Fear is the enemy. Fear is what feeds our anxiety and nourishes our sensitive nerves. Stress is normal but if it becomes overwhelming and we feel we've lost control that's the point that we pass into anxiety disorder. Our nervous system becomes hyper sensitive: every small worry and improbable threat becomes magnified many times over.
We imagine we have all kinds of life-threatening illnesses, imagination and Google provide the symptoms, the finest doctors in the land can't change our minds. Or we develop social anxiety or agoraphobia as our mind tries to protect us from imagined threats by making us avoid people and staying home.
It's tiring work fighting anxiety and this can lead to depletion which is to say depression. We have entered a toxic cycle of symptoms and bad thoughts causing fear which floods our nervous system causing more sensitivity which causes more symptoms causing more fear hormones causing more nervous sensitivity and on and on we go.
If only we could stop frightening ourselves half to death every few minutes. Maybe we can: through understanding and reassurance and by simply stop fighting. Fighting causes more strain and tension, things we need less of not more.
UNDERSTAND that if doctors and blood tests and scans say you're physically fine and it's all due to anxiety then they're right. Believe them. If it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck then it's probably a duck. UNDERSTAND that your nervous system has reached breaking point and become hyper sensitive and this is the true cause of our symptoms and bad feelings.
Be REASSURED that the power of anxiety is limited and it can't kill you or disable you or make you lose your mind.
Be REASSURED that you can recover no matter how long and how deeply you have suffered the moment you stop prolonging your illness by flooding your nerves with fear hormones every 5 minutes. It isn't necessary and it doesn't help.
So work with your doctor, consider medications, try talking cures such as CBT and explore the self-help paths to recovery contained in books and YouTube.
But FACE the fact that it's 'only' anxiety. Stop fighting your anxiety and ACCEPT all the symptoms and bad feelings for the moment. FLOAT through each day feeling that some outside force is propelling you forward. And LET TIME PASS: you spent months and years getting into this state, allow time to recover.
And the greatest of these is ACCEPTANCE (for the time being) because it robs fear of its power.
I am 75 years old, this is everything I have learned about anxiety in my lifetime.
Written by
Jeff1943
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Thank you for posting this!! I just posted and then yours came up afterwards...I really needed to hear this today. You are right. We are so much stronger than we believe. Stronger than the anxiety. Thank you Jeff1943🙏🏼
I needed to hear this so much. I've been drowning in everything and fighting with all I have, and it's so so so nice to hear that I don't have to. I'm so tired. Maybe I can rest now. Thank you.
Such true words Jeff, thank you. I have not been in a good place recently and your posts are always timely for me. Just when i tell myself its just anxiety, a symptom comes up and i am full of fear again and shaking. I scurry to make doctor appointments but only to find myself in the same fearful place again.
I am tired, anxiety and worry is exhausting. As of late i have been worried about pulsitate tinnitus that i gave had in my right ear since June. I have worried it us my BP but the doctor sats that is fine (i have finally been able ti quit checking it at home which only aided in making me more anxious. My doctor ordered an MRA which showed no problems. I have seen an ENT and had no allergies but my ears feel full and my gut tells me it is inner ear related as i get stuffy and have chronic sinusitus. I also feel off balance and light headed and also attribute to middle ear problems but seems nothing to be done. I think i see the doctor too much needing reassurance which is only fleeting. So i have canceled my next ENT appt. and they were having me go for a nurse visit to check BP (which is fine) so i have canceled that as well. You see, i am trying to gain some contol over myself and have fewer doctor appt which only seems to be feeding my health anxiety.
I say all this because talk therapy helps me the most to get out of my thoughts and eases my worry. Thanks to all who had heard me and this forum, i am grateful.
Chris, I too have a touch of pulsile tinnitus but having had a scan which was o.k. I don't notice it any more unless I search for it. I too feel ever so slightly unsteady and have feelings of fullness in the middle ear. I'm probably much older than you so I can use a cane when on long walks, trouble is you can get too used to using a cane so you feel even more unsteady without it!
In my case it's just the aging process, something to do with blood vessels in the inner ear. There's a tablet called Serc that is supposed to be helpful but as I'm already on a statin and BP tablet I'll pass on that one.
Thank you for posting this. I always get so excited when you post.. You are so like Clare Weekes.. I've been watching her interviews on YouTube lately...I would recommend them to everyone... She was so awesome...
I first read Claire Weekes' first book in 1974 and I am an advocat of her acceptance method as you may have guessed. That book is titled 'Self help for your nerves' in the U.K. and 'Hope and help for your nerves' in the U.S. both versions available from Amazon. The book continues to receive excellent reader reviews: the fact that it was written years ago is not a weakness but a strength: it has passed the test of time.
This is a great message, I have been going through constant anxiety attack for a while now but I feel relaxed now, believing God that with time I will recover. Thanks.
Hi Jeff, I love reading your posts as you are just right in everything you say. I am 74 and luckily these bouts of anxiety only started when I was 50 and instead of treating me for menopause symptoms the Doctor gave me anti depressants for depression. Thank God I don’t have health anxiety, sounds better than hypochondria doesn’t it? The anxiety bout has lasted as long this time as I try to get out each day even if only a walk to Weatherspoons for a coffee. I asked my G.P. If I could see a phsyciatrist but you have to be almost suicidal to see one on NHS.
I love America and Americans and so many on Health Unlocked now and they seem to have more therapy than we do. I know CBT off by heart as been for so many sessions over the years. Doesn’t really help when I am really anxious. Chatting and being sociable,having a few drinks of wine with friends best thing for me.
Keep writing to us Jeff with your great advice from Lin x
Some people have anxiety and nervous breakdowns due to overwork or whatever but they eventually recover and are never bothered again.
But in the case of about 50% of us including me it's inherited, genetic, due to slight chemical imbalances. By understanding, reassurance and therapy (including self-therapy) we recover - but further episodes occur from time to time. But as we know how to deal with them and have successfully recovered once we can recover again and this time it's easier as we're experienced.
We recover by not fighting but accepting the symptoms for the time being. As Beevee once said here 'Learn to live with anxiety and you'll be able to live without it.'
Thank you Jeff. I’ve been feeling so so amazing the last few months but I’ve had a huge set back recently with the anxiety intrusive thoughts. I don’t have the social anxiety or the heath anxiety just real bad intrusive thoughts then I have the anxiety attack with them. I’m numb today. Trying so hard to accept them but my gosh they are so scary and the fear because of them is unreal. I keep reminding myself to float though then. That I’ve come so far and it is only the anxiety. Today it isn’t helping me much. I too am a Dr Claire Weekes fan. A fan or yourself and Beevs too. You both have helped me so much in the past.
Miss-P74, setbacks can be disappointing but four steps forward and one step back is still progress. Just practice what you know, the acceptance and the floating, and don't expect results by tea time, and your nerves will lose this temporary re-sensitivity and the intrusive thoughts will fade. I hope you resume your recovery soon.
Thank you Jeff. I appreciate you’re time. I really do. It just feels like I’m going round in circles. I am doing everything possible and I am not expecting speedy results just some peace within my head at times like this. Thanks again Jeff. I’m getting back to meditation and Dr Weekes recovery process.
My anxiety disorder is inherited so I will never be free of it entirely but using the late Claire Weekes' method of acceptance I keep free from major episodes and feel normal 95% of the time.
Wow! Your words are so inspiring. I am going to try and resist fighting my emotions and reactions, I tend to overreact and overthink, I am definitely going to try and stay calm and will think of all what you have said. Very wise words, thank you.
Nothing I write is original, AZ1970, I repeat the words and methods already written down over 50 years ago by the late Australian psychiatrist Claire Weekes who developed the acceptance method for respite and recovery. In recent years alone her books have been reader reviewed by 1,600 people on the UK and US versions of Amazon. 90% rated her method either Very Good or Excellent and her main book 'Self help for your nerves' is on its 40th reprint. In the US the same book is titled 'Hope and help for your nerves'.
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