Tools to Deal with the Monster of All Time – Anxiety

The medical assistant informed me that Mr. Y did not want to have his blood drawn, and that he seemed irritated. Having known Mr. Y for more than ten years, his irritability was likely stemmed from feeling anxious.

I knocked at the door and entered the exam room. There was Mr. Y, sitting on the chair, with his son sitting across from him.

“How are you doing?” I asked.

“You know, I am not doing well. I feel very anxious about everything. Right now I am seeing a psychologist and a psychiatrist,” Mr. Y replied.

Mr. Y has a lot on his mind. He is worried about his cancer. He is worried about how he is affecting his children’s life because he needs some assistance in care. He is worried about needing orthopedic surgery because he has pain. He states that he has been anxious all his life and that is him.

Anxiety is the feeling of worry or uneasiness about something or someone. This feeling increases your irritability and restlessness. You may feel a sense of extreme bad feeling that is hard to describe. You may have a sense of doom. You may also experience trouble in focusing or concentrating. You may have insomnia. Other physical manifestations include having heart palpitations, sweats, tremors or shaking.

Everyone experiences some degree of anxiety at some point. Anxiety becomes a problem when it is affecting your daily well-being.

When you feel anxious and realize that you are feeling that way, you may feel anxious about your feelings, which adds to your anxiety.

The emotional effects of anxiety may include increased irritability, trouble falling asleep or staying asleep, fatigue, difficulty in concentrating, feeling restless, or experiencing panic attacks. The physical manifestations may include heart raising, high blood pressure, muscle tension, sweating, chest pain, headache, shaking and upset stomach.

To decrease your anxiety, the first step is to explore what the reason behind of your anxiety is. What are you thinking that is causing it? Back to Mr. Y. He feels anxious because he thinks he may never get better physically with his walking. He feels anxious because he thinks he is always going to be relying on someone else with at least some of his everyday routine, while he was a very independent person in the past.

When you have the awareness of the reason or the thought behind your anxiety, acknowledge it. Accept the fact that you are feeling anxious because of that thought in your brain. The situation or the people cause you to have an opinion about them.

Once you accept that your opinion about the situation is causing the anxiety, take a pause. Take deep breathes. Take a step back and look at the situation as an observer. Is what you are thinking true? If it is, so what – is there something you can do about it? If it is not true, how else can you think of the situation?

Sometimes, the more you think about it, the more anxious you may feel because there seems to be messy thoughts tangled in your head. It is helpful to allow yourself a time to pause. Practice meditation. Turn down the volume of the voice that is yelling out what is causing you to feel anxious. Go to a quiet place and pay attention to your surroundings instead.

Journaling may be another way to decrease your anxiety. When you write it out, your thoughts and feelings become more tangible. They also become more manageable.

Exercising may be helpful to calm yourself down. Focusing on the movement or thinking about something else.

Of course, all these methods will not replace the professional help from a therapist or a psychiatrist. Please do not hesitate to seek help if your anxiety is chronic and is affecting your daily life.

Anxiety is a part of everyone’s life. It affects each individual differently. It is important to recognize what we are thinking that is causing us to be anxious. It is not because of the situation or the person; it is because you have an opinion about that situation or the person. Some helpful ways to decrease your anxiety include taking a pause, taking slow and deep breathes, meditation, journaling and exercising. It is also helpful to reframe – what is another perspective to view the situation which makes you feel less anxious or more neutral about it? The most important thing is, when your life is affected by chronic anxiety, please do not hesitate to seek professional help.