Crippling Anxiety

LegacyUser

Hi guys,

I suffer from crippling anxiety. If I have a one-night stand, even though its ALWAYS protected 100%, I worry about STD's. I mean, I get stomach pains from thinking about it so much.

If friends of mine say something, I always take it the wrong way, and worry,but they are always joking.

I applied for a medical card,and I am praying that it comes through. But until then, how can I deal with my anxieties?

Mr. Loverman

I used to suffer from anxiety attacks about certain things, similar to yourself.

I dealt with it by drawing two columns on a piece of paper:

Things I can change | Things I can't change

I would then put the thing I was worried about in its relevant column. It nearly always ended up in things I can't change!

I would then keep the piece of paper in my pocket and look at it anytime I got anxious.

It worked for me, cause it was a written reminder it's out of my control so there's no point worrying about it.

Try to remember life is a bit of a game so worrying about things is pointless.

Best of luck!

Shelga

Don't have one night stands?

LegacyUser

This is called health anxiety and affects a lot of people. Avoiding one night stands can be impossible. You might think you know someone really well and then they decide to stop talking to you after having sex. This happens. You need to realise (but not over-indulge) that most STDS, while bothersome, are completely curable. This doesn't mean you should take risks, but you should ease your mind. No point worrying about that. Also, challenge your worrying thoughts with logic. Your thoughts seem to be "If I get an STD I won't be able to cope with the embarassment or the physical damage it could to". Chances are you would be able to cope and you would be able to get better again in certain circumstances.

If this becomes an issue where you're anxious about anxiety it's time to step in and get yourself to a doctor. Anxiety is a normal human emotion and shouldn't be 'controlled' though anti-depressants. Get yourself to a CBT counselor that your doctor suggests. She/ he will challenge your worrisome nature and give you peace of mind but to remain sensible in this area.

superhero87

ya iv been in the same boat for a year or two heavily now, but its was going on a lot longer than that, used to smoke a lot of cannabis, making me think thats all it was, so i would of had it for years to some degree and not really knowing it.% again, **** it want to nip this in the bud, no point prolonging it with booze.

Best advice iv heard came from here (http://www.anxietynomore.co.uk/the_book.html), below are are a few of the pages i copy and pasted on word printing them out, and carrying them around with me when i was interailing this summer for a month, it would have been so though if i wasnt following this advice, i havent looked into the book yer man is selling but going on this information it looks very promising AT LAST A LIFE;invite them in the lose there power, your mind needs a rest, found this hard to believe but noticed an effect after a few days, get proper sleep, and eat healthy too, food list in info below this info tells you not to fight the thoughts your having, to see them as what they are, anxiety, let them come in no matter how crazy they seem, they will lose there power. another book i found helpful was PEACE OF BODY PEACE OF MIND it also tells you to move towards your fears "facing discomfort brings comfort"(as unlikly as it seems)

treat negative thoughts as theories rather fact, and put them on trail kind of with rational evidence to lessen there effect(can be impossable at times) this is cbt(cognitive behavioural therapy) downloaded a self help book on this before, found it very helpful(self help for dummies) , also downloaded and tried a few guided meditations, might take a while to find the right one for you
i use a self esteem one for the mornings an one to help me sleep at night, also found a video on youtube called "tapping" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r7OZwhcqxY which is good if you have the time, its very odd, mixture of meditation and well tapping.


downloaded (for free shuusssh) the charles linden method, i found helpful for advice but to follow it properly it tells you to stop seeing your therapist, and come back when youve worked through issues, which might be a while for me, main bit i got out of it so far was to use a distraction, eg writing, become apart of a drama group(dont have to get on stage, learning lines and acting practise is enough) organize something, personally i act in amature plays an i did find that it was a release, but id only be in a play every couple of months so i didnt get a great help out of it,

writing on the other hand i love, and the best hing about is that to become a better writer to need to practice like a mother****er, write a book, look online for creative writing prompts, no one evn has to read them but it frees yours mind a bit, also writing out negative thoughts can help you see them in a different light, helping you to figure out situations, as writing is governed by a different part of the brain than speaking, it can give clearer thoughts than an anxious mind, i have taken to carrying a little notepad around with me, to jot down memoirs or what not, also great for a google list, charles linden says that anxiety disorders come from the mind not been challenged enough, if it has no food it will start to make its own( replaying social situations and such).


cleaning doing the dishes can give a little boost, also try being a bit zen living in the moment, like when your walking around notice the feel of everything, your feat on the ground when you walk, the smells you get, how cold is it. while eating take the time to really taste the food(mindful eating) when im really bad just counting things around me can help, doin multiplacation, keep the mind active, **** like su doko would be go to do when on the bus.

another book i read(also where i got some of the previously stated info is from irelands own Gareth O Callaghan, and his book "a day called hope" this provided me with great insight, one of his main points is that the best weapon you can have againist depression(this really annoyed me for a while, do i have anxiety or depression? they come hand in hand, i reckon iv had anxiety for so long that it just built up to much which caused me to be depressed not being able to talk to your closest friend, and constantly being wrecked will depress anyone, most treatments for one will work for the other) is information. mr O Callaghan in his recovery( not fight) went back to education, and became a qualified councilor, his book is definatly worth a look, he believes that it is better to try and overcome the situation without medication if a t all possible, a great book and well written, i had it done in under a wk.

music, get the right types around you, uplifting, search and search for the songs that give you a good buzz,( songs i likehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL1cRSRUUZQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jg4ekLG9Zo cant beat a bit o bowie) also one last thing if you are following all the above steps, and are starting to feel better, then one day you find yourself right back at square one, dont give up its a setback, and a part of recovery, keep following the techniques that worked for before(also pick something and stick to it, i found this very hard to do) the steps youve taken before are not lost, just buried under sympthoms again, a setback only has as much power a s you give it, i would be thrilled if this info could help one person.
also would like to know if there is a support group around galway city or people interested in setting one up?












FROM THE WEBSITE ANXIETY NO MORE

Listen to your body
When we first experience anxiety, it is, in most cases because of a period of stress and worry. Our body cannot take any more so it sort of shuts down; it has reached a breaking point and has said enough is enough. This may lead to feelings of anxiousness, feelings of panic, the feelings of detachment. It does not matter what the symptoms are; your body is saying “I can take no more”, which is where the word breakdown comes in, because that is really what it is. Now all your body is asking for is a rest and time to rejuvenate itself. Do we give it that time? No, through no fault of our own, we then worry about these symptoms, worry that we are going mad, wonder why we feel so anxious, so emotionless and this puts more worry and strain on our already tired body. We may begin to feel worse, we tell ourselves we must get a grip of this thing, so we fight it and worry even more. Well I think you can now see why these symptoms persist.
This is exactly what I did for all those years while I suffered. In fact I was worrying because I had been ill for so long and my days were filled with fighting and worry. This is what I am forever telling people. In order to help yourself, do not fight to feel better. Do not worry and obsess about how you feel. You need to give your body the break it so craves.
Embrace nature
Step outside and take a walk, go for a bike ride or a swim. Try not to sit around indulging in self-pity at the way you are feeling. Getting out of the familiar surroundings that you find yourself in every day can refresh your mind and really give it another focus apart from yourself. This is a very good way of helping your thoughts become more outward instead of inward.
Exercise is also one of the best physical stress-reducing techniques available. Exercise not only improves your mental and physical health it also reduces stress. It relaxes tense muscles and can aid sleep. Exercise also burns off all the stress chemicals and creates a release for all the anxiety and worry that can build up in our day.
Just be
Stop fighting your symptoms, tensing against how you feel, trying to push your symptoms away. Don't spend everyday going round in circles trying to figure it all out. This just adds more stress and anxiety to how you feel. Worrying just makes your mind more and more tired, more and more detached from everything around you. If fighting worked you would be cured by now so why not try the opposite. Recovery is never a 'I must rid myself of these feelings', it is all about not doing. Some people try and control how they feel day in, day out, they worry and fight their way through their day, trying to get the better of this thing. Imagine the stress this puts on that person, the body wants and needs a break and it gets the exact opposite. When you go round all day trying to physically and mentally control how you feel, do something about it, keep a grip on yourself, you are doing everything wrong, the exact opposite of what you should do.
However you feel, just accept it. Fighting your symptoms and trying to push them away just adds more tension to your already anxious body, it just adds to your feelings of anxiety and this is why this condition stays with you. You can never hope to recover this way. It is human nature to fight something, it is all we know to do. But with anxiety it is the very last thing you should do.
Embrace your fears
Start to move towards your fears, as you may now know avoidance just does not work. By avoiding you are telling your body you are in danger, this then becomes a learnt behaviour and forms your new habit to run away from how you are feeling.
The best bit of self help advice I was given was "Avoid your fears and they begin to grow, move towards them and they dampen" This may not be easy at times, but this is the way to de-sensitise. Invite your symptoms and fears, shake them by the hand, let them be there. They hate been invited as they have no fear to feed on and this is the very thing that keeps them alive.
Forget the miracle cure
Just like I did, too many people like spend too much time searching for that miracle cure or the new magic pill that is just going to make it all go away instantly, that cure that so many people falsely promise. They also may be convinced they have missed something and that the answer must have eluded them so far. I tried every so called cure available to me, until I realised the cure must come from within. Recovery comes through the correct information and a little patience. The best way to help yourself is not to spend every day trying to rid yourself of how you are feeling, but to be willing to work with the feelings there. This is the way to give your mind and body a break. Worrying and fighting daily just adds to your feelings of anxiety and panic and keeps you in the cycle. Nothing is achieved overnight, but with knowledge, comes less worry, less fear and this helps give your mind and body the time and space it needs to recover. In the end it was a realisation that I had to let recovery come to me and not to spend hours each day chasing it.
Stop the 'What ifs'
Today is a good day to stop the 'What if' thoughts.
What if I never get better?
What if it’s not anxiety, but a different mental problem?
What if my old self is lost forever?
What if there is something else wrong with me, brain tumour?
What if I can't breathe?
What if I have to live like this for the rest of my life?
What if it’s just me that feels like this?
What if I'll never be able to enjoy the things I used to?
Thoughts like this are a waste of time and they usually amount to nothing.
All they do is keep your anxiety alive. All this worrying puts a tremendous burden on your body. Recovery is not about resting the body as much as resting the mind. Thrashing it daily with worrying thoughts only increases your feelings of panic and anxiety. Since recovery, I have found that worrying is the single most useless emotion we have. It serves no purpose whatsoever and is only counter-productive.
The next time you have one of these ' What if ' thoughts, just let it go. It's just your habit to worry - understand this - realise it will serve you no purpose and just let it go.
For more advice and answers visit my Q&A Page
Recovery From Depersonalisation and Derealisation
"Understanding Feelings of Unreality"
Sufferers of Depersonalisation or Derealisation feel divorced from both the world and their own body. Often people who experience depersonalisation claim that life "feels like a dream", things seem unreal, or hazy; some say they feel detached from their surroundings. Another symptom of this condition can be the constant worrying or strange thoughts that people find hard to switch off.
People often say that no matter how hard they try, they don't feel like they can interact with the world around them. They feel a sense of detachment from their surroundings, finding it hard to talk and connect with others. Also they feel no love for the people closest to them and even question if they did a certain task or had a particular conversation. The most upsetting thing is they lose a sense of who they are and can't seem to perceive themselves as being normal.
Depersonalisation is a common and understandable offshoot of the anxiety condition. Before going further into depersonalisation, let me clear up one thing that I get asked often. “No, you are not going mad.” This feeling comes from being constantly worried about your own problems, it is not serious or harmful in any way and has a totally logical explanation. It is temporary and, with patience and understanding, eventually passes like any other symptom.
Depersonalisation occurs with anxiety because you are so used to watching yourself, questioning your illness, day in, day out, that you start to feel detached from the outside world. Your mind has become tired and less resilient through watching and worrying about your symptoms. It has been bombarded with worrying thoughts and becomes fatigued. When our limbs tire, they ache. When our mind tires, we feel these strange feelings of detachment from the world around us, experiencing an almost dreamlike state, convincing ourselves that we are going mad or losing it. You are not; your mind is just so very tired and just craves a rest from all this introspection of oneself.
When people are caught up in the worry cycle, they begin to think deeply and constantly. They study themselves from deep within, checking in and focusing on their symptoms. They may even wake in the morning only to continue this habit, “How do I feel this morning? “I wonder if I will be able to get through today?”. What’s this new sensation I feel?” This may go on all day, exhausting their already tired mind further. This constant checking in and constant assessing of their symptoms then becomes a habit. The more they worry and obsess about how they are feeling, the more detached they feel, which in turn has them worrying and obsessing even more, the outside world now takes up little of their attention, they are just so concerned about themselves.
All this worry is bound to make your mind feel dull and unresponsive. You are so concerned about how you feel, that you are letting nothing else into your day. Is it any wonder you have come to feel so distanced and detached from your surroundings? Is it any wonder you find it so hard to concentrate? Some people, when studying for exams for hours on end, reach the point where they can no longer take information in, so they take a break and carry on the day after. For you, there are no breaks and no time outs.
What a lot of people don’t know is that depersonalisation can occur in people without anxiety or panic issues. This can occur when someone has lost a loved one, been involved in an accident or maybe a recent shock. It is the body’s way of protecting you from all the worry or hurt you maybe feeling, like a safety valve and it is there to protect you. This is normally temporary and when, say, the person grieving overcomes some of the hurt, the depersonalisation will fade. The trouble with anxiety is that people suffering have a tendency to worry and the depersonalisation comes along to protect you from all this stress and daily worry. People can then feel detached, empty or emotionless. What happens then is that people begin to worry and obsess over this new feeling, thinking it's something serious or they are going mad. They may even forget their anxiety and focus solely on this new feeling which can lead to these feelings increasing. The unreality grows as we enter a cycle of worry and fear and so your body protects you from these feelings of unreality even more, making you feel more distanced and detached than ever. It is the very worry and fear over this feeling that keeps you in the cycle.
The way to move forward out of depersonalisation is not to worry and obsess about it, but to work with it there; to give it as much space as it needs and not be too impressed by it. See it as your body protecting you and not a sign that something terrible is happening or that you are going mad. This symptom is like any other and the more you worry or obsess about it, the bigger the problem can become and the longer you stay in the cycle. Below is one of many emails I receive from people who were convinced they would never find a way out of this condition.
Hi there Paul! I just wanted to thank you for your book. After countless Doctor's visits I still never knew what I suffered from until I found your website!! I have suffered with really bad anxiety for the last year following a panic attack I had back in February. After buying your book for the 1st time back in November and following your advice I am making strides every day to recover. I suffered from depersonalization and bizarre scary thoughts. The depersonalisation was so frightening and no one ever explained to me what it was until your book. When the thoughts would come I would try so hard to fight them and then I would think….Oh My Gosh....why am I thinking this and it would create more anxiety and feelings of detachment. I saw a Social Worker for 6 months and she let me suffer for so long without one explanation of my symptoms, I honestly and truly thought this was me forever. With your book I am getting better everyday.......the depersonalisation is gone and now I am working on these crazy thoughts!! God Bless you and thanks for writing this book.
Kind Regards
Janet
I took some convincing that this was just an off-shoot of anxiety at the time when I was suffering, I thought this must be more serious. I now know that I was just in the habit of watching myself all day and was so concerned about how I felt and how I could get better, I had no interest in the outside world; my condition consumed me. I was living my life while at the same time watching myself and doing neither very well. I felt so detached that I could not read a book or follow a conversation. It was like taking part in some sort of movie, having to act my way through the day. I just could not connect with people or anything outside of my own little world.
This symptom, like many others, relies on your fear of it to keep it alive and this is the symptom I have been asked about more than any other over the years. I do go into far more detail in my book and explain how I was able to recover from this harmless yet disturbing symptom. This condition can really fool people into thinking it is something far worse than it really is. I myself found this feeling of detachment very hard to accept and understand, but when it was explained to me in full, in time I was able to rid myself of this symptom of anxiety.
Worrying, Racing, Disturbing Thoughts
Worrying, racing thoughts is the one symptom with anxiety that can bother people the most; they do not understand how they can have such thoughts that seem so scary and come with such impact. I have heard people say they fear the beginning of O.C.D or that they have awful thoughts about those closest to them, feel that they are ‘going mad’ and that they cannot control these disturbing thoughts, they seem to come without them even thinking them. Well these do have an explanation and these worrying, disturbing thoughts really are just an off-shoot of anxiety.
The reason you seem to have your attention on yourself all day and it feels like there are many thoughts running through your mind is twofold.
1. It is all the confusion about how you feel. Your mind spends all day looking for answers and trying to find a way out of this hell. Some people may even stay up all night, reflecting on the whole day and trying to figure everything out.
Eventually, thinking just becomes automatic, it becomes a habit. All day, every day, these thoughts seem to enter your head before you even think them. Look at it this way, when people meditate, they stop thinking for hours on end, until it becomes a habit and they can go all day without a worrying thought, which is why they feel so refreshed. Not you, your thoughts just carry on and on and when your mind is tired, like it is now, it grabs hold of every thought pulling them in and making them stick.
2. Why are some thoughts so bad? When you are in an anxious state, emotions seem to be tenfold, everything magnifies and a little problem becomes massive. Something that you could dismiss when you were healthy, can stick around all day.
Anxiety is really just adrenalin that needs an outlet and this includes manifesting itself into scary, irrational, strange thoughts, they are not important and should just be seen for what they are, anxiety just playing its tricks. Anxious thoughts are totally normal when suffering with anxiety. People ask me. 'Why do I have all these anxious, scary thoughts?, 'Because you have anxiety' is always my answer. It's a simple response to a simple question.
These are just some of the scary thoughts on anxiety that I have come across. I call them the ‘what ifs’!
What if no one can cure me?
What if it’s not anxiety, but a different mental problem?
What if my old self is lost forever
What if there is something else wrong with me, brain tumour etc?
What if I lose control?
What if I can't breathe?
What if I have to live like this for the rest of my life?
What if this feeling never goes away?
What if it’s just me that feels like this?
What if I'll never be able to enjoy the things I used to?
What if I have an attack and pass out?
What if I cannot be the person I used to be?
You may have said one or two of the above to yourself or recognise a fear you have. Well, I did too; it was always ‘yes, but what if?’ Well, all of these ‘what ifs?’ usually amount to nothing. They prove to be just an overactive mind playing its tricks on you. Thoughts seem to come uninvited and always seem to hold such force when we are anxious. Also, a lack of understanding of anxiety can bring these fears. Like me, you may have gone for a long time without anyone explaining to you why you feel like you do and you may not even have been told that it is anxiety. Can you see why these fears can build up in people? A lack of understanding of their condition, coupled with the habit of always thinking the worst compounds their fears. Add this to a tired mind that has lost a lot of its resilience, and you have a whole host of ‘what ifs?’.
Some people worry to the extent that they believe everything they feel is life threatening. A headache becomes a brain tumour, a stomach ache can become cancer and so on, and no matter how many times their doctor tells them there is nothing wrong with them, they are never quite convinced.
If this is you, then realise these thoughts are just figments of your imagination, mainly created by your anxious state. Everything becomes magnified when we are anxious. Let these thoughts go, don’t react to them and see them as just that, thoughts that carry no weight whatsoever, no matter how loud they shout.
When we try too hard to do ANYTHING, it seems to slip further from grasp. This includes to ridding oneself of unwanted thoughts. The more you "try" to push them away, the longer they linger and the stronger their impact. When we welcome and give room to unwanted thoughts, they lose their significance and quickly diminish. When you impose a false sense of importance upon a thought, it will often appear more serious than it deserves.
Time again is a great healer concerning this condition. I allowed them to flow in and flow out and I didn’t react. When I did this, I noticed the scary thoughts seem to lose their scary edge. Stop fighting them, just say: come if you wish, I no longer care, you are not important.
Don’t ever tell yourself that you must not think these thoughts. Let all thoughts come; do not run away from any of them; see them for what they are, just thoughts, exaggerated because of the way you feel. They can do you no harm and they mean nothing. They won’t be around when you recover, so pay them no respect. The best way to alleviate these intrusive thoughts is to allow them their space by NOT trying to force them out.
Why not try following a negative/scary thought through and ask yourself, what’s the worst thing that could happen? Then ask yourself if it is really going to happen? Is this thought rational in any way? If you do this, you may find an answer to a thought you have been so frightened off, so that next time these thoughts enter your head, deep down inside there will be a part of you that can see them for what they really are and let them go.
I often get asked ‘How I do I stop thinking a certain way’, my answer is DON’T try, if it’s not important whether your thoughts are scary or not, why try to stop them, give them their space, this is the way to lose them. Fighting thoughts and trying to rid yourself of them is the wrong approach and a battle you will lose for sure, again you are fighting something that is totally normal in the circumstances. Don't think you are going crazy or try and fight or change the way you think.
What is recovery and is it possible?
This is a question I get asked very often. The answer is definite yes. I have lost count of the number of people who have gone on to fully recover; all it takes is a little patience and a proper understanding. I was one of those people who went through anxiety attacks for so long that I thought I would just have to live with it. I had tried so many treatments and began to give up all hope. Luckily I persevered and decided to go away and find as much information as I could. For once I stopped throwing money at all these miracle cures and decided to educate myself as much as possible on the subject. I was tired of being pushed from one doctor to another. I no longer wanted another prescription to try and make my anxiety just go away, I just wanted proper answers. What I found was someone who was very knowledgeable on the subject and was able to not only help me, but also point me in the right direction with my own studies. I was then able to lead myself back to recovery the right way. The one thing I did learn was that the best knowledge comes from going through it and coming out the other side, the only people I have ever respected on the subject all went through it and came out the other side, there is no other better education.
The main thing I did find out is that it takes a full understanding of anxiety and how we feel, so as to move forward in the right way. You can't recover while your day is full of worry and fear of how you feel through a lack of understanding, trying to think and fight your way better. This is why people rarely move forward with medication; it is just a crutch. The real cure comes from within; too many people want the instant fix that just does not exist. This is why many people spend years going from one treatment to another and getting nowhere.
I spent years going backwards, because at one time I had no information or knowledge on the subject and my whole day was filled with fear and worry. I spent all day going round in circles in my mind as I had no idea what was wrong with me, this was the very reason I got worse and not better. I was adding so much worry and stress to a body that was crying out for a break.
The knowledge I gained helped me not only to understand what was wrong with me, it also helped me understand what was holding me back and keeping me in the cycle of anxiety. Once I understood why I felt like, I did I was able to calm the fear and worry as the symptoms did not scare me as much. There was also no need for the constant running around in my mind, trying to figure it all out. This helped my mind to become more flexible and I was able to think more clearly. It also stopped the worry cycle, I now knew why I felt the way I did, my body was finally going to get the break it so craved.
Recovery also came because for once I trusted in my own body to repair itself. I stopped looking for that outside miracle cure or that magic pill that would make it all go away. I gave my body as much time and space as it needed to recover. This is the way to recover. Through my years of helping people, I have yet to meet someone who recovered overnight or in a week. Recovery takes time, as we may have formed habits. A lot of anxiety is caused by habit, but like all habits they can all be reversed.
This is why I wrote the book 'At Last a Life' so as to give people a far better understanding of their condition. Just explaining a certain symptom can take away so much fear and worry. I get some lovely emails thanking me for writing the book. So many people say they feel able to cope so much better after reading it, but a lot come a while after, when they have taken that step back and are now beginning to see real progress.
The Stigma of Anxiety
A lot of people buy the book and tell me to write private on the package, their family don't know and they would rather keep it to themselves. This is a really sad side of the anxiety condition, the stigma that seems to go with it. If we have a cold, everyone has heard of this and you get a little sympathy, but anxiety is different, how can you be anxious, pull yourself together, it’s all in your head, these are just some of the comments that people may have heard. When we suffer it really is the last thing we need to hear, we need time and understanding to be able to move forward and not to be put under more pressure. If you have an understanding partner then all well and good, if you feel they do not understand, then why not let them take a look at the website or if you have the book you could tell them to just have a read through it. I told my family, 'You may not understand, but just believe me and give me my space'.
Recovery finally comes through a shift in attitude through knowledge. Once you understand why you feel like you do, you are no longer bewildered and thrown by how you feel. There is no longer a need to worry and investigate your symptoms. This in turn gives you mind and body the break it needs. I can honestly say I could feel all my symptoms again tomorrow and although they would be unpleasant, I would just carry on with my day. I would not investigate or worry about them. There would be no deep thinking, no trying to figure them out, no fighting or acting my way through the day, no going over and over how I felt, questioning everything all day. Basically all the things I once did that kept me in the cycle of anxiety. I basically had a breakdown and that is what it is, your body being over loaded with worry and stress, this is why you feel so tired and spent, why your mind seems to tired and fragile. It has just been pushed beyond its capabilities and is crying out for a break. But what does it get? Well we then feel the symptoms of anxiety/stress we worry even more, 'Why do I feel like this?', and ‘what is wrong with me’? We may find all our waking moment trying to fight and think our way better, spending days going over and over how we feel, trying to find a way out of this hell, which in turn just brings more stress and worry to the mix, this is basically the simple truth of why so many never find a way out as they are in the classic anxiety cycle. If someone had actually told me this early on it would have saved me so much suffering. I was just shifted from one doctor next, from one student straight out of medical school to the one who just felt the need to dig up my past. I was never given any explanation and this I feel is something that needs to change fast.
To finish I would like to tell each and every one of you that you can recover, we are all built the same way and .Our bodies all react to the right messages we send it. I spent so many years doing everything I should not have done; it was only when I did the opposite that massive changes started to take place.
Don't be tempted by any claims to cure you overnight, these people are usually just there to take you money fast, I should know, I threw enough money at them. If this instant cure existed then the whole world would know about it and doctor’s surgeries would no longer put it as their number one complaint. Recovery comes through knowledge and patience, these two things will get you to the place you want to be. You body is waiting and waiting to recover, believe me, all you feel are surface symptoms, the true person is just buried underneath them waiting to resurface, once we step out of the way our mind and body will do the rest.
Food and Anxiety | Anti-Anxiety Diet
Unfortunately, through anxiety we sometimes turn to alcohol and establish a bad diet to try and make us feel better in the short term. Changing your diet and lifestyle can help many forms of anxiety and the symptoms that go with it.
As I was recovering, I decided to eat healthier and found that, through this, I had so much more energy, felt calmer and less depressed. I also understood the importance of burning off all my excess nervous energy and took up a fitness campaign that suited me.
These changes in my life made a lot of difference to how I felt overall. They are not the only answer to anxiety, but they can bring some much needed relief to the way we feel.
Try and eat a healthy, whole foods diet with plenty of fresh vegetables and fruits. Try and include foods that are rich in the B vitamins, such as whole grains, nuts, green vegetables, eggs and fish
To help lift moods and help calm anxiety, keep away from processed foods and eat more natural products. Also what we drink can have an affect on our stress levels. Although drinking alcohol seems to have a calming effect short term, it dehydrates the body, leaving us feeling more anxious than ever. If you feel you can't give up altogether, then just try and moderate it.
Avoid fizzy drinks loaded with sugar, instead drink plenty of water, I am personally not a big fan of water and drink the flavoured variety which is fine also. Avoid caffeine too much caffeine, again there is no need to give it up completely, just try and moderate it.
Below is a small list of foods to avoid and which foods to keep on your side when you are feeling anxious or stressed. Again I don't expect you to be perfect as I was not, but a few changes may help you see the benefit.

Foods to eat
Yoghurt
Bananas
Vegetables
Wholegrain foods
Brown Rice
Beans
Turkey
Chicken
Cottage Cheese
Fresh Fish
Poached Egg
Tuna
Fruit
Porridge
Baked potato
Peanut butter
Garlic
Spinach
Foods to avoid
Fizzy drinks
Processed food
White bread
Chips
Pastry
Cakes
Caffeine
Sugar
Alcohol
Chocolate
Cheese
Fast Food
If you want more help and advice with anxiety and panic issues then do please take the time to look around my site.
Anxiety and Setbacks
What are they and why do we have them?
One vital part of understanding recovery is recognising that we will have setbacks; they are part of the process involved in becoming the person you once were. Recovery does not always work in straight lines and can be an up and down affair. Once we realise that fact it can help us tremendously as too many people let these times throw them back into total despair.
What is a setback?
A setback is not to be confused with feeling a little up and down throughout recovery; this is normal. I went from having no good days, to having good and bad days. I was very happy with this as it proved to me that I was moving forward. I would describe a real setback as a period during which you feel you are back to square one and that everything you have gained has gone. You feel as empty and lost as you have ever done, scrambling around again for answers and questioning everything once more.
Setbacks are all part of the process
When you finally find the answers to anxiety and have a better understanding of it, you may feel an instant relief. You begin to understand that you are not going crazy and that so many others go through the same thing. There is no need to have a constant daily battle with yourself, fighting to be the person you once were, putting on an act, studying and worrying deeply about how you feel. The old you is there, it is just buried underneath the symptoms. You finally understand this and things get easier. You may feel a freedom that you have not felt for some time and everything seems rosy. You are finally moving forward.
After years of doing everything I should not have done, this was me. I started to make small steps to becoming the old me, having some days of clear thinking and freedom, almost like I could touch the person I once was. Then, wham, I felt like I was back to square one and I would question this: “Why did I feel so good last week and now back to this? What have I done wrong? This is me forever, I will never be free”.
These were just some of the statements that had me worrying again and trying to think, fight and scramble my way back to how I felt the week before. I was back to ‘googling’ symptoms, filling myself with self pity. I had basically returned to the full anxiety cycle - but why? Because for some stupid reason I thought I could crack it in a few weeks and that all these years of suffering through a lack of understanding would simply disappear. It was like treating someone who was depressed and expecting them to never feel down again. I was asking and expecting the impossible.
So what did I learn?
I learnt that the more I let a setback bother me, the longer it lasted, so I just had to learn to live alongside it and pay it little respect. Memory and habit of past suffering were at work. How could I suffer for so long and not expect to feel anxious and lost again?
I began to see setbacks as part of the process. No matter how horrible I felt, I refused to let them throw me back into total despair and just waited until they passed, which they always did. When you start to go through a few setbacks you learn to hardly ever give them a second thought. They are still unpleasant, but nothing to worry or despair about.
I remember how many times I have tried to get this point across to people, only for them to let a setback throw them into total despair. A lady once said to me 'Paul I feel very anxious today, but it's fine, it will pass'. That was exactly the point I wanted her to get to. She also pointed out that she always seem to come out of them far stronger and would feel freer than ever. This was also the case with me to, it was another chance for me to shrug my shoulders and not let anxiety win, I was in charge now and it was getting zero respect from me.
Don't become a victim
So don't become a victim of setbacks, don't fall back into the anxiety cycle of worry and bewilderment, filling yourself with self pity. Understand they are all part of the process, all the progress and knowledge is never lost, it is just buried under symptoms, waiting to resurface.
And more than anything, remember that:
A setback really has only as much power as you give it.
wers to all sorts of questions throughout my years of helping people with Anxiety and Panic and certain questions came up far more than others. So for everyone's benefit I decided to list some of the more popular ones below.
Q.1 Why do I feel better in certain situations and not in others?
This is a very common one and it all comes down to how you think in other situations.
For example, you may feel better in the safety of your own home rather than at a family gathering. There is no difference in both of these situations, the only difference is in the way you think. You are the same person and it is not the situation that makes you feel worse, it is your thought pattern and memory working together.
You may spend the day worrying about going to a particular function, setting your body up to be anxious on arrival and then blame it on the situation you are in rather than the thought pattern you have created during the day while at home. You may get there and then also worry about making a fool of yourself, spending the whole time tensing and trying to control how you feel and creating more anxiety. Do you see how we do this to ourselves? It is not the situation, but our perception of the situation that causes us to feel worse in certain situations.
You must just accept how you feel wherever you are and in whatever situation you find yourself; deal with yourself and not the place, if your feel apprehensive then that's fine, don't try and lead yourself by the hand or try and keep a grip of yourself, release this grip, nothing will happen. Sometimes a place may hold certain memories of failure, which makes us feel anxious, but this soon passes when we learn to accept how we feel and let go of that tension.
If you truly accept how you feel in every situation and stop trying to keep a grip on yourself or looking for the easy exit, you will find that although you may feel uncomfortable at times, nothing bad happens to you, and in time your reactions lessen until you feel more able to cope, day by day. Anxiety loves avoidance, so take its power away, move forward and embrace these feelings of fear. This is the key. Moving towards your fears is far more productive than hiding from them. By continually hiding and running away from how you feel you are training your mind and body that there is danger in normally everyday activities. It is just responding to the signals you are giving it. So if you go towards your fears, allow yourself to feel this way, you are then telling it that it's fine, there is no danger here. You will cope with how you feel, again it is just a feeling brought on by excess adrenalin that always subside and in time your confidence begins to grow, it will never grow while you avoid, to find peace we must feel a bit of fear.
Avoiding symptoms just does not work, as you must realise by now. You need to let all feelings be there, not to avoid them but to go through them, invite them even. This worked for me, I had faced my demons head on and realised this was the only way to stop fearing them. I ignored my body's instinct to avoid and started to embrace how I felt, I moved towards the feelings of apprehension. Eventually, I started to understand my condition so much more.
I mention the word 'understanding' again, because this is the key to recovery. How can you not fear something you don't understand! How can you accept something that still scares you?
Q.2 Will these feelings ever go away?
Yes they will, once you understand why you feel like you do, you can then start to unmask a lot of the fears you hold about anxiety. There are so many myths about anxiety that it worries me just how many people are misinformed and truly believe they will never get better and that they will just have to live with this condition forever. Too many people spend years like I did, searching for that elusive miracle cure that just does not exist. Your body has been through a lot in the time you have had this condition. It maybe emotionally spent and feel so tired. None of this has done you any long term harm. Just see your body as running at 75% at the moment. In time when you learn to step out of your own way and start doing things the right way and changing your habits, it improves and starts to feel more healthy and refreshed. Letting your body recover at its own pace is the key. An overnight cure is impossible after what you have been through. But what a journey recovery can be when we allow it to happen.
Understanding anxiety also takes away so much fear out of how we feel. A lot of anxiety is habit, a learned behaviour that can be reversed. Every stage and symptom has a logical explanation that can be explained. With less fear and more understanding, we also calm the constant worrying; it is the lack of information on the subject that keeps the worry cycle going. Constant worrying that we will never get better also adds to the belief that we will just have to live with it.
Once we start to understand anxiety and use the tools we have learnt to cope with how we feel, the change can be dramatic. In my recovery, I found that the more knowledge I had and the more I understood my condition the easier it was to accept how I felt and get on with living. I started to lose the fear of my symptoms. Eventually they began to hold less power over me and I started to pay them less respect, my attention began to become more outward than inward.
It is your desperation to rid yourself of how you feel that keeps your anxiety alive. The stress you put on yourself day in day out, the constant worrying and thinking about your condition, puts a tremendous pressure on your body. Is it any wonder you stay anxious? It's time to stop beating yourself up about how you feel and give your body the rest it craves.
Knowledge is power. The less you fear your symptoms, the less they mean. This also stops the worry cycle you may find yourself in, which is the very thing that keeps anxiety going. You are bound to worry if you don't know what is wrong with you. That is why you need an explanation to help break this cycle.
Q.3 Why do I find it so hard in social situations? I find it so hard to communicate with people.
Is it any wonder we find it difficult to follow a conversation when all we are concerned about is ourself and how we feel. We can't concentrate on what the other person is saying because all we are concerned about is how we are feeling and how we may be coming across. I found myself trying to hold on to myself, trying not to crack. It was like acting out a part in a film. It was like being two separate people, one trying to hold a conversation, the other watching my body's reaction. Is it any wonder we struggle to fit in to the world around us?
Once we find the courage to accept how we feel and try not to put too much importance on how we come across, we find it easier to follow what the other person is saying. We become less concerned about how we feel, which gives us more time to be interested in the situation we are in and we start to become more involved in the present.
Q.4 Why do I seem to have so many scary / negative thoughts running around all day?
The reason you seem to have your attention on yourself all day and it feels like there are hundreds ofthoughts running through your mind is because of all your confusion about how you feel. You go round in your mind all day long, looking for answers, trying to find a way out of this hell. Some people may even stay up all night reflecting on the whole day, trying to figure it all out. Mostly these arenegative or worrying thoughts and that's why they seem to come automatically and with so much force. When you are in an anxious state, emotions seem to be ten-fold. Everything magnifies, a little problem becomes massive, and something that you could dismiss when you were healthy, sticks around all day.
Eventually thinking just becomes automatic; it becomes a habit. All day, every day, these thoughts seem to come before you even think them. Looking at it from another angle, when people meditate, they stop thinking for hours on end until it becomes a habit and they can go all day without a worrying thought. That is why they feel so refreshed.
Not you, your thoughts just carry on and on and when your mind is tired, like it is now, it grasps hold of every thought, pulls them in and they seem to stick. Some people worry to the extent that they believe everything they feel is life threatening. A headache becomes a brain tumour, a stomach ache can become cancer and so on, and no matter how many times their doctor tells them there is nothing wrong with them, they are never quite convinced.
If this is you, then realise these thoughts of illness are just figments of your imagination, created by your anxious state. Everything becomes magnified when we are anxious. Let these thoughts go, don’t react to them and see them as just that, thoughts that carry no weight whatsoever, no matter how loud they shout.
When we try too hard to do ANYTHING, it seems to slip further from reach. This applies to ridding oneself of unwanted thoughts. The more you "try" to push them away, the longer they linger and the stronger their impact. When we welcome unwanted thoughts, they lose their significance and quickly diminish. When you impose a false sense of importance upon a thought, it will often appear more serious than it deserves.
Time is a great healer, especially concerning this condition. I allowed any thought to be there and I did not react. When I did this, I noticed the scary thoughts seem to lose their edge. There is no need to fight them or try and rid yourself of scary thoughts, just say: come if you wish, I no longer care. Do not be thrown by these symptoms or this experience. Once you begin to recover, the mind and body settle down and these overwhelming thoughts disappear, along with the anxiety condition.
Don’t ever think, "I must not think that". Let all thoughts come, do not run away from any of them. See them for what they are - thoughts - exaggerated because of the way you feel. They can do you no harm and they mean nothing. They won’t be around when you recover, so pay them no respect.
Q.5 Why did anxiety choose me?
Anxiety does not choose certain people. It is not something you just get like a cold. Anxiety is the result of your body being over worked, be it through long hours or stress at work, a problem or collection of them that you have been worrying about. Your nerves have taken on so much for a length of time and go 'bad' as many put it. If you work anything beyond it's capabilities, whether it be a blender, a vacuum cleaner or a car, it will break down or begin to clunk and run badly. Your body is the same. So anxiety is not an 'it'. It is not something your body wants to go through. It is your body telling you it can no longer work at the pressure you are putting it under. That is why it is important to take your symptoms with a pinch of salt and not to then get stressed about the way you feel, adding more stress and worry to an already tired body that craves for a break.