Anxiety (1)

.Anxiety is an emotion that behaves as a warning sign. And that can be VERY helpful. It means that if I'm crossing the road, I'm going to look both ways so I can be safer. It makes my heart beat a little bit faster, moves the blood from my stomach to my extremities, increases my alertness, makes me breathe a bit faster so I'm primed to notice and move quickly if an unexpected car comes whizzing round the corner. And when I get to the other side, everything in my body goes back to normal because the danger is no longer there.

However, sometimes our body doesn't get the message that the danger is over and the 'off' button becomes problematic. What does this mean in real life?

We may stay on high-alert, always watching out for the danger that could be lurking around the corner, even though we can't always put our finger on what the danger might be.  This is called hypervigilance.

Or maybe the symptoms of anxiety are triggered by something that is relatively small because our body is so highly attuned to potential danger.  This is hypersensitivity.

Why does it happen? Anxiety can come from many different places, so it isn’t always simple to identify the cause. Trauma, PTSD, stress, some medications, and various physical or psychological conditions can all increase the likelihood of anxiety showing up in ways that feel overwhelming or unhelpful, instead of just offering the usual safety signals.

What can we do about it?

Symptom Management
We can learn how to manage the symptoms of anxiety. For example, slowing down our breathing sends a message to our brain that this is not a high alert situation that requires us to breathe faster.  And that can sometimes be enough to send the 'stand down!' message to other parts of our body that are reacting as if we are in danger.  

Building Tolerance
We can identify the levels of distress that we are able to tolerate without needing to even manage our symptoms. Through careful, sensitive work with a trained counsellor, these levels can change over time. For example, someone with a phobia of spiders may not be able to be in the same room as a spider at the start of treatment, but at the end of treatment they can be in the same room, or even manage to move the spider back to the wild!

Understand our Anxiety
Sometimes we need to recognise the unhelpful thoughts and beliefs that are behind our anxiety.  Working with a counsellor can help to identify these and explore alternative ways of thinking.  For example, I might believe there is a very high risk of being run over when I cross the road, but after working on this I may reframe the thought. Knowing that I am taking all the steps that I can to lower the risk of being run over, and weighing up all the evidence for the many times I have crossed the road without being run over, can help to reduce my anxiety levels. 

Above all else, if we are experiencing anxiety, we need to be kind to ourselves. There are automatic responses going on in our body that trigger the strong emotions - it isn't that we are a failure, it's just that our body is really good at noticing the triggers and this then sends signals to our brain and our emotions. These are just examples of what we can do about  anxiety, provided to give hope that anxiety does not have to take over our lives. 

If you want to find out more or explore a more personalised approach to working with your own anxiety, get in touch using the contact form here.