Recovery can take time, there is no quick fix. Forget anyone who tells you otherwise, no secret hid away on the internet or a retreat. Each and every answer I found, every insight I ever had, every conclusion I came to was to give up the fight with myself. The fight with myself was the exact reason I was staying stuck and not getting better. Trying to get rid of anxiety was actually the cause and not the cure. I had tried everything and got nowhere until I came across Dr Claire Weekes' book "Essential Help for your Nerves" which taught me to stop trying to get better. The day I gave up trying to get better is the day things began to change, slowly. I realised that I could not force peace or relaxation, it just created more disturbance. My mind was exhausted with trying to find a way out, it is the reason thoughts went on non-stop, obsessive like. In doing nothing, I had to leave my mind alone, that was the only way it could settle. It could never settle by me using my mind even more because I was trying to fix anxiety with an anxious mind. It was like pouring petrol (gasoline) on a fire in the hope that the fire would be extinguished! I had to wake up wracked with anxiety, with my thoughts racing, the elephant standing on my chest, stressed up beyond my eyeballs and do absolutely nothing about it. Doing nothing gave my mind and body the rest it so craved. This was never about me, I could never rush recovery, never force it. I realised that I just forgot about recovering, not putting a time limit on it. I just took how I felt with me. My effort to do something about it stopped, I shook hands with my anxiety and all techniques were abandoned.
I just gave up trying to fix my inner world and that really was the crux of my recovery. To get anything to settle we need to leave it alone. With anxiety we feel we have all the worlds' problems on our shoulders but that is what an anxious mind does, it creates problems out of nothing. Everything seems like a problem so we worry more. Health, relationships, going out, you name it. You have to allow this also, let the mind worry about anything and everything, but not get involved in its drama. Just observe it all in the same way you listen in to a conversation between two other people.
It is all about a deep acceptance of any state you find yourself in and letting go. No more fixing, no more trying to sort it out, no more fighting to feel any different than you do. Just lay everything down and allow yourself to feel like shit. Not allowing in the hope that you will feel better, or "Come and do your worst but get it over quickly" is just putting up with it and not truly accepting the state you are in. Acceptance is allowing yourself to fall into any suffering, a complete letting go of trying to sort anything out, get anywhere or be anything other than where you are and then the mind and body will begin to sort itself out. The body works perfectly well all by itself, the heart beats all by itself, your stomach digests, cells multiply, it heals cuts and broken legs without you needing to interfere. The whole system works perfectly without your interference, it doesn’t want or need it, it knows exactly what it needs to do to heal. Your body is beyond any intelligence we can imagine and will heal itself if left to do so. Just don't get in the way of the natural healing process.
With anxiety, it will throw a question at you, a ‘what if’ and you feel that you need to find an answer to make this awful, sickening, horrific and debilitating thing go away. So off you go, thinking, thinking, thinking – trying to make sense of what this thing is, why are these thoughts in my head, why aren’t I normal etc etc? If you think you find an answer after all that searching, anxiety will just jump on to the next thing so off you go again on a vicious cycle of searching and searching and never getting anywhere. All you can do is stop trying to find an answer, stop waiting for the day when this will be gone. Don’t make being rid of anxiety a goal, don’t make it anything. Accept that, today you have anxiety and do not let it stop you in any way. Don’t let it make you hide in the house or not go to work or not see friends/family. Keep going, even when you feel like you might die from the feeling of fear or from the detachment you feel. I can promise you that it will go if you stop reacting to it. When your mind says ‘but what if it’s because of this?’ don’t start searching, just leave it alone and get on with your life and the power it has fades until it is gone.
I had very bad anxiety for a long time. I could barely function. I couldn't sleep, I couldn't get up (don't bother trying to figure that one out), lost interest in everything, lost my sense of humour (think my wife was pleased about that bit 😉). The stress I felt day in, day out was debilitating. At one point I took 4 months off work but it made no difference. I just worried about other things. Gradually, normal feelings started to return but recovery wasn't linear. I had good moments then lots of bad moments, then more good moments. Moments turned into hours but still had bad days. The anxiety was still there when I woke in the morning but tapered off as the day wore on. This gave me more hope that I was on the right track and my negative inner voice started to sound more positive, telling me to push on through the thoughts and feelings and pay them no respect. The old me started to rise up from beneath the symptoms. The important thing to remember is that no matter how hard it may feel, keep moving forward knowing that the anxiety can and will go.
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Beevee
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Everyone recovers at different rates so don't get hung up about how long it takes. It largely depends upon how quickly a sufferer truly understands the concept of utter acceptance and puts it into practice. I had anxiety for 4-5 years ( gave up counting) and during that time, I started practising acceptance. With hindsight, it was very much trial and error and the penny had to drop a great height and slowly! Even when it has dropped and you are fully accepting, anxiety won't disappear immediately because there is usually a time lag between you (slowly) grasping the concept and the mind and body getting the message. Recovery happens in layers which you may not even notice at first.
Nice to see a post that offers hope and a voice of calm and reason. I've been a bit of a claire weeke's "disciple" and have recently read Paul David's "At Last a Life" (the second one) and laughed and laughed at the section that talks about joining forums and people calling themselves "anxietygirl" and "stressedoutmum" etc and i recognised much of my own behaviour! The take home message over and over is just get on with it warts and all! The other book that i read over xmas was Dare by Barry McDonagh and it was another Claire Weekes reiteration - she was so ahead of her time!! (And an Aussie - yay!!) Just like thinking a broken bone better, thinking anxiety better doesn't work either!!
I bought Paul David's first book but was well on the road to recovery by the time his second book came out so didn't bother getting it. Like you say, it is all about acceptance but it was Dr Weekes who led the way and reckon she has saved thousands, if not millions of people from having to suffer further. A proper Saint if ever there was one.
The trick is to literally step out of the way and let the mind and body do what it wants, in the knowledge that it is all completely normal under the circumstances and will sort itself out if we let it. Instead, sufferers continually prod away by worrying/fighting the symptoms which wouldn't be there if they didn't have anxiety!
People need to believe that they are so much bigger than their anxiety. It's all one big trick and easy to fall prey. The message I give is always the same. It is ONLY anxiety and doesn't deserve the respect people give it. Call it's bluff and watch it melt away.
Looking at our website names, we could have been made for each other! 😉 Love Australia too 🇦🇺 Been a couple of times to visit a sister-in-law on the outskirts of Melbourne and also took the opportunity to visit friends in Kirribilli, do the Great Ocean Road and Port Douglas for the Barrier Reef. All the usual haunts for us whinging poms!
Hi Beevee, I was just wondering how long did your recovery take and how many setbacks? I'm currently in one right now and this time it seems like I have OCD or fear of mental illnesses. One day in my setback, I came across someone with OCD and then thought what if I have OCD and now I make up intrusive thoughts in my head and it scares me. What do you think I should do in this setback? As well as answering my questions on top. Thank you so much.
Hi luceromike. Do nothing. Let it all happen. Let yourself think you have OCD. Let yourself feel the fear. This is what acceptance is all about. Letting it all happen and not getting caught up in it all and trying to resist it, push it away etc.
My attitude to setbacks was that they were an important part of the recovery process and an indication of how far I had come in recovery. It is just the mind and body releasing more negative energy which is a good thing. It needs to be released and not prevented from leaving by getting involved and worrying about the return of symptoms. The more setbacks you have, the more opportunities you have to practice acceptance and they lose strength and importance. Practice makes perfect. A willingness to accept will cure.
I had many setbacks. I didn't count them because I knew this was a sign that I wasn't fully accepting - I was still pushing for recovery. You learn not to bother about counting how many you have had or how long it will take to recover. In terms of recovery timescales, it depends entirely upon how quickly or how slowly a sufferer can develop an attitude of acceptance and mean it. This is something you simply cannot rush, there are no short cuts. Literally forget about recovering and stop making it your goal. Resign yourself to having anxiety for as long as it takes. Otherwise you are trying to force the matter, trying to fix yourself. It is about letting recovery find you, not you trying to find recovery. Do you understand what I mean?
When your anxiety is in full flow, it is very easy to become afraid of something which, ordinarily, would be so trivial, you literally wouldn't give it a second thought and move on. However, anxiety attaches a false importance to that thought so the sufferers starts worrying and fretting about that and it then sticks around, gathering momentum. It makes mountains out of molehills. In your case, it was bumping into that person who said they had OCD, which, incidentally, is just another form of anxiety with the brain getting stuck in a loop because of mental fatigue being added to sensitisation of the nerves. The suffer can no longer think around a problem, only about the problem itself. If it isn't OCD, your anxiety will pick on something else for you to worry about. For me, it was my health then my relationships. It's a very fickle and relies on fear to keep it going.
Although scary, you start to recognise those thoughts and feelings as anxiety based (and not real) and detach yourself from all the babble going on in your head and rise above it, instead of getting involved. No matter how bad you may feel, just get on with your day and accept all the weird and not so wonderful thoughts and feelings as anxiety and give up trying to do anything about it.
Hope this helps.
p.s. Tell your friend to practice acceptance and stop fighting the obsessive thoughts.
Thanks Beevee for responding. You've been a great help and I wish there were more people on this site that have accepted and have recovered so that it brings us more motivation to fully accept. Many books and websites seem to lead to acceptance but it's so hard when there's not a lot of people posting online about how they succeeded doing this. I only know of you and two other people out of the many people who have tried accepting and failed. It's weird because I did this method with panic attacks and it worked wonders, which is why i felt great for a month. I noticed I haven't gotten over my health anxiety (focusing mostly on severe mental illnesses) which is why I'm back to square one.
Also, it's easy to accept panic attacks in my opinion, but it's hard to accept bad thoughts. How do I let myself think I have OCD or schitz and feel the fear without getting scared or irritated? Because if I let myself get scared or irritated, it gets worse.
You say they get worse if you let them. Let them. Let them scare you, let them irritate you. Let them do their worst. Sure, it's uncomfortable but they cannot harm you. When you experience the worst anxiety can do and come through the other side, confidence gradually builds and that little voice in the head starts to give words on encouragement instead of negativity ( e.g. I did this yesterday, came through it so I can do it today). You are beginning to lose fear of the symptoms.
Recovery lies in accepting those thoughts as part of your ordinary thinking, even repeated thoughts and to not shy away from them, hoping they will go. Relax towards them as best you can and think them willingly which will release tension and those thoughts (which have probsbly become habit) will gradually melt away. You can't stop those thoughts coming so let them come and do their worst. They are only thoughts, however horrible they may seem. They are not real, they are only present because of the intense, fearful reaction they bring to your sensitised nerves. In the words of Dr Claire Weekes, you lose upsetting thoughts by drawing their teeth, not trying to stop them biting.
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