Hi Musingman,

Don’t worry there are some success stories out there, though I can tell you that I am a work in progress with my anxiety.
To understand my anxiety I began to sit with the feeling and let it in- but the thoughts I change them. The first thing that goes through your head during a panic attack are “oh my god not again” etc. But instead of thinking that I take deep breaths and calmly say to myself ‘it’s okay I can control this. You will be fine.’ I would then take myself to a safe place which is quiet and sit down and breathe. Then i’d count down from 10 with my breaths focusing entirely on those.

The steps I have taken to overcome everyday anxieties is to observe them. I meditate daily for 20 minutes to an hour so I can understand myself more. I watch how it makes me feel and the thoughts. I then listen intently to my thoughts and be as supportive to myself as possible. I let the feelings of panic and chest tightness in, I don’t fight them, I let the feelings in but as the same time I am supportive to myself, kind to myself.

I believe thoughts are the key to success so the more work you do on your thoughts, the easier to handle situations that may cause anxiety.

Trust me I have been on those boards with people lamenting over their anxiety- and the fundamental issue is that the majority do not wish to face their anxiety. They have chosen to not choose happiness and calm and would rather use drugs and moan to doctors and psychiatrists and complain about society before they actually sat down and looked at themselves. Anxiety is all related to thoughts which then attaches to feelings.

So to change the feelings, change the thoughts. One small compassionate step at a time.

I was there too. I blamed everyone else, but now I realise its me who has to change. I have to love myself, look after myself and most important of all TAKE RESPONSIBILITY of my thoughts and actions because no one is suffering around me, just I am making myself suffer and that is not how I choose to live.

When feeling anxiety I’ve had to become more compassionate towards myself. I understand that I may have limitations but I cannot live in anxiety of my anxiety- if you understand what I mean. So to counter that what I do is everyday I do something small and minor or put myself in a situation which may cause me some anxiety. However it is controlled and safe- not like I’m standing in front of charging bulls. The key here is to start small, very small, little goals and achievements and patting yourself on your back for doing so.

So for example this is what I do for my social anxiety (this is spread out over a course of a week):
– Say something nice to a stranger
– Go to the coffee shop at the top of the road and treat myself to a hot chocolate
– Go for long walks in areas I have designated as ‘safe’
– Help someone in need (virtual or physical presence)
– Write down daily what made me feel good/ achievements

Aims are a great way of finding out how much you can do. Though I want to remind you when it feels like its too much its okay to walk away. No one has the right to question you and you do not need to give them answers.

The first step is mostly to work on the thoughts- because believe it, its the thoughts that begin that chest grappling feeling. So conquer them with kindness to yourself (through meditation and gratitude journalling and actively listening to your thoughts)

Second is to write a list of small aims to slowly desensitise you to the triggers of anxiety- so the coffee shop one was because Im afraid of crowded places and people looking at me. So to sit there have a hot chocolate is an act of kindness for myself as I get to treat myself while I do something that scares me 🙂

Third is then to expand little by little on those aims, keeping mind of step one of your thoughts. So continue doing things that may frighten you but be kind to yourself in the process.

I hope this has helped in some way!

It’s no problem 🙂 With the very little I am learning about myself I want to assist those who need that little reassurance 🙂
Anxiety can be beaten! And Im so grateful you have found some of my advice useful. Merry Christmas to you as well and Happy New Year sending you plenty of hugs and love!

Hi, MusingMan, anxiety and panic attacks are the worst feelings, but it can be overcome. I’m wondering what caused the first panic attack four months ago, as that may give some insight. I can recommend the book “When Panic Attacks” by Dan Burns. You need only read the first part that has all the exercises to get a fantastic does of cognitive behavioral therapy, which is a very effective (and drug-free!) method to combatting anxiety and panic.

Secondly, I would have a conversation (in a journal) with the panicked part of yourself. Usually that part of ourselves is the part that experienced some sort of trauma in the past, such as abandonment, engulfment, being told we were worthless or an actual attack of some kind, etc. What does the grown up part of yourself that knows everything is going to be OK need to say to the scared part of you that is convinced everything is going to be terrible? Write down that conversation. The irony is, the more you give voice to the scared part of you, the less panicked s/he will become.

Never underestimate the power of allowing that scared part of yourself express emotions. Anxiety is ultimately emotions that have been shoved back down. When they escape – as they all must do at some point – they do so in the form of a panic attack. So, get into a safe place (have a good therapist on hand, a great friend, or somebody or something you trust to calm you down) and have that conversation and express those emotions.

Doing these practices along with meditation, journaling, developing a spiritual practice of any kind, reaching out and confiding in trusted friends about the situation, etc. are all ways to support that scared little person inside of you, so that s/he feels comfortable enough to express what is needed to heal.

Fear is here to teach you something – to uncover a negative belief that is not true, so ultimately, once you get past your anxiety, you will actually be a calmer and more peaceful person that you were – even than before the anxiety began. I know it because I’ve lived it!

Glad some of this helps. The end of an 8 year relationship is the perfect reason to begin having anxiety, so that makes a lot of sense. So, give all of your fears and insecurities a voice. Sometimes I just sit down and write out everything I fear. I then write out the reasons why all of my fears are incorrect. (For example, you WILL love again, you ARE valuable, you ARE loveable, you WILL find someone else, you will NOT die alone, etc.)

I also surround myself with anything that can deliver the message that “Everything is going to be OK, I promise”. Sometimes its an uplifting movie, TV show, book, friends, activity, etc. That message is to reassure that scared part of you. Once you can tap into that place where you feel safe again, you feel safe enough to express all of those feelings – have a good cry, pound a pillow, scream and yell (in the car for instance where no one else can hear you), run 10 miles uphill, etc. All of these things express the negative feelings, which gets rid of the anxiety. “You have to feel it to heal it”.

Also, remember that anxiety is delivering a false message. Anxiety is not your intuition. Only that calm, grounded and peaceful place in you is the voice of intuition. (Fear = False Evidence Appearing Real or Forgetting Everything is All Right) So, part of anxiety’s expansion is the believe in the middle of an attack that somehow your intuition is speaking to you. It isn’t, I promise.

Also, try bodywork. Trauma and anxiety can live in the body so try massages, somatic therapy, etc. Take baths, take yoga, dance, or anything that soothes your body in a positive way.

It takes a while but you will get to the place where you look back and say, “wow, remember when I had all that anxiety?” It will feel like a place very far away from the happy peaceful place you will arrive. It doesn’t happen overnight, unfortunately. :O) But, day by day, it does happen. I know because I’m coming out of about a 2 year period of anxiety for me in a particular area of my life. The process for me followed a Bell curve – slow at first, then pretty bad and then slowly coming out the other side again. It can be hard to see out when you’re in the thick of it, but keep at it.

Hi All,

I know that most people don’t come on to sites like these to share success stories but this note is a way for me to thank all of you on my Anxiety related journey since the last 6 months. Through you and 100’s of other sites like this, I learnt more about what Anxiety was all about. Through all of you I got comfort that there were other people like me and I wasn’t the only one. Through some of you I learnt coping techniques and you gave me faith that I could get a grip on my life once again. This is my way to give back to you.

Quick background about me. Until 6 months ago, I considered myself a happy-go-lucky guy in his 40’s. Highly ambitious. Drank too much coffee / soda / energy drinks, didn’t exercise, didn’t care about what I ate, worked late hours, smoked quite a bit but drank no alcohol. Have a great job, solid marriage, great loving family, financially secure but a self-professed stress junky.

Frankly, being under stress gave me an adrenaline rush on a daily basis and it was my fuel. Being a corporate strategist has always been my core competence, so overthinking things and coming up with creative solutions was my biggest asset. So in my corporate career I have deliberately kept myself under constant stress because it allowed me to be highly creative.

Then out of nowhere came a Panic Attack. At the sudden onset of Anxiety 6 months ago, I had no idea what’s going on as it came like a lighting bolt out of the blue and without warning. It changed my world completely.

When I had a Panic attack and went to ER they were very quick to perform tests, shoot me with Xanax and give me a prescription for Xanax and send me on my way. I never took it after the hospital visit because I did not want to build a dependency on medication.

I visited a therapist only once early on to confirm that I was not going crazy. I needed to hear from an expert that this was just anxiety and not nothing else. He spent an hour with me where I did all the talking and he took notes. Then at the top of the hour he said that I anxiety and told me that I need to come him once a week. He gave me no advice, no coping tools, nothing. I would have considered going to back to him if I did not get a bill for $260 after Insurance payments for my 60 minute visit.

Then came panic attacks, irrational thoughts, cognitive distortions and other physical manifestations of anxiety.

So I turned to other avenues to help myself.

Please know that this is just my experience and some of you may have a better one.

I’ve learnt a lot since the last 6 months and begun to appreciate my life and everyone a lot more. Also, I’ve developed a new found appreciation for children with special needs and for people who’ve dealt with this for many years. I am going to make it my mission to help special need kids through charitable contributions and also through giving my time through community support. In that spirit, here is my attempt to make a small difference in someone else’s life.

First you need to do the following:

1) Accept Anxiety. Don’t fight it, don’t argue with it, don’t worry about it. The first thing you do is Accept the fact that you have it. Funny trick Anxiety plays on you is that it becomes easier to suspect that you have a dreadful disease or that you’re going insane but it’s harder to accept that it’s just anxiety.
2) Realize that Anxiety is just like any other emotion like Happiness, Sadness, Excitement, Disappointment, Worry etc..
3) Realize that there are no Right or Wrong throughts, No Good or Bad thoughts.. All they are thoughts. They don’t need a reason to pop into your head and they don’t need to be rational all the time.
4) You don’t need to spend time thinking why this is happening to you. You need to start thinking about how you’ll not spend anymore time than you have to on overthinking Anxiety.
5) Realize the fact that the Rational part of your Brain has the VETO Card. Anytime your brain is overthinking and anxiety is taking over the Rational part of your brain will Shut you down through a Panic Attack, Bursting into tears, etc..
6) Realize that Anxiety can never really hurt you unless you decide to let it consume you and shut out the outside world. NO ONE in the history of ManKind has gone crazy with Anxiety. Crazy people live in a parallel reality. Anxious people are anxious about what they fear the most. Because you fear it, you won’t do it.
7) Realize that you can continue to live your life to the fullest and let Anxiety like all other emotions reside in the background.
8) STOP researching the symptoms. The more you research, the more you find out about other symptoms and the more you know other symptoms the more your brain manifests it onto you.
9) If you DO research. Spend time learning different types of Yoga Poses, exercise regiments, Herbal Supplements, CBT worksheets, meditation techniques.
10) If you want to do more research, Read about the primitive part of your brain (Amygdala), neuro thought patterns and cognitive function. Read about Brain Elasticity and how to re-train your brain. Read about the SNS and PNS Nervous systems.
11) Most of all be patient and go easy on yourself. You don’t have to prove anything to anyone, you don’t have to beat anxiety, you don’t have to romanticize being better. Just work on yourself a little bit everyday.
12) Find someone like a close friend, a colleague or a relative to talk to you. Until I spoke to my friends, family & spouse I had no idea that everyone has weird thoughts from time to time. Before I did that, I thought I was the only one loosing my mind.
13) Trust the fact that you’ll find that everyone has varied levels of Anxiety (Low, Med, High). Our brain processed approx. 70,000 thoughts per day. In a Med to High Anxiety state we tend to latch on things that concern us the most and then overthink them until we have an Anxiety or Panic Attack. People who we consider NORMAL (Low Anxiety individuals) also have the same thoughts as us but are able to brush them off much more easily.

Then do these things that absolutely work:

1) Exercise – Anything from 15 mins a day to 1.5 hours per day is something you invest in.
2) Stretching 5 mins as soon as you wake up
3) Meditate 5 mins after you wake up and before you start your day
4) Invest in 30 mins of mediation daily. It will help you stay calm and also help you be an observer of your thoughts without being judgemental.
5) If you get a Gym Membership. Go sit in the Steam Room or Sauna for 5 – 6 mins and relax. During this time, let your brain wander without making judgements.
6) Learn deep breathing exercises so that you are constantly engaging your Rest and Digest response as a counter to Fight or Flight response. My favorite is to follow 5-4-5 role. 5 Seconds breath In, Hold for 4 Seconds and release for 5 seconds.
7) Get full blood work done to determine what Vitamins and Minerals you’re deficient in.
8) Get a Full Physical Exam to get any doubts about your physical well being out of the way.
9) Make a simple habit of smiling and acknowledging an anxious thought. Every time I have an irrational thought, I smile and say “There you are my friend. Don’t worry, we’re safe. I know you make me worry about things that matter the most. It’s OK. ”
10) Eat healthy – Bring a lot of fruit and veggies into your diet. Cut out the Junk food and fried stuff.
11) Cut out Caffiene, Sugar and Soda as much as you can. Do it slowly so that you don’t shock your system.
12) Chew Gum all the time
13) Drink a lot of Water
14) Drink a lot of Herbal Tea
15) Eat the following Supplements:
a. Vitamin D3
b. Magnesium Calm Supplement (amazon.com)
c. Omega 3 Fatty Acids
d. Vitamin C
e. Positive Thought (St John Worts from Amazon.com)
f. Natrol Stress & Anxiety Day / Night (Amazon.com)
16) The list in the #23 item is what worked for me. You need to do more research on what works for you. Passion Flower Extract, Valerian Root, Kava Kava, HTP5, GABA Supplements. The choice is huge out there. Keep trying something a few weeks and see how it works for you.
17) Sleep on time and eat on time.
18) FAKE IT UNTIL YOU MAKE IT. This is the best thing I did after I read it somewhere. I kept living my life like nothing was happening until Anxiety lost is power significantly. I kept pretending like nothing was wrong until my brain was convinced that there was nothing to worry about.
19) Go to GroupOn and buy massage packages. Pamper yourself. Get a new haircut, go to a Spa. Do something that’ll make you feel like a Million bucks.
20) Go to Walmart and buy an aroma therapy defusor. Load it up with Lavendar oil and smell that all the time. It will keep you calm.
21) One Hack I learnt along the way that is the Human Brain is unable to Multi-Task at Will so when you have a racing mind; you can counteract my chewing gum, tapping your feet or snapping your fingers. When you at least 2 things simultaneously you force the cognitive part of your brain to take over. Same thing while driving, if you feel like your brain is wandering; Chew Gum, Hum a Tune or tab your fingers. You’ll see how fast you can switch to the Cognitive Part of your brain.
22) Find a social cause that takes your time where you help people who are less fortunate than you. It will have a profound impact on you and suddenly realize that your problems are pale in comparison. If you can’t give money, give time. If cannot give time, promote someone’s cause on Social Media. Bring awareness to something larger than yourself.
23) Last piece of advice. If you are religious, pray. Pray and put your faith in God to steer you through this journey. If you’re not religious then realize the fact that the Universe always has a way to steer you and guide you.

Finally, things that you absolutely shouldn’t do:

1) Constantly fight anxiety or try to push anxiety
2) Try to suppress thoughts or try not to think about them. The more you try it the more end up thinking about it
3) Think that a magic pill will make it all OK
4) Lock up yourself into your home and think about it all day long. You’ll spiral into depressive states.
5) Mope about it and feel sorry for yourself. You will not want to fight it.
6) Get frustrated about not getting better and being depressed.
7) Think that something is terribly wrong with you health wise.
8) Go to Google and keep looking up symptoms.

How Anxiety made my life a whole lot better:

1) I started working out and now am in better shape than ever before. I run, I lift weights and I do Yoga.
2) I started eating a lot healthier and started to promote healthy eating in my family.
3) The health benefits were plenty.
4) I cut out stimulants such as Candy, Soda, Energy Drinks and Coffee by 98%.
5) I stopped smoking for 6 months cold turkey and now smoke only 1-2 cigarettes a day when the brain chatter is in over drive. I hope to quit completely again soon.
6) I became more mindful through meditation and learnt how to not let my thoughts over power me
7) I became more calm in my life and learnt not to frustrated on the little things
8) I realized that I loved my life and everyday was a blessing. That helped me love my family more and appreciate everything I had a lot more.
9) I became more sensitive to other people and their problems. I just didn’t judge as quickly as I used to.

Finally, you need to read the following material that really helped me. They’ve been bookmarked on my computer since the last 6 months.

Read this list: http://wiredforhappy.com/100-smart-ways-to-calm-your-anxious-mind/

Read this letter from cover to cover: http://archive.is/uQspw

Go to: http://www.youtube.com and look for Guided Meditation videos

Go to: http://www.anxietyguru.net and listen to the podcasts.

Go to: tinybuddha.com and read blogs.

Finally, I’m at a stage right now where I know I have anxiety but it does not stop from living my life. It never did because I was not going to let a something that did not exist or was imaginary impact my life.

My Anxiety currently lingers somewhere in the back of my mind and will every now and again remind me that I need to worry about some “What If” scenario. A place or a word will trigger the over-thinking but I know I have the tools to quite the thoughts down and that’s OK. Will I ever get rid of being anxious every now and again, frankly, I don’t know and nor do I care. I wake up every morning knowing that I may have anxious thoughts and I tell myself – “I have Anxiety So What?”

All I know is that investing in Anxiety or Emotions related to Anxiety are an investment with NO Returns. Just accept it and move ON.

Life is a beautiful adventure and anxiety cannot take that away from you.

Stay blessed and stay strong.

I’m in deep gratitude to all of you.

Thanks

I am very happy that I found this website.i think you guys will help me.it’s just been a like 1 week since I first had my panic attack but I controlled it with breathing .I sleep well at night with help of some herbs but when I woke up I feel terrible and it is making me depressed.can you guys help me

Sorry I don’t know where to post so I post it here because I am so nervous thank ou