Anxiety Treatment

About Anxiety Treatment
Receiving anxiety treatment is now easier with the use of mental health services over the internet. Anxiety treatment consists of understanding your anxiety and then identifying the most appropriate treatment technique to decrease your symptoms. Traditional therapies that were previously received in an office setting, can now be received over the internet with the same success rate. When engaging via messaging, or attending a video or phone therapy session with Mindset Therapy, you will connect via a secure link while using your computer, smartphone, or tablet. Video sessions are face-to-face over non-recorded video conferencing which allows for a personalized experience with your therapist, in a location most convenient for you. By engaging via messaging or attending your video appointment over the internet, you remove obstacles such as travel time to the appointment, lack of quality care in your community, and the perceived stigma of being seen at the therapist’s office. Sessions over the internet also give you the most flexibility in attending your appointment. When treating anxiety over the internet, you choose the time and location most comfortable for you.

Anxiety Symptoms
Understanding anxiety can help you understand whether treatment with Mindset Therapy is the most appropriate choice for you. The word anxiety is a broad term that means many different things to people. Common ways people refer to anxiety is “stress”, “nerves being shot”, low patience, “I’m worried”, “I’m afraid”, and “I can’t do that”. Anxiety can affect physical, emotional, and cognitive (thinking) components of your body.

Common Symptoms of Anxiety Include:

• Fatigue

• Low Patience

• Increased Heart Rate

• Nausea

• Worry

• Feeling On Edge

• Sweating

• Irritability

The degree of impact on your life varies from person to person, and changes over time. Each symptom on its own may not be significant, but an increasing number of symptoms and greater impact on your life suggests your anxiety would benefit from treatment, so that you can lead a more productive and relaxed life. It is often helpful to seek guidance from those close to you to determine whether you have experienced any of the above symptoms, because it is often difficult to notice things in ourselves when they have developed slowly.

How to Help Improve Your Anxiety

While treating anxiety doesn’t always require a professional, it is important to recognize your anxiety as soon as possible to have better success in reducing your anxiety. One difficulty in recognizing anxiety is that it is insidious, or creeps up slowly. Due to the slow worsening of your anxiety, you unconsciously start to modify your environment to reduce your anxiety and feel better. However, this only acts to reinforce and strengthen your anxiety. An example would be, if a person is afraid of spiders and avoids the outdoors to prevent seeing a spider, they may start to also avoid the garage or certain rooms in their house for fear of seeing a spider. They may even avoid theme parks and other activities outside where they would be unlikely to see a spider. By doing this, they have increased/worsened their anxiety and their anxiety now determines how they live their life. What started as a fear of spiders has developed into them limiting their behaviors to reduce their anxiety.

Avoidance is a common way people reduce their anxiety, but the avoidance only worsens the anxiety. Anxiety can also take the form of worry, which is thoughts. Worry involves being “prepared” for things and thinking of various possible outcomes and scenarios to prepare. While preparation is good, worry becomes non-productive. Worrying includes “planning” for a problem that is not clearly defined and does not have a solution. When people worry, it is in an attempt to gain control over their life. However, they begin to feel out of control because of all the possible outcomes they have come up with for the issue. When avoidance and worry begin to affect your behaviors, mood, and physical functioning, you should consider help from a professional.

Anxiety Treatment Process
When making changes on your own is not enough to reduce your anxiety, seeking help from a professional can help you become successful. The anxiety treatment process includes meeting with your therapist to learn more about your anxiety and its triggers. Is your anxiety related to a thought or worry? Is your anxiety related to an object or activity? Once you and your therapist learn more about your anxiety, you will discuss the best treatment options to include cognitive-behavioral therapy or exposure therapy, both of which are highly successful in reducing your anxiety. Treatment of anxiety includes working with the thoughts that maintain the worry and avoidance and learning different ways to think about your anxious thought or object. Treatment for anxiety can be difficult because the therapist is asking you to face the thing you have been avoiding. Although this can be hard, it is required for success. Just as physical therapy after a surgery can be painful, it is necessary for a full recovery. Through open communication with your therapist, you will learn ways to reduce the anxiety in a safe environment at a pace you are most comfortable with.