NORTHERN CALIFORNIA — Cartoonist Gemma Correll this month released the graphic memoir Anxietyland through Gallery Books, recounting a week-long panic attack she experienced in 2018 and her lifelong struggle with anxiety. The book opens when Correll goes to the hospital and traces her relationship with anxiety back to her childhood.

During the 2018 panic attack in her Northern California neighborhood, Correll tried long walks, meditation apps, magnesium, and liquor to calm her nervous system. She lay on the ground in the fetal position to try to calm down, lay awake at night, and gagged at the sight of food. She ignored work deadlines because she could not get her eyes to focus.

Correll told her husband she needed to go to the hospital, and he agreed to take her. She later sought care at an outpatient mental health clinic to learn coping strategies, where she learned that her symptoms were identified as Anxiety and Panic Disorder. She learned coping methods, established friendships, and started medication.

The memoir covers Correll's life from childhood through adulthood. Since childhood, she experienced a feeling she calls "The Bad Feeling," depicted in the book as a sickly pink blob with sharp teeth, mean eyes, and claws. She illustrates The Bad Feeling kicking her when she is told she is over-sensitive, shy, or a freak.

As a youth, she struggled to fit in, make friends, and feel safe. As a young adult, she tried therapy without success and used alcohol and work to suppress her anxiety. The memoir also describes her being hypervigilant about keeping her cat Oliver safe from various dangers.

Anxietyland depicts theme park rides including the Emotional Roller Coaster, the Worry-Go-Round, and the House of No Fun. Clowns appear in the book and are shown coming from a therapist's office. In a passage addressed to her child self, Correll writes, "You can't get rid of it entirely, but you can learn to cope."