Will my anxiety ever go away?

sorry me again, candie, how long have you taken to get back to normal just out of curiosity? as you seem so positive about life, I will get back there but as you say you can’t force it, it will come naturally. it’s just wearing sometimes. I am starting to analyze again, and feel I have forgotten it all. it’s so mad, you feel so caught into it all again. I am so tired, I just want to sleep it all off, but I know when I wake up, that electric current will be back again. help me .!!

Lorry- I am not back to normal, I still have anxiety I am just learning there is nothing I can do to change it. Once it really hits home you have no control over this, the fighting eventually starts to slow down.. then stops to a halt and recovery can begin. You will get better when you stop grasping to get better, recovery happens subconsciously when you give your mind and body a rest. So just for one day- tell yourself you can worry about how you feel, or you can feel like it anyway and get on with things. Why do you think you feel better at your lowest ebb? Because you can’t be bothered to fight anymore… so why not stop the fighting before you reach your lowest ebb and give your nerves a chance to recover. Take that leap of faith and let yourself be- whats the worst that can happen? The truth is the worst that can happen has already happened, so you have nothing to lose in letting go of the fight.

Take care x

Your a star Candie, I see where you are coming from and Lorry, you are always so kind and supportive to others on here when they are having a hard time, try turning those understanding words on yourself x

Yes that is good advice Candie and it’s really good to see someone who has truly grasped what I have always tried to get across.

Lorry it does take time and nothing comes overnight. But please don’t do the anxiety search, going from one site to another, investigating every symptom. You will just end up going around in circles and making anxiety the focus of your day or more to the point you will make ‘How to get rid of it’ the focus of your day which is something I think you do and what does hold you back from time to time. Again it will all fall into place in time. Nearly everything I preach not to do, I know because I did everyone of them myself.

Paul

Candie – I think it’s really good what you said about not breaking the ‘flow’ with thoughts and feelings. I’ve started to get a few pesky thoughts coming back and was wondering what you do/did when this happens to you – do you just let them be there or do you say something to yourself like ‘I’ll be fine’? It’s often hard to remember not to fight the thoughts and feelings of anxiety when you’re feeling rubbish!

Hi Candie thanks for your post. I’ve got a copy of Will’s book and took another look through it last night bearing what you said in mind. I think I can see where I’ve been going wrong now! Like you I am a perfectionist and realise that I have spent loads of time going back trying to control/fight the thoughts I have been having and this has now become a habit of fearing them as well. This morning I am trying to let them ‘flow’ in and out, not question them and live in the present moment and feel slightly better already.

I can see that this won’t be easy to do all the time and won’t be sorted overnight but like any bad habit it can be overcome!

That’s interesting Mike I never knew that and your right anyone can suffer. There are probably many more people in the public eye that suffer. On Will’s book, I think you either get it or you don’t. It is a little advanced, but can be simplified. The message in the book is to again not to have internel fights for perfection, simplified, ‘Don’t fight to be right’ and allow yourself to be.

Hi everyone.

I’m going to respond to the starting post as sometimes its the feeling of entrapment is what can really let someone feel down while suffering.

The only thing that really keeps us in the cycle of anxiety is the level of significance and the attention that we give it. It’s really that simple. The advice given here by Paul is entirely simplistic – accept the fact that you are feeling bad, and do not make it a broader issue. This method really works because it loosens the mental grip that anxiety has on us, and it also allows us to just freely move forward without adding any more fuel to the fire.

We all have heard at some time Issac Newton’s third law of physics. It states that “every action must have an equal and opposite reaction.” I believe that this statement does indeed comply with how the human mind works as well. I believe that the human mind functions on the principle that every emotion that we experience is a reaction to something we consciously do or think of. Another thing that I realized is that the reactions cannot be experienced without an underlying action. A simple example is us being either hungry or full. When we are hungry our body sends us a message that we need to stop what we are doing and to eat and replenish our reserves. On the other hand, when we start eating and we reach the point that we are full, our body sends us a message that we have reached our limit and that we should stop eating. This simple example not only shows us the action-reaction forces that happen but also reveal a deeper intelligence in that our body knows how to limit itself and that we cannot keep eating forever. This ensures that we can never really push ourselves over the edge if we truly listen to what our body is telling us.

Now you may be wondering how this relates to anxiety. Well, I describe anxiety as purely a reactionary mechanism. We cannot decide to be anxious without some underlying action that takes place. This is very simple to prove; at this very moment try to be anxious, try to experience all those symptoms and things that you fear, will it upon you. I guarantee that you can’t. Therefore it is purely impossible to willfully experience anxiety.

So the question remains, what is the underlying action that is causing us to experience all this? The answer is an over-stimulation of our minds, or us over-analyzing a particular situation. Think about it. When we are anxious, we can easily pinpoint the thing that we are fearing – be it a particular symptom, going crazy, losing control etc. While we are anxious a bunch of rapid-fire thoughts enter our minds that relate to why we are fearing it, what its effects could be, what will become of us afterwards, and plenty of “what if” statements that are poorly constructed and have carry little validity if we analyze them well enough. So it is clear that we are overstimulating the mind and that we are feeling this way purely because it is telling us that it needs rest and that it has had enough of this.

So why when we are given all the useful most simplistic advice of accepting this anxiety, it still doesn’t seem to be working right away? Well, when we are anxious, our body is in an all or nothing phase. Heightened anxiety, like the fight or flight response, will make us so hyper-aware of our surroundings, that we tend to look for potential threats and symptoms and take appropriate action, rather than to think of another solution. Since our minds are already overloaded as it is, when the solution to all this – the acceptance, the admittance to anxiety – crosses our minds, it is usually overanalyzed rather than being put to action. We think too much about the solution that instead of putting it into action, it remains a thought.

This type of action is common in situations under pressure. Think back to high school when we are taking a multiple-choice test. We’ve all been told that when answering these types of questions, go with your first instinct and stick with it. This is mainly because when we think about the question too much, we tend to over-analyze the question and we can essentially read things that aren’t really there. For example:

What colour is my car?
a) red
b) yellow
c) blue
d) orange

If the answer is red, then we can immediately proceed with the answer. But when we come back to it, we can think “well, it’s red, but when the sun is shining on it, it looks more orange than red and when its night, the red doesn’t show as much as the orange does.” It’s really easy to see how over-thinking can lead us in the entirely wrong direction.

So we know how over-stimulation of the mind can keep us in the anxiety cycle, but how can we break out of this cycle? Well think of it this way, our anxiety is something that is so irrational, so invalid, so stupid that we need a solution of equal value – recall Newton’s third law of physics. Paul’s solution of acceptance satisfies many of these qualities as acceptance, not worrying, possessing a whatever attitude destroys much of its significance already. But the one advice that Paul gives us on his website that really helped me the most

“Stop fighting them, just say: come if you wish, I am ready for you”

This notion of inviting, demanding its presence and willing it to be there is very empowering as it not only instils us with self-confidence, but it truly demonstrates the acceptance and our trust in our own bodies’ ability to protect itself. Jumping in the path of what we fear is something that we don’t think of right away since what we fear, is something that may hurt us. But when we really look at the situation, all it is is some excess adrenalin running through our bodies – totally harmless.

So I guess to summarize, anxiety is a reaction mechanism that triggers when our mind is over-stimulated and that a threat is perceived. Upon close inspection, this fear is simply our anxiety and excess adrenalin so it is perfectly safe to just confront it and see it for what it truly is.

Well, hope everyone has a good working week.

I totally agree with frank, a few days ago I experienced probably one of the scariest anxiety attacks ever ( for me)! I just laid there and observed and let it burn out, it got to a certain point and I remember thinking.. is that it!!! Yep, that was it! Now im feeling really anxious, but im not that scared of it… guess it’s just my nerves playing up more than me fuelling it.. as im trying to force myself into a deeper level of panic and to just observe it… but there is no deeper level of panic! This is it….. all this time I couldn’t quite recover because there was always that what if.

So I confronted the ‘what if’ and I just can’t be scared of it! Sure my hearts racing, feel dazed and hazy, shakey and having odd thoughts but that’s just adrenalin releasing…. this is the worst it can possibly be….. there really is no point of no return! I am almost mad with my anxiety for not letting me be scared so I can burn off some of this adrenalin! Now im sat here like a twitching, shattered wreck but its pure adrenalin… I feel no perceived threat.

Very good post once again Frank. To go along with a couple of things you say. The time we invite anxiety and its symptoms, we stop fearing them. I actually liked hitting a peak and observing just an increase of adrenalin and then seeing it die down. It was like ‘See again nothing happened, it died down as usual’ This gives you great confidence and the reason that you cannot make yourself feel anxious’ This is because you do not fear the symptoms when inviting and allowing. I always had that’Come if you wish’ attitude. It also helps when you feel particularly anxious again as you have allowed it and seen it die down so many times, you become less impressed by any symptoms and it loses edge, you then tend to take it more with a pinch of salt, instead of in my early days of fearing symptoms, running away from them, worrying about them…etc…etc…The feelings were the same, but my attitude had changed so much towards them and with this new attitude I added no fuel to feed the anxiety and symptoms came with less force and less often as I broke the cycle and gave my nerves the rest they needed.

It seems something has sunk in over recent days and I am starting to feel a little better. Something I have not been able to say, and really mean, for some months. I’ve been reading the blog, the book, searching symptoms, reading the book, the blog, etc etc, knowing it made sense on paper but still not able to really believe that it was anxiety, seeing the patterns but interpreting them as a threat rather than just anxiety.

I ended up seeing a neurologist because of pins and needles, prickling and general tremor and burning sensations on my skin. All frightening to me but GP, friends, family saying they were psycho somatic-I didn’t really understand what it meant. The neurologist said that the ‘healthy brain’ (ie not a brain with someone having anxiety) had filters that filter out a lot of the sensations going on in our bodies. In an anxiety brain, the adrenaline has over stimulated parts of our brain and there are no filters, like the tuning fork analogy in a way I guess, which is why I was feeling all these other sensations. They have calmed down since now I understand and can see the connection with the anxiety, tremors, negative thought cycles, exhausted etc. As my body is healing itself I can feel these symptoms weakening and as they are weakening I understand more that anxiety, adrenaline, tired nerves, whatever you want to call it is causing it and I am letting it be.
Just for today and the last few days, it has not been scaring me as much, if at all. The cycle of anxiety!
I’m gonna take things one day at a time although I feel something has clicked for the moment which is welcome.x

I’m a relatively new sufferer from panic/anxiety and am still in the first stages of recovery. I went through a dreadful weekend with intense continual rushes of adrenalin and try as I might I couldn’t seem to use pauls method of letting it wash over me and ignoring it, things went so bad I visited my GP yesterday who gave me a short course of oxazepam, I’m under no illusion that these meds will cure me, just hoping they’ll give me some relief from my physical symptoms while I use pauls methods. the adrenalin rushes calmed down and the ones I felt didn’t bother me, but then I started to feel like I couldn’t breathe, my doc checked my heart and lungs yesterday and I’ve also had ecgs when I didn’t know what I was suffering from, this difficulty breathing really scared me which made it worse I’m sure but its so hard to think rationally at the time. I’ve also developed a problem with food, my first panic attack came out of the blue after I’d eaten, today I felt a little better and went out with my friend, I bought myself a snack to try as of course I have to eat, started my food and seemed ok then out of the blue I got a huge urge to run which I did, started playing games on pc to distract myself, didn’t work, got to the point where I was imagining ambulances and hospitals. I then decided to lie on the sofa turned on a loves songs channel and laid down and tried to relax, I knew I was tense because my legs were stiff, tried to shut down my mind and drift off, the phone rang and woke me up but I did feel much calmer. I’m sorry this is such an essay but did I do the right thing? Is this what Paul is saying when he says to let it take you? Is just the breathing going off normal? I felt no rushes of adrenalin as such. Should I take myself off and try to relax and breath through it? Does or did anyone else here have the problem with food? how did you combat it?

Thanks for listening.

Lisa.

Thank you for telling your story Amy and I am so pleased you found your recovery and the book and site helped, it makes it all worth it. And as I always say stories like yours give so much help and belief to others. Well done and good luck in the future.

Paul

Lisa, Don’t forget the house warming invites and good luck with your move.

Can anyone relate to this? Feeling really excited and anxious while having a conversation with someone…my usual conversations are started anxiously, like I guess I should talk to them, then I start talking to them and once the conversation is going well, then I start getting excited, and start talking real fast…I try to calm down while I’m talking but it real hard cause I feel like the other person can notice all my reactions…I start to notice every movement I make and how I stand when talking, if I swallow or not, etc…Then I notice how easily most people can switch what their thinking, say during the above conversation a person comes in the room…the person I was talking to can come up with something to say to them so easily…like their in a flow of some sort…

I normally don’t make two posts per topic but the thoughts of the first post seem like the perfect place for this.

I like to point out a few points on how an aspect of our thinking minds that may put a perspective on anxiety and recovery. The truth is, all our thoughts are connected. Often when we suffer from an anxiety attack or fight or flight response, it is often due to a single thought that we become truly scared of, and this triggers many other thoughts that come at us in a rapid-fire fashion. This is primarily caused by our adrenal glands releasing adrenalin all over our body. Often while this happens, our fear of the situation rises because we start to draw connections between two similar thoughts, and eventually this string of thoughts becomes so frightening that we start to panic. While I have experienced this, this sense of panic usually stops itself after 15 – 30 minutes later as one single thought finally brings us back to reality.

The key point of all this is that every anxiety “attack” that happens is a string of thoughts that are tied together with one particular thought that we “fear” or are “fearing”. While it may seem that the attack comes out of the blue, if we look back and inspect it, we can actually find that that it actually builds up and that the moment of panic was not caused by a particular thought out of the blue, but a string of thoughts that we conjured either consciously or subconsciously.

Let’s take a particular example of how our thoughts are connected. In fact I’m sure many of you can share this experience I’m about to describe. Let’s look back when we first suffered. After an anxiety or panic attack, we begin to question our well being and we begin to do some research on how we are feeling and all our particular symptoms. We are pretty much in a state of desperation. We go on to Google, and we type in things like anxiety, panic attacks, cures, recovery, symptoms and other things that worry us. Finally, we land on this site as Paul guides us towards recovery.

Compare this to a panic attack. We experience one particular sensation or worrisome thought at some point earlier in the day. We tell ourselves it’s a one-off and that we shouldn’t worry about it. But what do we do? The thought sticks in our mind like a magnet and we can’t seem to get rid of it. Then another string of thoughts come in and eventually, the string gets longer and longer. Pretty soon the length of the string overwhelms us and we panic. So the connection of thoughts is definitely there. Often we are too bewildered to notice this right away.

So the question really boils down to what this topic is saying. How do we break out of this thought cycle? How do we recover and cut that string of thoughts to return to our normal selves? Well, I’m sure many of you see recovery as the freedom from constant anxiety and constant fear. To be able to live life to the fullest and to not worry about a particular symptom or sign that something is wrong with us.

The stigma of anxiety and recovery, I like to describe it as, a two sided coin. Essentially what it means is that when you fully experience one, the other comes in shortly after. The cycle of anxiety attacks works this way too. We panic, then we enter into a state of calm, then we worry, and finally, we panic again. It’s the cycle that many of us are trapped in right now.

The truth is when you think of either one of them, the other comes in as a secondary thought. It’s inevitable to not view it this way. When a person views themself as anxious, then that person is likely to think of recovery. However when a person views themself as recovered, then it is true that they may have recovered, but when they begin to realize what they have recovered from and often they get too overconfident that they fall into the same cycle after feeling another symptom. So it is clear that the thought of anxiety and the thought of recovery are connected.

Let’s look at another example. Let’s say I give you a set of numbers.

10, 50, 65, 87, 30

Then I tell you, I want you to remember all of these numbers, but I want you to absolutely forget that the number 65 is on the list.

While it may be easy to recite those numbers and not the number 65, the mere fact that I told you to forget about “A specific number” makes it literally impossible to forget about it. Chances are, you will either remember all of them or none of them. You can’t truly tell someone to forget something because the mere thought of it being there is what attracts it. It’s very much like a magnet. This is the exact reason why telling someone regarding anxiety to “get a grip” or “forget about it” is completely useless. It only drills the thought into their head even more.

So how do we really situation from this two sided coin of anxiety and recovery? The solution is simple, you take away the coin. This is essentially the core of the advice that Paul gives us. The advice he initially gives us is one of acceptance and admittance of our bad feelings. This act, I like to describe, as an all or nothing act because it takes us out of the realm of anxiety and recovery. The notion of Paul’s advice can be this

“no matter how bad I feel, I accept it and will move on with my day accordingly”

This stance puts absolutely no emphasis on recovery or anxious thoughts because it takes away the significance of the sensations we are feeling. No matter how bad they are, I accept them and will move on. Often we make the mistake that we tell ourselves this, meaning the motive of recovery is there, which means that lurking in the background, the anxiety is there. In order for this to actually work, we need to take both recovery and anxiety out of the equation. In essence, take the coin away.

Let’s look at Paul’s second advice

“Come if you will, I am ready for you. Show me your worst. I want more. Is that really all you got? huh?”

Paul’s second advice is also all or nothing since once again it places no emphasis on anxiety or recovery. This time you are willing the fear on you. Demanding it. No matter how bad it is, you want to feel it, you want it to bring its worse. The aspect of recovery doesn’t matter. This advice is 100% stimulating. Once again, the stigma of the coin cannot have an effect since you have taken it entirely out of the equation.

So I guess the point of all this is that recovery from anxiety really involves taking our incentive to recover away. The more we think about recovery, the stronger the thought of anxiety will be. Essentially we must look straight ahead; not into the future and not back, but live in the now. The more we stop thinking about it, the lesser the impact that it will have on us. But it is vital that we do not impose this style of thinking on ourselves. This will only make those thoughts stay. We need to think beyond the sense of recovery and naturally, it comes to us.

Hope everyone enjoys the rest of the week.

Thanks Frank,
Your analogy about the string of thoughts getting longer and longer is something that I have been facing over the past few days. Ironically, I have been feeling so much better, but it was this thought that started me thinking about the anxiety again and then worrying that I was going to have a bigger fall if I climbed too high, if that makes any sense!
Then, last night I attended my usual yoga class and the instructor who I really admire started talking about a person she is working with who has OCD. She kept talking about it throughout the class and well this was enough to start me thinking that maybe all of this thinking about anxiety that I am doing is OCD, which happens to be one of my bigger fears; or the stigma of this is something I fear. I have learned a lot from this instructor about living life in the moment and being a witness to thought and not a victim to them. I was thinking that this may just be an opportunity to deal with this particular fear and that I should face it instead of run from it.
But trying to face it means thinking about it which is what I am trying to stop so you can see the problem! It really sounds quite funny and ridiculous as I am writing it down. I know that the answer is close to me, but I have read too much and thought too much to see it right now.
“Can’t see the forest for the trees”. Oh well, I am feeling better just writing this down, it is a little cathartic. This has caused me to lose some sleep which often gets me down, but as Paul has advised, I will try to shrug it off, not pay it too much attention and move on with my day.
If anyone out there has any advice though, I would appreciate it.
Thanks, have a beautiful day!

Very good post Frank and yes you can only make yourself anxious if you fear the feelings, anxiety lives on the fear of it.

I am also glad Frank that you said this as I think it is very important.

Paul’s second advice is also all or nothing since once again it places no emphasis on anxiety or recovery.

And yes as I have said before, ‘don’t make it your daily aim to get better’, give up that battle and you will move forward. I remember someone saying to me ‘I have tried all day to keep my anxiety at bay’ I said ‘Well not only have you fought all day getting nowhere, but you have also made it the focus of your day, try the same battle tomorrow and you will lose again’. Let anxiety and its symptoms go where it wants, don’t feel the need to control or stop it, allow, welcome it even, it has no power once we allow it. We no longer fight it, we no longer worry about it, we no longer go around all day thinking of ways to rid ourselves of it, we no longer fill ourselves with self-pity, we no longer make it the focus of our day, yes it still lingers in the background and that’s fine, we have been focusing on it for a while but that habit will die down in time. Too many people think once they give up the battle with themselves they will feel great and if they don’t they are back asking questions or searching symptoms around the internet.

As Candie said in an earlier post is that she still feels anxiety, but has a totally different attitude to it and looks at it with interest and not fear anymore. She is not as bewildered by it and understands enough to not let it scare or bewilder her. So she worries less about it, does not try to do anything about it anymore, understands it always dies down so is less impressed by it. All this I went through and all it means is she has finally opened the door to recovery, she understands it won’t go overnight but feels enough of a change to know that she is going in the right direction. All this happened to me, people sometimes say I am better but not sure how or what I did. They understood enough to take the fear out of anxiety, it bothered them less and they started focusing on other things and recovery just crept upon them. It all started with a better understanding and less fear of their symptoms. I was so unimpressed by how I felt I would have to think about how I felt. At one time how I felt was my day as I was so impressed by it, I thought of nothing else but trying to rid myself of how I was feeling. This had to change before I could hope to move forward.

Paul

Yes, Paul, before I believed acceptance was my key to make it go away… for months I just put up with my symptoms… but now im slowly moving towards them. I think you have to invite the fear in your anxiety causes before you can make real improvements. Acceptance to me goes this way- learning to live beside the anxiety, anything else is a bonus.

Expecting too much of yourself can really hold you back. I used to say to myself ‘accept it and you will feel better’- then I never instantly- and would get more aggravated! It can take a while for the cobwebs to clear.

One of the biggest “Ah ya” moments for me, and it wasn’t easy, was to finally realize and to start to internalize that I do not have control over what happens to those around me. I was always trying to make everything right for my husband, my kids, my mom. Always trying to control the environment…usually by just worrying about it. I had this distorted idea that if I wasn’t worrying I wasn’t doing my part…like I didn’t care. Then I finally realized, no one knows what is going on inside my head, no one knows whether I’m worrying or not and worrying is not helping the situation and it certainly wasn’t helping me. I am slowly living the idea that I don’t have control and I never will, so all of worry in the world won’t change that. There is a scripture something like “Worry never added one day to a man’s life” so I try to remember that and live for the day. Release control and you’ll feel the freedom of recovery.

Dean- eat the foods, eat them as often as you would like- until the fear subsides. The way to get over this is to move towards the fear. Whiles you still fear this the anxiety will stick around. Only you know if this is an irrational fear, or if you really have allergies to these foods- you can have tests done if you are confident you have them.

Hi, New to writing on this site but been reading it for several weeks. This is all so familiar to me. I haven’t got the book but have read Claire Weekes books on and off for years, which seem to say similar things. Since recovering from cancer my anxiety has come back with a vengeance. Although the prognosis is good and it’s nearly 2 years since finishing chemo the anxiety remains. I understand its the automatic thoughts that release the adrenalin and then the cycle goes. In the evening I seem to feel much better and can see things rationally and then as soon as I wake in the morning the cycle starts again, how am I going to get through the day. It seems so difficult at times to just let the anxiety be there but I know its the only way to lessen it. If only we had an on/off switch. Suppose we need to look at it like a dimmer switch that is more subtle. Reading how other people suffer and cope does help to know I am not alone and I can get better. Take care

Hi everyone, a big welcome to the blog for the newbies too! 😀

Sarah, you seem to be scared of your own mind… which is something we all experience. The way to lose these thoughts is to confront the fear they cause- I was at my wits end so I sat and waited for myself to ‘lose control’… but it didn’t happen. It never does, if you’re going to lose control it happens anyway. I suppose anxious thoughts are caused by trying to reinforce control internally- to gain some relief from the anxiety. But it has the opposite effect! As someone once said on here, loosen the grip on trying to gain control and recovery will come to you.

Yes as Candie says welcome to all the new posters over the weekend, I think there were about 6 newcomers all in one day. Although I may not have the time to answer all your questions, I will pick up on some main points and post a little something later.

Lisa: Painting for cider, Well sounds good to me, the longer I paint, the wobblier it may get though. Good luck with your move and keep popping in to say hello.

Hi,
I have come a long way in my battle but seem to be left feeling unhappy and unexcited about things. I wonder whether you can truly get back to the person you once was once these feelings subside or is it something you have to work on over time. I find it frustrating at times but at the same time know that it is a matter of patience and time. I also think that the memories will be hard to let go of and have become a habit to think about often which may also be causing this feeling. If anyone has any thoughts or has experienced or is experiencing the same stage then some advice would be good.
Take care everyone

Hiya Lisa, I went through a phase like that, as I thought i might have a food intolerance. But I didn’t. Can you relate the itching feeling to any particular types of food? and can you say where the itching burning is ? above your belly button or below it? Possibly right at the point where the ribcage/breast bone ends?

Hi Amy
I remember in previous posts you mentioned you felt more anxious when the weather was dull and miserable. I have had the same thing, often feeling more anxious on cloudy dull days. What I have noticed is that now I am improving I don’t feel nearly as anxious but am still left with the memories of how bad I felt so dull days tend to remind me of my anxiety! I do worry that I’m slipping back sometimes but on the whole I’m definitely moving forward. Is there anything you did to help yourself overcome this particular thought pattern?

Hi, Peter, I think it must have been another Amy but funnily enough, I did feel worse on dull days. What I did was broke that pattern of memories. I would recognise that it was memory and not fight it, tried to look at the memories without reacting to them ie not highlighting the fact that these memories were important. With time the brain learns that those memories don’t matter anymore as no emotion is attached to them. Also, I spent as much time as I could outside, even if for 10 – 15 mins at lunchtime and after work. Exercise, for me swimming is good as it gets my arms and shoulders moving where a lot of my tension lies.

Also, when you start remembering about your anxiety and how it used to affect you, you have a choice as to how you react to it. You can either let it make you feel apprehensive, scared, or sad OR you can choose to think ‘man, I’ve experienced things others haven’t (but many have), I must give my self some slack and think wow that takes courage and patience’ ie make it a positive experience and learn from it. I certainly take a lot of time to chill now. I learnt my behaviours were my downfall – always on the go, doing too much, trying to please others etc. Once you can face your past without fear, you are there. SO face these memories, don’t flinch, don’t attach emotion and be pleased with yourself with what you’ve come through. Visualisations of sunny places on cloudy days also make me feel better too.

Also, last winter I got a lightbox from eBay. I know they can be expensive, think mines was £40 but man, they certainly light up your room. It’s quite nice to get some bright light. they do work for a lot of peeps esp in the winter. Not sure if this info helps.

Hiya Lisa, I had mega probs with my stomach just like that. it’s a lovely mixture of tension and nerves being sensitive. There’s a saying something like the stomach cries when other parts of the body aren’t working right otherwise it’s very sensitive and the core of your whole body. Also stomach acid will play a part in causing some pain. What I did was felt and noticed the discomfort (don’t flinch from it) and tried to eat every 2-3 hours. even something plain like a piece of toast or crackers with spread. My main thing though was milk. when you haven’t had much in the day, milk is nutritionally sound to help you get your appetite and metabolism going again. You might not be feeling hungry and the mo (or full like you say) as your muscles are tense and metabolism has learnt to slow right down due to you not eating much. so slowly do it and don’t panic if you don’t finish a whole meal, just come back to it later but once you mentally release that tension in the stomach it does go. Believe me. Also if you take an attack during eating then let yourself have an attack. WHo’s in charge here you or anxiety? It doesn’t matter just let it come, let it go and your body will learn that it’s much easier to be not anxious and tense than anxious and tense/ Add no emotion apart from carefree and you’ll feel lots better. I’ve been where you are. You can do it!!! Time to take control back.

Is it normal lose weight during anxiety? I seem to lose some weight over the past months even without exercising. I eat normal and I eat the right food.

Thnaks

Hi,
a question for Amy: How did you overcome the fear of the anxiety returning. I feel I am getting there but am not back to my old self and seem to have the fear of the anxiety being there or returning in the future. I have not read too many success stories rather people just coping with it so to speak so I would be interested to know what full recovery feels like and how you know when you are there. I am not on medication and do not worry too much about what things I eat either but would like to try and look forward to things and feel happier than I do at the moment as it puts a terrible strain on my whole family and I would like to see myself well and enjoying life the way it should be. Do you feel like your old self or is there something missing. I also feel like I have got into the habit of holding back for some reason and get a little down from time to time more through frustration than anything else and also hearing how some people take forever to get over it if at all which I know doesn’t always help. Maybe hearing a success story and concrete proof that it can be achieved would be good and give belief to others.
Thanks

hi again,
I guess i have read too many things about people suffering for a long long time and also mainly about how to live with it rather than recovering from it. This is what most articles suggest and there aren’t many which give positive advice as Paul does. I would like to believe everyone can go on to recover and live healthy happy lives but I think sometimes a bit of doubt creeps into everyone’s mind from time to time rightly or wrongly. At the end of the day I know it comes down to patience and time but I think we are all guilty of looking for answers especially when all we have done is stress/worry for a while and then suddenly everything is turned upside down and we are left picking up the pieces.
I am not disputing that people have recovered and are recovering and hopefully at some stage, I will be here saying just that but I think there is too much negative reading out there and not enough positive which is what we all need when battling.
It does help knowing others are in the same boat nonetheless and helping each other.

Hi Paul,
Thanks for the advice. I do try and keep away from the subject when I can as I am aware that drowning in it as a subject doesn’t help. I think I would be the same after recovery and not wanting to relight the fire so to speak. I think I take too much to heart and reading about ‘coping with it’ or ‘living with it’ is not good enough for me as I would like to think I can go on to fully recover and just be more aware of it in the future. Reading your story is positive and talking to others who have been through the same experience does help greatly. You are right when you say it is an up and down affair and I do feel I have come a long way to how I was. This site has been very helpful to me and I will stick around as there is some good advice. I think I am guilty of being impatient and a bit of self-pity from time to time and reading information which is not always helpful and sows the seeds of doubt. I think this is the only site that doesn’t want to sell programs or cd’s of miracle cures and offers the advice for free. It is hard to keep the faith at times but when I get back to being the person I would like to be I shall be glad I did keep the faith.
Thanks for the reply

SJ it is not about ‘it’ coming back, once you learn about it and recover it is only you who can go back there again. But you learn so much, I am a far calmer person before my anxiety, my whole outlook on life has changed, trivial things seem just that. I learnt not to worry or stress about things, what will be will be and even through my recovery I learnt not to worry about how I was feeling as I understood it, how could I worry or stress about it when I understood, before I did that is all I did ‘Worry’ about every aspect of it. I can guarantee I will never go back there, I could never worry or put too much stress on my body to do so. Even now I may get a day when I feel a little anxious and it does not bother me in the slightest. You are worrying about anxiety and this puts more stress and worry on your body, hence you stay in the cycle, it is all the fuels it needs. My recovery came when I started to do the opposite and that came through knowledge when I did not understand sure I was bound to worry and stress about it, try to get rid of it, try and think my way better, yes all the things that kept me in the cycle. It is like learning a new subject and this is why people recover later down the line, the more they learn and understand the less they worry or question how they feel, the less bewildered they are.

And it is not a ‘thing’ or an ‘it’ that has chosen you or others. Anxiety is just our bodies being overworked, our nerves get overworked and become bad if you like, we become sensitised, it is just our body telling you it needs a break. If you overwork any machine beyond it limits then it breaks down or starts to clunk and run bad, your body is the same and just now needs a break to recover, but we don’t do this, we then worry about how we feel and the cycle continues.

Paul

SJ…About six months ago I thought exactly want you mentioned. “Do anyone really recover from anxiety?” I wanted to know why there is so much suffering on the internet and not much help.

Well I’m here to attest that Paul’s book and this blog is where the answers are for anxiety and DP recovery. I have a long story of anxiety starting back in high school and DP which started in college. After following this site, reading Paul’s book and putting the ideas into practice (this is the key) I’ve become a new man.

I’m not 100% yet – don’t let this scare you because it’s only a matter of time – but I’m felt feelings and emotions that I haven’t felt in years. A sense of pride has returned as well. I’ve finally found what I was searching for…anxiety and DP recovery! And this blog and book is the main reason why.

J.R that’s great and I am glad the book/blog has helped you so much and you make a good point, you are not there yet but so happy with the great progress you have made. This is what I always tell people, don’t look too far ahead and demand full recovery, just go for progress, this is a far better attitude to have as recovery comes bit by bit, little parts of the old you surface, you start to feel emotions again, you start to enjoy things again, smile again, feel calmer, more able to hold conversations, it all comes in layers, it did for me. When people look at recovery it seems so far away, but when they felt healthy and anxiety-free they probably never imagined feeling like this. So just be happy with the progress and don’t put the pressure of recovery on your shoulders.

SJ, I could sign most of your posts as if they were mine (so keep up on good work :-P). I’m about at the same stage — I made some progress, yet the impatience of “getting it over with” pops up, and the “what if I’m not on a good path?” and “this treatment takes too long”… looking too far ahead I guess. That’s probably slowing me down a bit (along with this awful weather in Continental Europe, and mild illness which also causes lack of exercise, some extra stress on the job,…).

The first step is understanding Lisa… if you couldn’t breathe… then you would stop breathing- yet you haven’t- so clearly you can breathe. I get a feeling like my throat is a bit restricted sometimes, which makes me breathe heavier. So one day I thought ‘sod this’…. I willed the anxiety on and sat there and waited for me to stop breathing. Well, I could have waited forever, because it didn’t happen… it never does. Anxiety is fear of what may happen, and the feelings you feel during this. If you are asthmatic, however, I wouldn’t advise you to ‘dare’ the anxiety… but give it a go if your not and I can guarantee after a few times the fear will dampen.

If there is one thing that will show great results during recovery it is embracing your fears, and keep doing it till you no longer fear them. If your scared of chest pains, breathing, thoughts, phobias, leaving the house, eating… ANYTHING- then face the fear. It is the last step for me, I have accepted the physical sensations… now im learning to embrace my fears. You don’t have to throw yourself straight in at the deep end either. Just move slowly towards it at your own pace.

hi paul

i wondered if you could do a post on the feeling of something bad is going to happen i have this feeling most days and it really does upset me i have improved so much over the last couple of months but yet this feeling is still with me i just feel like it will have me spiralling backwards it leads my thought processes to think i am not getting better and will always be caught in this anxiety spiral

many trhanks

samantha

Hi Candie,

Thanks for replying to me, I have been digesting the information here, and I must tell you all, I have had quite a ‘revelation’ yesterday! Let me explain;

I live in France, and for the past 3 weeks or so, I have been trying to teach my mum French, as she would like to converse with our lovely neighbours (who have taken to dropping in wild mushrooms, smoked trout and all manners of alcoholic drinks, made with apples!) Anyway, she was really fed up, as she could not seem to absorb the basic principles, no matter how hard she tried. I asked her when was the last time she had really ‘tried’ to learn anything? She replied, ‘ when she was at school’ (a long time ago!) I then said to her, ‘well, when I first used my Nintendo brain train, my ‘brain age’ was 90 yrs old!, but after some practice, this has reduced considerably, so, therefore, it must mean, I am activating a facility, that I have not used very much, and am progressing smoothly. Therefore, she couldn’t expect to learn French straight away, as her ‘learning part’ was a tad rusty!
As I said this, it came to me, if I have been using my analysing facility, lots and lots (and believe me I have) it is well ‘oiled’ and going to be set a really high level. So, when those of you in the know, say, let the constant analysing pass, give it space, but do not indulge it, what we are really doing is re-setting our levels. So! I tried it today, I said to myself, right, no analysing about stuff that is really not important (you may recall I was stressing about my brain function last week) The thoughts drifted in and out, and all the while I concentrated on the task at hand and got on with my day. It turned out to be a really good day! Earlier this evening, I felt myself feeling tense, and apprehensive, even a bit sad, so I told myself, ‘what do you expect? You have been in shreds for nearly 6 months!’ And do you know what? It PASSED!

I reckon I have finally got the last piece of the jigsaw, the thoughts were always so much harder than the physical symptoms, it took me no time to get shot of those, but it looks as if I will be able to get shot of the thought aspect after all. I can really accept that it is going to take a while, they have been with me on/off for 5 years now, though really bad the last 6 months, but hey, habits can be changed! I know this much, if I stopped speaking French today, within 6 months or so, I would have great difficulty in conversing, so why not lose the anxiety habit?

hi there, I can totally relate to the thoughts thing, and like we are all getting reminded it is just habit. but we have to really believe it before we can change it. we can all get there, we truly can and I am saying that with so much belief now. it has taken me a long time to get into the habit but I have and that’s the main point !. hi, candy and Lisa and Katy hope you’re all well, and Shirley too!.

As I always say this place is such a great help.

Going off the subject. I live in Southampton quite close to where the young dad and his 2 kids died. I was trying to explain to my hubby that so many lives have ended needlessly because they truly believe the thoughts that they are having are real. It was such a tragedy. its people like paul who really help and get us to understand things.
have a good day all

I would appreciate some clarification on the following, my doctor says I have anxiety and have used the info on this site and other resources I am feeling much better than 10 weeks ago. However, some days I still feel like I do not want to get back fully to the cut and thrust of normal life. Is this because my anxiety is getting worse, or am I having a mental/nervous breakdown or is this the norm. Paul, I am sure you may be able to appreciate where I am coming from. I think in a nutshell I am worried that having made great progress, I don’t want to suffer a major relapse. Cheers

Hi LorryT, I’ve read the story your on about in the paper, its awful isn’t it. The man that did it was suffering from depression I read, a bit like the story about that man who jumped off a balcony on holiday with his kids. Some would call it a selfish act of love, some would say he was mad.

James, this blog is here to help people, so don’t be frightened to post how you feel! I know I have come here in the earlier stages of my recovery and posted a few desperate messages. As Paul said he wanted this website to be the last place anyone with anxiety had to go for answers. It is fine to seek some reassurance, as long as you remember recovery is about believing in yourself too. It is a learning experience, confidence builds slowly- that’s why it can take coming through bad periods of anxiety for us to see there is no real threat. I know after iv had a bad week I always come through thinking- yet again nothing bad ever happened. Anxiety reared its ugly head earlier today… so I thought whatever, this is boring now… nothing bad is going to happen, it didn’t and it never will. I feel great now and haven’t given my little episode a second thought.

I have come to a stage now where I really am bored with what anxiety throws at me, it’s like… oh you again, get on with it then so I can see yet again how nothing bad is going to happen…. I call its bluff every time and nothing bad ever happens. In fact, after reading what iv put- I think I have bigger problems- talking about anxiety as if it is a person! haha

Thanks Candie, I asked the question on another forum and it was suggested that maybe I got to relaxed and that scared me, it makes sense kinda cos for the rest of the day I was afraid to sit down! probably my body is so used to being tense it came as a shock lol

Hi Lorry T and Candie,
I am in Canada but occasionally there are similar stories in the paper here and just recently I read on my yoga teachers’ blog that one of her students took her own life. This used to be something that really scared me and to tell the truth it is still a kick in the stomach when I hear of such things. But I remind myself that it is difficult for everyone to hear not just people with anxiety. It is okay to feel sad and I am allowing myself to feel that and then move on with my life. Worrying about it won’t help. I also remind myself that this is not the only time that I will be confronted with news of this sort so it is an opportunity to deal with it in the right way. There is a temptation to try and work it out, reassure myself that I wouldn’t do that…. but as you said Candie, your faith in yourself builds on the road to recovery and I am truly feeling this, so the need to analyze every emotion is fading.
Staying off the blog has helped too. I was too reliant on it, as much as it has helped, I needed to think of other things.
Hey Scarlet, I picked up a book you recommended awhile back – “Stop worrying and start living”. It’s a good read, and interesting to see that through time, much of the advice on recovery has always been similar, even Eckhart Tolle’s popular work echoes what Claire Weekes was saying 50 years ago – that we have to start witnessing our emotions and stay in the moment. Sounds so easy, doesn’t it! Off to start the day, have a good one all! Nicole