"If you suffer from anxiety, you probably have a contentious and complicated relationship with your mind. It feels like your mind tortures you. It gives you all these thoughts about what you should be scared of and horrible things that could happen to you."
ADAA member Michael Stein, PsyD, authors this recent blog post on anxious thoughts.
I can identify with this description-my anxious thoughts have overwhelmed my usual rational self ,and is exacerbated by 2 older sisters who lord it over me as if they were experts on anxiety/depression----sad thing is ,I let it get to me whereas before I wouldn't even engage in mental health issues{their ignorance is appaling,as well as their attitude -haven't seen any of them for 7years ,ywet they think they have the authority without any basis-ive spent a lifetime almost in educating myself on Mental health,and they are so out to belittle me -anyone else relate.?
If you haven't seen them in so many years, how are they belittling you.....text. phone calls, emails, facebook,?
Not certain if I identify exactly with your situation.
But after seven years of dealing with and dodging the impact and manipulations of a woman in my husband's family, I emailed her not to call, email, write, come near our home, or FaceBook EVER again. Explained why in one or two sentences. It wasn't easy to stick to that. But we have and life is a significant less anxiety filled with me not having to keep my guard up with her.
She couldn't accept that, and "Pollyanna" comtinued to try to bait me into a defensive position, her husband tried through facebook, It took 6 months of me just responding this was serious , not a game and final. Our home life is so much calmer by absolutely cutting her out of our lives. We have not given in during these two years following,
Really don't know it that approach is an appropriate for you, but perhaps enforcing a "time off" any communication periodically for a few weeks at a time might be something to consider?
hi thanks for your reply!Glad you managed to get rid of an unpleasant person.with me its family ,and I should have a life of my own without them as they are selfish and lack generousity of spirit,but I have had a lifetime of social phobia,ect and now I fear its too late as im not going forward with life and depression/stress anxiety are doing its best to keep me from moving on.im a lot older too though still mobile.im living as a recluse and im fearful of life!sorry to harp on ,just thought I id put you in the picture --its over the phone.and conversation is limited.
There is some of "me too" in your reply. Am older too and the woman in my mix is my husband's only sister. Pollyanna with everyone else, but she was always wanting something if she called us. Lives about 15 minutes from us. Husband has three adult children, he has written off two and Pollyanna decided to become very good aunt to them but also coloring my husband as a villian, no good father and he should just reach out and reconnect with them.
And she became a very good friend with husband's first wife, the mother of those adult children, over the last 6 years. Is that weird or what? Husband has been divorced for almost 30 years and his first wife is a fine woman,,,,,I have kept my distance but respectful to her......but there really is no reason to bother her.
Well, when an "event" happened that needed to be dealt with, I heard from the first wife what Pollyanna was saying so negatively about my husband. I was actually dumbfounded. I explained to her on the huge things he has done to help his sister, including supporting her and her family, and me allowing them to live in my condo for two years until I learned by letter from an attorney they were going to be evicted due to drug use, argument with other residents, etc. and I would have to pay the legal fees involved if I didn't get them out of condo. So I bargained another 3 months for them to find another place to live, No one employed with no reason not to be.
Pollyanna had never said anything about all that to the first wife,
That is when I decided we needed to get that sister and her famiily out of our lives. My internal anger and respect for my husband overcame my fears, and I just DID it.
And it is lonely and miss family...mine all live thousands of miles from here. We do wonder what will happen to us later. We just have one another to lean on.
So maybe we do have more in common than I thought. If you ever wish to send a personal mesage to me instead of "talking" on this open venue, that's fine. Have several ladies on their own as friends there where we can be more open in a private way and sometimes just to say hello, how was your day.
Thank you for the notice of the blog.
I guess I'm getting to old to worry anymore. At 73 I have had three first time epilepsy fits and was hospitalized be cause I went into a Blizzard world and lost all since of reality. I'm ok now and waiting for an nuroloistnuroloist
Live ADAA Webinar with Q&A: Calming the Inner-Chatter of Your MindNew ADAA Blog Post - Hope For Eating Disorder RecoveryADAA Blog Post: What You Can Do to Overcome the Effects of Anxiety DisordersNew ADAA Blog Post - Understanding Hoarding Responses to Covid-19: Where Did All the Toilet Paper Go?
What Calming Exercises have you used to help your anxious/depressive thoughts? 
