pretty and cared about him. They thought I had a wonderful personality and understanding of Korean culture. But, dating their son? Oh…that won’t work.

His dad thought it laughable. Literally laughed at me during the meeting at one point and said his son should just focus on practicing English with me since he was going to study in America. My ex’s proclamation of “she’s not my teacher” elicited more laughter.

His mother thought…oh…if only that girl were smaller and possibly Korean. People would laugh at us, she said, or stare at us. I was taller than him, and I wasn’t thin. That was unheard of in Korea. The girls should be smaller.

I cried about this. I was distraught. I ended up deciding to go back to America earlier than planned for other reasons but…if I’m being honest, the situation with him was a contributing factor. He agreed with his mother when he discussed it with me. “I mean…the girl IS supposed to be smaller.” We began to grow apart.

We ended things for good a month after I moved back to America. Meaning…we ended things five months ago. During the first month I was back, I had intense reverse culture shock…crying all the time, feeling disoriented. I reached out to him for support and got very half-hearted responses. He ignored me, he was mad that I left. He said horrible things to me.

Despite all this, I had in my head that he was coming to America in January and perhaps I would go to the state he was moving to and live with him. I proposed this. He rejected it. He said that since there were other Koreans on the campus who knew his father, he couldn’t have me there. People would talk.

So, after having him treat me like I was an embarrassment to him – someone he will gladly share a bed with but refuse to stand up for in front of family and friends – I guess you could say I’m a tad bit…damaged. It’s still a difficult thing for me to discuss. I was so hurt by the way he treated me that I think a part of me will always look back on it and wonder why I let it go on for so long.

However, with each passing month…I am gaining perspective. I am almost…grateful for what happened?

Firstly…there’s something about people outright insulting me that makes me 100% more secure in who I am and what I look like. I realized that I’m the only one who can make me feel good about me. You know what? I’m not disgusting looking. I’m not gigantic. I’m not these things because I don’t think I am these things. I look in the mirror and like the way I look. I dare someone else to tell me I’m “too big” or “too tall.” It’s laughable. Why should I care?

I have also realized that I am much more comfortable and confident talking to men since having that relationship. I am certainly not eager to jump into another situation like that, so I don’t view every man I meet as a potential date. I’m going to be much more careful that I was before. I am having fun meeting and getting to know men every so often. But there isn’t any pressure. I’m not obsessing over things that cute guy said or what that cute guy texted.

I also am able to view the situation as…comical? I don’t know if that’s the right word. But I’m amused by it. I occasionally have moments where thinking about it makes me sad…and maybe it takes a while for that to go away completely.  But I think it’s kind of funny that the situation with him seemed like such a huge deal at the time. It has made me so much tougher and so much more relaxed and so much less likely to tolerate crap from people in all situations.

In the past six months, I have gone from rock bottom to working at a wonderful job that pays me well. I have my own place. I have new friends. I still talk daily with my friends living in Korea. I know that the chain of crappy events that led to where I am were all for the better. The next time I’m depressed about something, all I have to do is remember that I don’t get panic attacks these days and then glance in a mirror and remind myself that I think I look pretty darn good.