Anxiety
Counselling & Psychotherapy for Anxiety
Have you been really struggling with anxiety and been unable to lead a normal life?
Anxiety is a natural human response when we feel that we are under threat and is experienced through our thoughts, feelings and physical sensations. Our bodies are biologically designed through evolution to go into ‘fight’, ‘flight’ or ‘freeze’ mode in response to perceived danger, in order to survive. However, this reaction can become hypersensitive and often does not benefit us within our day-to-day life. The sources of anxiety are often emotional reactions to perceived threats and insecurities.
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An example would be feeling overwhelmed by others’ expectations of you, or your own high expectations that you place upon yourself. You may feel worried, tense or afraid about something that is going to happen or think could happen in the future. It is normal to feel anxious at times, particularly when we are experiencing stressful events or changes. However, anxiety can become a mental health problem if it impacts your ability to fully live your life. Professionally I have witnessed an individual’s overwhelming fear, the crippling impact that it can potentially have, and the difficult isolation and suffering that it can create. You do not have to struggle and manage this alone. Firstly, seek medical support and be assessed by your GP.
The symptoms of anxiety are:
- Having an overwhelming sense of impending danger, panic or doom.
- Having trouble concentrating or making decisions and excessively worrying about past events or the future.
- Feeling detached from your surroundings and disconnected from your world.
- Feeling irritable, fearful, tense or restless.
- Your thoughts are racing and you are having trouble sleeping.
- Experiencing invasive thoughts.
- Experiencing nausea or abdominal distress.
- Suffering with headaches or other physical pain
- Experiencing heart palpitations and rapid breathing.
- Sweating, trembling or shaking.
- Suffering with muscle tension, tightness, tingling in your hands and legs or muscle twitching.
- Feelings of being light-headed or dizzy.
Symptoms to be aware of when anxiety becomes a mental health problem:
- Your fears or worries are out of proportion to the situation
- Your anxious feelings are very strong or last for a long time.
- You avoid situations that you know will cause you to feel anxious
- Your worries feel very hard to control and are very distressing
- You regularly experience symptoms of anxiety, which could include panic attacks.
- You find it difficult to go about everyday life or do things you enjoy.
It is at this point that seeking professional support becomes necessary. My anxiety treatment plan in Guildford incorporates research-based interventions, focusing on you developing the tools to manage your anxiety and its related symptoms. By changing and interrupting your negative thought patterns will enable you to feel in control of your anxiety, opposed to anxiety taking control of you.
ANXIETY TREATMENT IN GUILDFORD:
Therapeutically, my treatment plan for anxiety will be tailored for you and your unique needs. This will incorporate Integrative psychotherapy, Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT) and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), which is the most effective and recommended treatment for anxiety by the NICE guidelines and the NHS. CBT is a short-term approach that aims to equip you with skills to regulate your emotions and reduce your symptoms of anxiety, to feel empowered and help enable you to return to your life prior to anxiety. The biggest step is acknowledging that you are struggling and require support. Reach out and arrange an initial 15-20 minutes consultation, so that we can collaboratively work together towards your desired goal of achieving a sense of physical and psychological control, safety and calm.