How Exercise Saved My Life

对于你们中那些可能不知道我我的名字是全方位的an Owens. I work at Fitness Together-Central Georgetown in a dual role as the director of social media marketing/fitness coach. In January of 2017 I was diagnosed with severe anxiety and depression. I feel that it’s important to give the background story first. Without any context the title would be a little confusing! In hopes of ending the stigma surrounding anxiety/depression, I felt that it was necessary to tell my story about how exercise saved my life.

2017 was actually one of the best years of my life. I had accomplished my lifelong goal of playing professional baseball. In September of 2017 I had just finished my first professional season. It was a season full of major accomplishments in my own life and I was so proud to finally say that I was a pro!

Upon returning home from that season I went straight back to school at Mount St. Mary’s University where I was to finish my last year of the MBA program while also serving as the volunteer assistant coach for my alma mater. All of the events that were happening in my life were great and it really felt like things were coming together.

Everything changed January 5^thof 2017. On a plane ride home from a family trip to Las Vegas I started to feel very nervous while on the plane. I had never had issues flying before, however this particular flight was extremely turbulent and I was clutching the armrest pretty tight the entire time. I was relieved to get off the plane, but while my family and I were walking to the baggage claim I began to feel my heart race out of control, my vision went black, and I luckily grabbed my Dad’s arm before collapsing. I immediately started to go into an uncontrollable crying fit (a symptom of anxiety that I would learn about later) fueled by the most debilitating fear I had ever felt. Little did I know this was the first panic attack that I’d ever experienced. Over the next couple of days my condition worsened to the point where I was getting panic attacks every time I would get off the couch. I was couch locked for 2 days before I could even muster enough strength to see a doctor. The diagnosis was very clearly an anxiety disorder due to a chemical imbalance. I was promptly put on a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) to combat the panic attacks and other meds to help me sleep.

The meds did help. I was no longer experiencing panic attacks, however my anxiety disorder had altered. Having anxiety feels like an elephant is sitting on your chest at all times. While this elephant is sitting on your chest you get uncontrollable fear. This fear isn’t even rational. You just think around every corner the worst possible thing is going to happen. It’s an awful feeling. However, it isn’t so much of a mental battle. The real mental battle began when my condition altered into pure depression. I can’t begin to try and tell you how much more awful depression is than anxiety. These issues, although similar in nature, affect the body and mind in very different ways.

My depression symptoms began around August of 2017 when I was finishing my final professional baseball season. Although my depression was short lived the physical and mental symptoms were incredibly intense. Instead of having physical symptoms like anxiety, the symptoms were mental first and then physical later. I used to think depression was just feeling sad and you could just stop it at any point by just thinking happy thoughts like Peter Pan. I couldn’t understand why these depressed people couldn’t just be happy! It was maddening to me until I had it. Then I finally understood. Depression doesn’t let you feel happiness. Depression doesn’t let you feel anything other than utter sadness. It’s the most disheartening feeling when you begin to lose your purpose in life and can’t understand why you even belong on this earth. I started to spiral and my thoughts began to drift to the different ways I could take my own life…

This is when I got help. And if this is the only thing anyone takes away from this blog is to ask for help. Tell someone. It’s incredibly scary because you don’t want to be the person who has to tell someone that you’re thinking about killing yourself. However, this is exactly what I did. I can remember calling my Mom and breaking down saying that I was having suicidal thoughts and if not addressed I was going to act. I didn’t want to kill myself. I want to make this extremely clear. But when you have depression and you are in the grips of it, killing yourself seems like the only logical thing to do. Your mind is sick and even irrational thoughts start to seem rational.

I consider this moment the moment where everything started to turn around for me. Being in such a low place let me reflect on every aspect of my life. For the longest time I was trying to be someone I wasn’t. I was trying so hard to be this macho, professional baseball player dude. But really I was just a broken person like the millions of others who suffer from anxiety/depression.

From this broken state I began to rebuild. I was put back on meds for depression, however I still didn’t feel myself. Let me preface this by saying I’m not a doctor, but selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI’s) and depression/anxiety medications can help. However, the side effects of prolonged use of these medications are known to be awful. I won’t go into specific detail, but for me the worst part of the medications was feeling no emotion. I went from feeling the most intense depression to now not being able to feel anything at all.

From this point on I decided to take my anxiety and depression disorder into my own hands. I wanted to find a way to get myself off of these meds. I didn’t want to rely on medication and I wanted to be fully myself again. I began to do extensive research on anxiety and depression. I looked into every nook and cranny. I listened to just about every podcast, read extensively, and Googled nightly. What I came back with was so simple. It was so simple that I missed it. Exercise. All you have to do is type into Google: depression and exercise. The results you’ll find will be legitimate, medical studies done on exercise and depression. Once again, I’m not going to go into detail, but the scientific research is out and the results are conclusive. Exercise can cure depression. And if not completely cure, then significantly ease symptoms.

The issue I was having with depression was that I had no motivation to get up, let alone exercise. Depression is very similar to anxiety in that it severely debilitates your ability to exercise. You feel constant exhaustion, lack of motivation, and ultimately find no point to even leaving the house.

因为我不能鳍d the motivation to leave my house I pulled up YouTube and discovered all the free yoga classes available. I was trying to find ways to ease myself back into exercise without exerting myself to extreme fatigue. Yoga should be a mandated medicine for those suffering with anxiety/depression in my opinion. Because it was the first time I began to learn effective breathing techniques (diaphragmatic breathing) as well as how to use my breath to stay in the present moment. So much of anxiety and depression stems from worrying about the future or reliving the sadness from past events. Yoga and conscious breathing allowed me to control the present moment and learn to live life moment-to-moment rather than constantly worrying about things that have yet to happen or have already passed.

Because I was able to complete short, 10-15 minute yoga classes I felt comfortable progressing to weight training and cardio training again. Once again I started extremely slow, but because of yoga, I felt comfortable with exercising again. However I began to look at exercise different. Exercising was now my medicine. The endorphin release I was feeling from this constant exercise and movement was profound. I could feel that exercise was fundamentally changing the way I viewed the world.

现在一些可能会叫我锻炼溃败ine rigorous, but being a former athlete, I’m always looking to push my limits physically. Consistently pushing your limits in both weight training and cardio training is extremely important for learning how to control the breath under intense bodily stress. In fact saunas and ice baths have the same effect for learning to control the breath under stress, but that’s another blog post (wink wink).

I’ll do 30-45 minutes of yoga every morning upon waking, bike 2.5 miles to and from work, and weight train 3-4 times per week. In addition to all of this I find walking to be extremely meditative. I tried meditation and was able to get a lot of benefits from it, but for me meditation wasn’t quite active enough. It was my therapist who actually introduced me to the idea of walking meditation. I try to walk at least 1-2 miles per day in nature. Walking, and particularly walking in nature, can also have profound effects on your physical and mental well-being.

Now how did exercise save my life? Well I’m extremely proud to say that I took myself off of my depression medications and I no longer suffer from anxiety/depression. I’m not trying to tell anyone to stop his or her medications or therapy sessions. This decision was made in constant consultation with my doctor and therapist, however I wanted to prove to them and to myself that I could be medication free.

We often forget the powerful effects that exercise has, not only on our bodies, but our minds as well. Because anxiety and depression are becoming so common in today’s day and age I feel that it’s necessary not only to share my story, but the story of how powerful consistent exercise can be. For anyone suffering from depression please take the time to research this for yourself. Meet with your doctor/therapist/support system and get a plan in place that includes exercise in addition to medication or therapy. I put no quotes or references in this on purpose.

Take the time today to do a little research for yourself. Maybe you have depression and anxiety and feel how I felt. Maybe you’re looking for a reason to start exercising. Exercise can save your life, just like it saved mine.

I’d just like to take the time to personally thank God, my family, friends, girlfriend, amazing coworkers at Fitness Together, and our fearless leader Stacy Adams. Without all of you I wouldn’t be where I am today!

Thank you for reading!

-Ryan Owens