Dealing with anxiety

[_Batman_]

Any advice on dealing with anxiety. I tried deep long breaths and that’s not really helpful. I’m on meds, but that only helps a bit.

[Ad1230]

Hey there! I’m so sorry to hear you’re dealing with anxiety lately. Some strategies other than breathing that I might recommend are grounding exercises and meditation. Grounding exercises help me come back into the present moment when my anxious thoughts start pulling me into the world of scary “what if’s?” and worst-case scenarios. There are lots of grounding exercises you can do, and different ones work better for different people, so I would suggest Googling some and trying them out!

I save meditation for when I’m feeling calmer. It helps me to build the habit of being aware of my thoughts and guiding them back to healthy places. If you are into Podcasts, the Anxiety Coaches Podcast has lots of great help and resources for anxiety.

[Ad1230]

P.S., Deep breathing didn’t help me much either until I found out that I wasn’t doing it quite right. There are two tricks that really helped me. 1) when you’re breathing in, make sure you’re feeling your belly expand like a balloon. Sometimes I hear this called “Buddha belly breathing”. This helps make sure your diaphragm relaxes. 2) Really take your time on the out breath. Ideally, your exhale should be even longer and slower than your inhale. I really struggled with this, so my therapist recommended that I exhale through a drinking straw to slow it down. It sounds silly, but it totally worked! You basically hold a straw in your mouth, breathe in deeply through your nose — expanding your belly, and then breathe out as slowly as possible through the straw. It takes practice, and it’s not an immediate fix, but I’ve found it to be so helpful. I wish you the best!

[Agora1]

Hi Batman, meds are only the band-aid to success while we try different tools in helpingus. Breathing is the "Key" if done properly and used daily. It's a learned practice.

Actually, it is the long exhale that gives us the relief we are looking for.

Enough to quiet the adrenaline, the fear and apprehension as well as allow us to

fall into a calming, peaceful state of mind. Breathe xx

[_Batman_]

Thank you for all the replies and advice