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“Are you high? Have those pills kicked in already?” “You are battling chronic anxiety and depression and your solution is to go live on an island for 6 months?” My friend gave voice to what I had been obsessing about every minute for the last few days. I had applied for that scholarship before everything started and when I was told that I had been accepted, I was already hitting rock bottom. Going abroad for the first time ever didn’t seem like a sensible decision, especially at that time. When I got on the plane to Tenerife, I must confess, I was heavily sedated; I had taken a generous amount of valerian, linden, and passionflower just to name a few. I had so many different types of plants going through my veins that I was practically a walking botanical garden. So, the image of my first flight is still hazy, but one thing that stayed imprinted in my mind is the landing. Once the descend started, we entered a curtain of clouds that made the experience even more chilling because of the turbulences and lack of vision. When we got through it, I saw the houses scattered around so close to the runway that it made me think we were landing in someone’s yard. Later, I found out that this is one of the worst airports to land on due to its position and the legends that surround it. ‘The biggest disaster in the history of aviation,’ as the locals call it, speaks volumes. Well, that gruesome fear was the first step towards my healing. Once I set foot on Spanish ground, I was so thankful for being alive that I momentarily forgot about my anxiety. So, the bus trip from the plane to the gate of the airport went by without the normal gut-wrenching panic attack and faint feeling. Normally, taking the bus was a torturing process that involved tormenting myself about it for three or four hours in advance. Then, once I was on it, I would start sweating, my heart would start pumping out of my chest and there was this knot in my throat that I would just struggle to push down but never managed to. And after a maximum of 10 minutes, I would get off the bus and walk for the rest of the distance to get to my destination. The anxiety that followed came as no surprise. If you know anything about the north of the island, you know that it’s a mountainous area with curves and dangerous, narrow streets. As you can imagine, my first bus trip had all the chances of following the same pattern, especially since the curves made my stomach churn. But I wanted to see the highest volcano in Spain, Teide, and getting off at the next stop was not an option. To reach the cable car, you had to go through narrow roads and apocalyptic surroundings. The lady next to me kept glancing at me occasionally, with a puzzled look on her face, torn between wanting to help and choosing another seat. ‘Are you all right darling? You seem in pain’. ‘No….umm……I’m fine.’ That was the maximum I could articulate without breaking down crying. I knew for a fact that I came off as rude because of my crippling anxiety. But it didn’t matter. You see, when you have a panic attack nothing stays the same anymore. You watch helplessly how everything around you swirls into the unknown. These attacks are the perfect silent soldiers that scar your inside without leaving visible marks on the outside. You look normal but you don’t act like it. When the bus stopped its engine and we went off, my body seemed like a bag of mush. No energy left to move as it had all been used up during the journey. I stepped on the rocky soil and looked around. There were no familiar faces to witness my success, but I felt so blessed that I immediately began sobbing. It was at that moment that I knew the power was in me all along. And traveling was the way to set it loose.