Help me get a service dog
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Thanks to all the people that helped and shared! It means a lot to me!
My name is Piera and I suffer from severe depression, complex post traumatic stress disorder and multiple anxiety disorders (social anxiety, test anxiety and panic disorder).
Growing up I experienced year long, traumatising childhood abuse that is still lasting till this day. I often have flashbacks or nightmares about those memories.
I love studying and learning new things, but with my mental disorders school does way more to my mental health than just drain my energy. Just thinking about the people there makes me anxious. I have multiple panic attacks every day that can last up to several hours. It´s not rare that I have to run out of class because I hyperventilate and start panicking. Things like raising my hand to ask a question, or simply the teacher mentioning my name already causes panic attacks.
Besides that, I study hours for every single test and exam I have in school, but I get a blackout during all of them. That means I know the things I studied before and after the test, but during I get so anxious that I forget all of it.
My social anxiety can also make life really hard for me. I´m absolutely terrified at the thought of talking to strangers. What others might think of me is something I worry about every day. I will sit in class, burning to ask a question but be completely unable to, usually, I will ask the person next to me and they raise their hand and get the credit for their good participation in class. The same situation happens when the teacher asks a question and I know the answer, I will mumble it under my breath, my classmate hears it and answers, even though they didn´t know the answer at first. This makes me completely miserable and I wish I´d be brave enough to just raise my hand.
I also experience dissociations daily. Dissociations feel kind of like zoning out for me, just way more intense. I also get tics and my arms or legs start twitching during those episodes, they can last a really long time and afterwards I don't remember any of it. I also lose my orientation and get extremely confused, meaning when I get an episode outside of my house I will have no idea where I am or how to get home.
Sometimes I get really bad dissociative seizures where I fall to the ground and my whole body starts twitching and jerking uncontrollably. These seizures look kind of like epileptic seizures but are psychogenic.
I am completely unable of living a normal life. I always need someone I trust around me or I can´t leave the house without having panic attacks. A service dog would help me be more independent. You wonder how? Here are just a few things a service dog can do to help me:
· notice when I will have a panic attack or dissociation even before I know myself, that way I can prepare for the episode and try to minimise it
· calm me down during a panic attack
· ground me during a dissociative episode and bring me back to reality
· keep strangers at a distance
· guide me out of the room when I´m having a panic attack
· make me aware of my nervous tics
· give me a feeling of safety in crowds
· wake me up from nightmares
· be a reliable companion in difficult situations
However, the training is extremely expensive, and as a full-time student, I can´t afford it on my own, so every help and support I can get on here means the world to me! Every cent helps, and if you can´t donate please share! The service dog will be trained by the animal training center near Graz in Austria, you can find more about them here:
http://www.animaltrainingcenter.at/
If you don't have a credit card but want to donate anyway you can also send me your donation via PayPal:
Thanks to all the people that helped and shared! It means a lot to me!
My name is Piera and I suffer from severe depression, complex post traumatic stress disorder and multiple anxiety disorders (social anxiety, test anxiety and panic disorder).
Growing up I experienced year long, traumatising childhood abuse that is still lasting till this day. I often have flashbacks or nightmares about those memories.
I love studying and learning new things, but with my mental disorders school does way more to my mental health than just drain my energy. Just thinking about the people there makes me anxious. I have multiple panic attacks every day that can last up to several hours. It´s not rare that I have to run out of class because I hyperventilate and start panicking. Things like raising my hand to ask a question, or simply the teacher mentioning my name already causes panic attacks.
Besides that, I study hours for every single test and exam I have in school, but I get a blackout during all of them. That means I know the things I studied before and after the test, but during I get so anxious that I forget all of it.
My social anxiety can also make life really hard for me. I´m absolutely terrified at the thought of talking to strangers. What others might think of me is something I worry about every day. I will sit in class, burning to ask a question but be completely unable to, usually, I will ask the person next to me and they raise their hand and get the credit for their good participation in class. The same situation happens when the teacher asks a question and I know the answer, I will mumble it under my breath, my classmate hears it and answers, even though they didn´t know the answer at first. This makes me completely miserable and I wish I´d be brave enough to just raise my hand.
I also experience dissociations daily. Dissociations feel kind of like zoning out for me, just way more intense. I also get tics and my arms or legs start twitching during those episodes, they can last a really long time and afterwards I don't remember any of it. I also lose my orientation and get extremely confused, meaning when I get an episode outside of my house I will have no idea where I am or how to get home.
Sometimes I get really bad dissociative seizures where I fall to the ground and my whole body starts twitching and jerking uncontrollably. These seizures look kind of like epileptic seizures but are psychogenic.
I am completely unable of living a normal life. I always need someone I trust around me or I can´t leave the house without having panic attacks. A service dog would help me be more independent. You wonder how? Here are just a few things a service dog can do to help me:
· notice when I will have a panic attack or dissociation even before I know myself, that way I can prepare for the episode and try to minimise it
· calm me down during a panic attack
· ground me during a dissociative episode and bring me back to reality
· keep strangers at a distance
· guide me out of the room when I´m having a panic attack
· make me aware of my nervous tics
· give me a feeling of safety in crowds
· wake me up from nightmares
· be a reliable companion in difficult situations
However, the training is extremely expensive, and as a full-time student, I can´t afford it on my own, so every help and support I can get on here means the world to me! Every cent helps, and if you can´t donate please share! The service dog will be trained by the animal training center near Graz in Austria, you can find more about them here:
http://www.animaltrainingcenter.at/
If you don't have a credit card but want to donate anyway you can also send me your donation via PayPal:
Organizer
Piera Sussitz
Organizer
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