Anxiety Therapy
Anxiety, Whether It Appears As Constant Worry Or Occasional Restlessness, Can Be Treated
Do you find yourself avoiding social situations because they make you uncomfortable? Are you worried about things that either a) are objectively going okay or b) you have no control over? Do you essentially function well but find yourself keyed-up or on edge a lot of the time? Are you having a hard time enjoying yourself, even in safe, ordinary situations? Perhaps you’re stress eating, experiencing a loss of appetite, or isolating yourself from the outside world.
In whatever way it manifests, anxiety can make you feel as if you are living in a constricted world with limited options for happiness. The increased irritability and avoidant behaviors that often accompany anxiety can complicate relationships, sabotage careers, and prevent you from achieving long-term goals.
Anxiety can also cause physical symptoms. For instance, you may be experiencing body sensations, such as a rapid heart rate, nausea, shallow breathing, sweaty palms, aches, and eye fatigue. Anxiety even has the power to rob you of your executive abilities to focus, organize, and make sound decisions.
If stress and anxiety are preventing you from living the life you want, it might be time to get more support. I work with people to help them make positive changes by managing fear and cultivating a sense of safety that can create healthy patterns of response to the world. I help people identify and reduce anxious patterns and gain the clarity and skills needed to step out of the negative feedback loop of fear and doubt.
Anxiety Affects Countless Individuals Worldwide
Anxiety is one of the most common and well-researched mental health issues in the world. It impacts people of all religions, cultures, and races—and it is becoming ever more prevalent.
One of the reasons for this uptick is that we rely increasingly on digital companionship. Cell phones, social media, and streaming content put us in 24-hour contact with the world when our psyches aren’t built to endure that kind of exposure. It’s getting harder and harder to clock out of work, turn off the news, and ignore all the likes and tweets. Moreover, we are constantly exposed to toxic messages from our culture.
Witnessing such turmoil and unrest makes it hard to feel stable and secure. There are many experiences that contribute to anxious thought and behavior patterns. One potent source of anxiety is our family histories, which can impact our response to the world in ways we aren’t even conscious of. In addition to anxiety that may result from transgenerational patterns, early childhood events can have a lasting impact because, when we are young, we’re most susceptible to the imprint of environments and relationships. Compounding childhood and generational factors are rhythms of daily life that involve loss, change, challenge, threat, fear, and uncertainty.
Our nervous system has two major stress responses. One is to go into fight-or-flight mode, which in the extreme can feel like a panic attack. This response can include out-of-control rage, violent behavior, being jumpy much of the time, difficulty sleeping, or feeling irritable, among other behaviors. The other is to drop into a frozen state, akin to playing dead or being immobilized by fear. This can include apathy, loss of interest, exhaustion, aches and pains, or numbness, among other things.
Between the two ends of the stress response continuum is optimal stress—the level of stress at which an individual functions most productively and efficiently. Finding the balance within this continuum can be hard for individuals to strike on their own, and everyone has their own sweet spot.
Fortunately, you can learn how to become aware of your unique stress and anxiety patterns, take stock of what is real, and transform your anxiety into a positive force for change.
Anxiety Therapy Can Help You Find Peace
For many who are struggling with anxiety, the constant intrusion of negativity and fear can easily become habitual. Counseling for anxiety helps interrupt that problematic feedback loop. It gives you an ally who can help you slow down your automatic responses, identify triggers and patterns you may not see, and examine the link between how you feel and how you think.
In a space where you can feel safe and comfortable, we’ll begin by looking at what is fueling your anxiety and how it is affecting your life. Usually, there isn’t just one thing driving anxiety. There may be one main culprit, but it is often a confluence of factors: work, relationships, past experiences, or a genetic predisposition. Together, we’ll consider how life stressors are impacting relationship problems, acts of self-sabotage, or behaviors, such as substance use, that you may be experiencing. In time, you will be able to easily identify the sources of your suffering, rendering anxiety something definable and manageable.
My treatment strategy is always informed by the unique stressors and concerns of the individual. I offer an approach to healing tailored to your preferences and needs and can include the use of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), mindfulness, and somatic, body-oriented therapies for tracking and working with bodily sensations that may be informing your anxiety.
Most people who are coping with anxiety are quietly living in survival mode, hoping to make it through the next life event. A foundational goal in my work with you is to help you gain the awareness to cut through the fear and doubt so you can better manage your anxiety and stress. With the insight, skills, and strategies I offer, your symptoms can diminish and you can live a richer, fuller life.
I have been considering anxiety therapy for a while, but I still have some reservations…
I don’t want to give up the coping strategies that have kept me afloat this long.
Habitual behaviors and survival mechanisms, no matter how faulty, may be hard to let go of. However, anxiety counseling can help you manage overwhelming stress and change unhealthy coping mechanisms and support beneficial strategies that have served you thus far. Once you understand the relationship between anxious thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, you will be more capable of handling future stress in a healthy, resilient way.
What if I’m resistant to making a change?
The purpose of therapy is to get to the core of your suffering and treat it directly, as opposed to merely treating your symptoms. With greater awareness, you can gain greater control over the stressors that drive you to engage in limiting behaviors or fall into self-destructive patterns of substance abuse, overeating, or other harmful acts.
In order for change to stick, it has to occur at a pace that works for you. I understand that the things that bring you comfort serve a purpose. I will help you recognize unhealthy choices and take steps that are manageable and support an integrated lifestyle change. Where it makes sense, I will offer you emotional self-regulation tools for dealing with anxiety that will benefit your health in the long run.
I think this is just the way I am.
One of the hallmarks of anxiety is its ability to affect our identity, beliefs, and behaviors, all of which are intrinsically linked. People create self-protective narratives that become so habitual they forget about them—the stories become the water they swim in. In this way, the notion that “this is just the way I am” evolves into something real and painful.
My goal is to help you gently challenge distorted views of yourself and the world to reveal a new perspective. I can offer you real-world tools and exercises that will help you move past fear and doubt, improve your interaction with others, and prove that you are more than your limiting thoughts.
You Can Take Control Of Your Emotions
If you are living with anxiety and looking for stress relief or someone who can help you understand the effects of anxiety, I encourage you to reach out. Please call 608-561-8821 to set up your free 15-minute phone consultation to see how anxiety therapy can help you.