[tony229c]

I am a 22 year old law student in his first year, and I have been having trouble making the adjustment from college to the 'real world' so far. Since at least September I have been having anxiety attacks whenever I can't remember something. The problem is that the things I'm trying to remember are trivial or completely useless. For example, I will hear a snippet of a song and suddenly I will have to know what song it is, or something will remind me of a childhood cartoon or a scene from a movie, and I will struggle to remember it to the point that I have an anxiety attack. This was largely manageable until one day in December when I heard a man having a conversation on the subway, and I felt this burning need to know what the rest of his conversation was when he got off. So, I followed him for a minute or two, then got a hold of myself and left. I had a huge anxiety attack about this that day. The problem is that I keep thinking to myself 'I'm never going to know what he was talking about, and I'll never be able to find him ever again'. I genuinely don't care who he is or what he is doing with his life, but for some reason the 'not knowing' is killing me. I wake up every morning and wonder 'is this going to be the day I stop thinking about him?' I also keep trying to 'fix' myself through hypnosis to forget or by googling what I think is wrong with me. How do I get this obsessive thinking to stop? I've had bad experiences in the past, like breakups and deaths in the family and I've been able to move on from those just fine. Am I crazy?

The other half is that I feel guilty for feeling this way. I mean, I literally saw a guy in the subway and freaked out. I didn't go to war or see a car accident or watch a loved one die or any of that. It's just such a mundane thing that I almost think I'm making it all up.

[Open Eyes]

Hi tony229c, welcome to PC and the PTSD forum. Have you ever seen a therapist?

It sounds like you over hear a conversation and get involved with it and want to finish hearing it and get very upset when you don't know the conclusion of whatever the discussion is about. I am wondering what might be in your history where you needed to have a conclusion about something and did not get it. It could be overhearing your parents arguing about something and you never got to hear the entire conversation and something upsetting happened that affected you deeply and at this point you developed a trigger when things like that happen.

I don't think you are "crazy", but I think it would help you to get to the bottom of "why" this kind of scenario stresses you so much.