Understanding Your Anxiety and How To Treat It
The Anxiety Breakdown
What is anxiety?
What causes anxiety?
How do I get rid of anxiety?
These are some of the frequent questions I get asked when it comes to specializing in anxiety treatment. Most often my clients are coming to me because they have known anxiety is part of their life but this is not always the case. Anxiety can show up different for everyone.
I am an anxiety therapist in Wilmington, NC. I work with stressed out and anxious women. I provide counseling for women, anxiety treatment, treatment for perfectionism, therapy for imposter syndrome, and burnout counseling. My Wilmington, NC counseling practice offers online therapy in North Carolina and Maryland.
Online Anxiety Therapy in Maryland
Online Anxiety THerapy in North Carolina
Let’s take a look and try to give some insight into some of the questions above.
What is Anxiety
Worrying and difficulty focusing are common symptoms of anxiety.
First and foremost anxiety is your body’s natural alert and warning system. Experiencing small amounts of anxiety is completely normal. For some people though their system can be on overdrive and that is when it becomes an issue. If your anxiety gets to this point it is most likely impacting your every day life. Listed below are symptoms most often related to an anxiety disorder. Not every single symptom listed is something you may experience and it can look different for everyone.
Common Symptoms of Anxiety:
Worrying more than usual
Difficulty controlling your worries
Feeling like something bad is going to happen without evidence
Difficulty concentrating or focusing
Nausea
Feeling nervous
Thinking about the same thing and fixating on it
Increased heart rate
Sweating
Feeling restlessness
Headaches
Tightness in your chest
Tension in your body
Irritability
Check out this blog post to get an understanding of anxiety attacks versus panic attacks.
What Causes Anxiety?
There are many different factors that can cause anxiety to be present. This could include events that occurred in your upbringing and with family, build up of stress, a specific event, inherited through family members, and/or medical conditions or causes.
It is always important to address any possible medical condition or causes with your primary care doctor. This is especially true if there was no known anxiety present and a sudden onset occurred.
How Do I Get Rid Of Anxiety
As stated before, every body is programmed and equipped to have anxiety because it is our body’s natural alert and warning system. Often I encourage my clients to think about how to better manage their anxiety and anxiety symptoms rather than the goal of getting rid of anxiety altogether because it is not possible. It is also important to note that often anxiety wants you to avoid the uncomfortable. By confronting and challenging that feeling you are starting to do some of the work.
For some clients, this may look like having a care team made up of a therapist, doctor and/or psychiatrist. The doctor or psychiatrist is available to help prescribe medications and manage your medications. Often these visits with your doctor and/or psychiatrist are going to be shorter visits in both how often you visit and how long your appointment lasts.
A therapist can help talk through feelings of anxiety and give helpful strategies to work towards feelings of calm.
Other times a client may choose only to seek help from a therapist. Therapy is helpful to talk and work through feelings and emotions. In therapy you can also work on relaxation skills to help feel more calm, work to lessen negative or worrisome thoughts, explore a history of behavior and thought patterns, etc. Therapy appointments typically are weekly or biweekly appointments and last about an hour each session.
There are also many different ways to treat anxiety including but not limited to CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy), DBT (dialectical behavior therapy), ACT (acceptance and commitment therapy), EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing), and Mindfulness based strategies.
Check out these helpful blog posts for more information
What Is Mindfulness and How Is It Used In Anxiety Therapy?
It is important to remember as you go through the process of identifying and working through your anxiety, to give yourself kindness and compassion. Working on challenging your thoughts, feelings, and behaviors can be really difficult at times and most likely results won’t be seen overnight. Being open to what is happening with you and your anxiety and utilizing the skills and strategies introduced it is possible to begin healing and making your anxiety more manageable.
Check out these other helpful blog posts related to anxiety.
5 Tips for Choosing the Best Anxiety Therapist in Wilmington, NC
What to Expect When You Start Anxiety Therapy
START GETTING THE HELP YOU DESERVE TO REDUCE ANXIETY.
How does your anxiety show up? Does it create a bunch of worries or tension in your body? If you are interested in anxiety counseling reach out and schedule your free 15 minute consultation. I have the option of providing online therapy to anyone located in North Carolina and Maryland.
Reach out and get started with me today to begin reducing your anxiety.
Written by: Laura Rippeon, LCSW, LCSW-C
Updated 3/12/23