Anxiety
The Problem
You wake up dreading the day, and you go to bed at night with your head full of worries. Maybe you have uncontrollable panic attacks when things get bad, and they’re starting to be more frequent. Maybe you’ve developed a visceral fear of something specific (like closed-in spaces, or spiders). Or maybe it’s social situations that create that knot in your stomach every time. It’s exhausting. When waves of anxiety start crashing in, avoiding the trigger is the only way you have to cope. But that creates problems of its own, at work and home. In therapy, we’ll find better strategies to help you loosen the tight grip of tension and finally get some peace of mind.
The Treatment
There are many types of anxiety, and therapy will depend on your specific experiences. One powerful, research-supported approach to treating anxiety is one of my specialties, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). Some examples of topics we might focus on:
Mindfulness techniques to ground and center you in the moment
Understanding and breaking the vicious cycle of avoidance
Finding your values and hopes that may have been shut down by anxiety
Learning ways to physically relax when tension takes over
Strategies for improving sleep if your worries are keeping you up
Increasing your tolerance for what you’re afraid of, with tiny baby steps
Facing anxious thoughts and worst case scenario predictions
Together we’ll choose an approach that’s a good fit for you, and work to get you to a healthier place.