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Personally, I've always dealt with anxiety and panic attacks. They've never been too terrible, and not overly constant in my life, but enough to know it's squatting like a naughty toad somewhere inside of me, waiting to emerge and cause a bit of an uproar.

It had been over a year since I've had a full blown panic attack, but about two weeks ago I had one, seemingly out of the blue and with no real pin-pointable reason. It scared me. It made me begin to question whether or not how sane I am. How stable and how whole I am, as a person.

I made the decision to go talk to a counselor for the first time ever, and we covered a bunch of stuff during my session, but one thing that has been standing out to me today, is when she asked me about my interest in dating and a real long term relationship. They way she posed the question to me, was do I worry about how other perceive me? Do I want to be seen by others (romantically)?

When I've thought about before, I've always been pretty neutral on the subject. Sort of believing I could take it or leave it. But today my brain (scrambled as it is from being prodded) has yielded another response: yes, I'd like to be liked/perceived/wanted by someone else.

It's flattering to be wanted. It makes you feel like you're worth something - like who you are isn't a waste. Perhaps this is why (even though my overall interest in dating hasn't been strong) why it's disappointing when someone I think I'd like to be with or could be with, is already with someone else and therefore, not going to be interested in me.

How we see ourselves and the image we project is important to ourselves. I think we strive to make ourselves desirable. I think it's human nature to want to be wanted. Even for me.