Strategies For Dealing With Anxiety And Worry

Worrying and feeling anxious is normal; it’s how you assess and respond to potentially dangerous situations. But sometimes worry can take over your life. When that happens, you might need some strategies to help you let go of the worry and manage the anxiety.

5 Ways To Recognize That Worry And Anxiety Could Be Ruling Your Life

1. Worrying keeps you from falling asleep or staying asleep most nights.

2. It feels like your mind is always “on.”

3. You rehash your conversations, actions or behaviors over and over again, wondering how you might have done things differently.

4. When things don’t go as planned, you get frustrated, angry or scared.

5. You’re irritable a lot of the time.

All the worrying can make it hard to sleep well, and anxiety can cause headaches and stomachaches. Sometimes stress can be so intense that it can make it hard to swallow or eat because of the tightness in your throat or feelings of nausea.

If left unattended, all the stress and worrying can lead to an anxiety or panic attack. You might feel light headed. Your chest might feel constricted, and your breathing becomes shallow and fast. You might begin to sweat, see stars and feel like you’re going to faint. You might even worry that you’re having a heart attack.

Counseling For Anxiety

Often the worries and anxiety stem from things beyond our control, and the desire to control the uncontrollable fuels the stress.

Through counseling you begin to understand that your need for control might be rooted in a childhood that was filled with uncertainty or upheaval. Maybe you were left in charge of your siblings at a young age, or you were the moderator in your parent’s arguments. Counseling can help you understand how your childhood could have affected you as an adult.

Counseling can also help you understand that the constant worrying is a form of anxiety, and that all the worrying can have an impact on your mental and physical health. Through therapy, you can explore strategies to help you more easily accept the natural ups and downs of life, allowing you to let go of the need to control everything.

5 Strategies To Help You Let Go

1. Practice daily mindfulness. Mindfulness means paying closer attention to what is happening right now, with openness and compassion. It keeps you attuned to the here-and-now instead of worrying about past and future events. You can read more about practicing mindfulness and self-compassion here.

2. Exercise regularly. Exercise releases the body’s natural “happiness” chemicals and hormones. It can also help you sleep better.

3. Practice healthy sleep habits. A good night’s sleep can take the edge off, make you less irritable and activate your body’s immune system. The Sleep Foundation has some great tips on how to promote good sleep habits here.

4. Do yoga, get acupuncture or meditate. These alternative practices can help you relax your body and calm your mind.

5. Get support. Talk to friends, family or a counselor. People often feel alone in their struggles. Sharing your experience can help you feel more connected and supported.

If you'd like more strategies on managing anxiety in the moment you can check out my podcast episode dedicated to anxiety here.

Achieving Emotional Balance

Through counseling and some lifestyle changes, you can live a more emotionally balanced life. If you would like to live your life with more balance, please email me or call me at Progression Counseling in Annapolis at 310-339-1979, for a free 15-minute consultation.

This week on the Woman Worriers I interview Dr. Jonice Webb where we explore why feelings of anxiety, emptiness and disconnect often have roots deep in seemingly happy childhoods. 

---

Elizabeth Cush, LCPC is a therapist, blogger,  host of the Woman Worriers podcast, and the owner of Progression Counseling in Annapolis, Md. She helps busy, overwhelmed men and women manage their anxiety and stress so they can live their lives with more ease, contentment and purpose. If you'd like to know more about how individual and group therapy can help ease anxiety and stress call me 410-339-1979. 

Photo by Kinga Cichewicz & Nine Köpfer on Unsplash

Exploring Women and Anxious Parents

It feels like Spring has been a long time in coming this year. We have a few nice days and then we return to rain and cooler temps. The weather seems to affect my mood so here’s hoping Spring is right around the corner! I’m ready to get outside and do some gardening.

Anxious Parents

Parents modeling how to manage anxiety helps kids manage their anxious feelings

This month my Good Therapy article, Does My Anxiety Affect My Kids? discusses how anxious parents’ behaviors might affect might their kids. As a young mom I knew that my anxiety was impacting my kids. I didn't know how to do things differently and I often felt guilty and blamed myself for any of their anxious behaviors.  In my article I share that there’s good news for anxious parents! Just as children can be influenced by a parent’s anxious behavior, modeling how to manage anxiety can help kids learn to cope with their own anxious feelings.

Anxious Women

I continue to explore women and anxiety in my Woman Worriers podcast. Last week I shared my thoughts on mindfulness and how it helps me manage my anxiety today.

This week on the podcast I talk with chronic illness and pain specialist Daniela Paolone, LMFT .  She shares her personal journey with me and explores how chronic illness and pain has impacted her client’s lives. I hope you’ll tune in and if you enjoy the episode please consider leaving an honest review!

You can find the Good Therapy article here and the podcast here. I hope you have a wonderful week!

---

Elizabeth Cush, LCPC is a therapist, blogger,  host of the Woman Worriers podcast, and the owner of Progression Counseling in Annapolis, Md. She helps busy, overwhelmed men and women manage their anxiety and stress so they can live their lives with more ease, contentment and purpose. If you'd like to know more about how individual and group therapy can help ease anxiety and stress call me 410-339-1979. 

Photo by Meghan Holmes on Unsplash

Woman Worriers Podcast: A New Resource For Women With Anxiety

If you worry and have a hard time getting a handle on your anxiety, I’d like to introduce you to a new resource. I have just launched a podcast for anxious women, and I am so excited to share it with you. My new Woman Worriers podcast is now available on iTunes!

Why “Woman Worriers”?

Research shows that women are twice as likely as men to be diagnosed with an anxiety disorder, and I hope to investigate the reasons why through podcasting. I also want to help women better understand their anxiety, to recognize things that might trigger anxiety and to explore better ways to manage anxiety every day. With this mission in mind, my hope is to reach as many anxious women as possible.

If you read my blog, you know that I struggle with anxiety myself and that I’m an advocate for using mindfulness and meditation as a way to help manage the anxiety. You might also know that anxiety doesn’t just go away, because it’s a part of our natural defense mechanisms that help keep us safe from harm. The problems come when our brain and body think we need to be anxious all the time.

We’ll Learn From Experts

For the Woman Worriers podcast, I’m interviewing therapists, mindfulness experts, and medical professionals. I’ll also be looking at the social, cultural, societal and environmental factors that might contribute to women’s anxiety.

I hope to shine a light on women’s anxiety and give women the power to manage it in healthy ways.

In order to reach as many women as possible, I’m asking you for a favor. New podcasts need help gaining visibility and traction, and the things that help create that buzz are subscribing to, rating and reviewing new podcasts.

You can tune in and subscribe to auto-download new podcast episodes to your Apple or Android (coming soon) device. After you listen to a few episodes, please consider leaving an honest rating and review in iTunes  and let me know how you think this podcast might benefit women.

Thank you for your support and encouragement! 

You can also follow the podcast on Twitter, Facebook and the Woman Worriers homepage.

 Also, there are Woman Worriers support groups forming now to help you manage anxiety.

---

Elizabeth Cush, LCPC is a therapist and the owner of Progression Counseling in Annapolis, Md. She helps busy, overwhelmed men and women manage their anxiety and stress so they can live their lives with more ease, contentment and purpose. If you'd like to know more about how individual and group therapy can help ease anxiety and stress call me 410-339-1979. 

What's Behind All That Busy-ness?

Being an anxiety therapist and having experienced anxiety myself, I understand how anxiety can run your life, even when you think you have it under control. That’s because anxiety shows up in ways that aren’t always obvious. One of the symptoms of being anxious that isn’t always recognized is busyness, or always “doing.” If you have a hard time sitting still and feel compelled to multi-task constantly, you might be using busyness as a way to manage your anxiety.

Keeping Anxiety At Bay Through Busyness

Are you keeping anxiety at bay through busyness?

Many of my clients tell me that they find it hard to sit still. For some, being still creates anxiety because their inner critic jumps in and reminds them of all the things they should be doing. For others, their “always-on” mind makes it hard to sit quietly or enjoy reading and other quiet activities. Always being busy becomes a way to manage anxiety, because it doesn’t give you time to sit and think.

I remember times when my husband would say to me, “Can you just sit down?” Or, “Why are you always doing 10 things at once?” Being busy made me feel like I had things under control and helped distract me from the anxious, uncomfortable feelings that would creep in the moment I was still.

But the anxiety doesn’t go away when we’re busy. It often pops in to make a guest appearance just when you think you have it under control. Maybe it shows up when you’re trying to fall asleep or stay asleep, or when things feel beyond your control or they don’t go as planned.

So, if we’re “managing” our anxiety by being busy, why does it still come back? Well, when we constantly work to avoid feeling anxious, we’re actually making ourselves more anxious. Instead of relieving the anxiety, we’re actually creating a pattern of behaviors that keeps anxiety hanging around.

Always “Doing” Only Makes You More Anxious

Our bodies react to things that make us feel afraid. Anxiety and stress are fear responses. If we try to avoid the stress through busyness instead of learning to calm ourselves in moments of stress, our bodies still sense the stress and react accordingly. In fact, if our body doesn’t have a chance to chill, to de-stress, it will have a harder time managing when the next stressful event comes along. 

It’s like a chain reaction: You feel anxiety when you’re still, or quiet, so that prompts you to get busy. The busyness pushes the anxiety to the background, but it still exists below the surface, not being attended to. Then something small happens. Maybe you stub your toe, or drop a glass, or make a mistake at work. Now the anxiety jumps from the background into the present moment.

Now your reaction comes from a place of extreme anxiety, because you were already anxious to begin with. You might react in a way that doesn’t fit the intensity of the event.  Maybe you scream at the pain or yell at those who ask if you’re OK when you hurt yourself. Maybe you berate yourself for dropping the glass and start to cry. Maybe you have an anxiety attack because you feel so overwhelmed at work. Now you worry that the next time something happens, you’ll react in the same way . That thought keeps the anxiety bubbling below the surface.

Getting Comfortable With Being And Not Doing

Can I allow that I'm anxious in this moment?

I know that it’s really hard to change old patterns of behavior, but that’s what I’m asking you to do. When you find that you’re creating busyness for yourself, I want you to pause and pay mindful attention to what’s happening. Try sitting still (without your phone) and ask yourself  “Can I allow that I’m anxious in this moment and sit with it for just a minute?” 

Check out where you feel the anxiety, with a curious attention. Maybe your chest is tight or you have a stomachache. Say out loud, “The stress and anxiety feel like a hot poker in my chest, or a ball of hard clay in my stomach or  _______” (you fill in the blank). You might feel a little weird saying this out loud. It might make you smile or laugh at yourself, and that’s OK!

Next, try breathing into the stress and anxiety with slow, deep, measured breaths. You can slowly breathe in for a count of 4, hold for 4, breathe out for 4, hold for 4 and repeat. Then ask yourself how you’re feeling.

Lastly, I want you to be patient. Chances are, you’ve reacted and responded to anxiety and stress the same way for long time. It’s a well-worn path of behavior and neurological responses, and it will take time to change them. By practicing doing things differently, in a consistent way, you’ll begin to notice that you can manage your anxiety more effectively both physically and emotionally.

---

Elizabeth Cush, LCPC is a therapist and the owner of Progression Counseling in Annapolis, Md. She helps busy, overwhelmed men and women manage their anxiety and stress so they can live their lives with more ease, contentment and purpose. If you'd like to know more about how individual and group therapy can help ease anxiety and stress call me 410-339-1979. 

Photos by  Andrew Neel  & Andrew Neel on Unsplash

Why Women Are More Likely Than Men To Be Anxious

Women are 2x more likely than men to experience anxiety

I recently applied and was accepted as an expert contributor for Good Therapy. Good Therapy is a therapist directory, much like Psychology Today. They also have lots of great content and resources, like posts for particular populations or psychological issues. I’ll be writing about women and anxiety.

My first post discusses why women are twice as likely as men to experience anxiety. The human body is wired to respond with anxiety when it senses a threat. Here are some of the factors that make women more likely to be anxious than men:

https://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/is-she-more-anxious-than-he-is-probably-heres-why-0912174    

I would love to know your thoughts! You can leave a comment below or on the blog at Goodtherapy.com.

I'm also explore this topic in my podcast, Woman Worriers.

---

Elizabeth Cush, LCPC is a therapist, blogger,  creator and host of the Woman Worriers podcast, and the owner of Progression Counseling in Annapolis, Md. She helps busy, overwhelmed men and women manage their anxiety and stress so they can live their lives with more ease, contentment and purpose. If you'd like to know more about how individual and group therapy can help ease anxiety and stress call me 410-339-1979. 

Photo by Sydney Jackson on Unsplash