Coping strategies

[gettingbetter09]

Hey everyone

Has anyone got any coping strategies they would like to share?

I suffer from social anxiety, some days i cant even leave the house. Today i made it to the shop and did a uturn straight home. My panick symptoms are nausea (odd vomiting) and upset stomach. I can cope with palpatations and wobbly legs no problem and just breath through them but its the feeling of wanting to be sick that gets me running away from alot of situations.

I have alot coming up, child moving school and also we are buying a new house. Im dreading sitting in the mortgage meetings, wondering how the hell am I going to be able to hold back the vomiting. 😶

Im on propranolol x3 a day 40mg, have been referred to CBT and i have an appiontment for the drs this week to see if i can start anti depressants.

Hugs x

[Jeff1943]

Gettingbetter09, 50 years ago someone wrote a book about you and you will soon recognise yourself in its pages. Panic, nausea, wobbly legs, palpatations and agrophobia, it's all in the book.

When she was a young woman Claire Weekes experienced anxiety and panic whilst studying to be a doctor. She developed an understanding of anxiety and was able to develop a method to cure herself of anxiety disorder. Some years later she wrote a book about her method and devoted the rest of her life to advocating it and healing patients by her technique.

In the past 50 years since she wrote that book it has helped tens of thousands of people of all lands to recover from the demon that is anxiety. Her method was simple but requires persistance and patience. Anxiety disorder occurs after a period of stress and worry affects our nervous system so badly that it becomes overly sensitised. In this state it fires off a wide variety of symptoms that closely match real organic illness but aren't. They mimic those illnesses but they are imposters: they may make us feel awful but they can't kill us, disable us or drive us insane. They are fake, frauds, imposters, they are no more than glitches in your over loaded nervous system even though they cause us much fear. The problem is the fear we feel causes more anxiety which causes more symptoms which causes more fear in a vicious circle that perpetuates the nervous sensitisation.

claire Weekes advocated that instead of fighting and fearing the symptoms of anxiety we should instead learn to Accept them for the time being. After all we know that anxiety is a fraud and has its limitations and can do us no real damage. It is in fact a toothless tiger. And if we can just accept the symptoms then we will stop generating the fear on which anxiety thrives. And eventually our fraught nerves return to normal and in the fullness of time we too recover and recapture our quiet mind. That's the short version of course, to explore the Acceptance method properly you need to order 'Self help with your nerves' by Claire Weekes (u.k. version) or 'Hope and help with your nerves' (u.s. version) from Amazon. You should check the several hundred reader reports.

I commend this book to you as more than just a coping strategy but as a cure and path to a full recovery if you have the persistance and patience to practice its four imperitives and let time pass.

[gettingbetter09 in reply to Jeff1943]

I got this last night on audio and i have to say it feels like she knows me and shes taking my hand and saying its ok you can do this. So far it feels warm and not at all scary. I really am fed up of feeling like this and totally want to get better. I have to face my fears and my biggest fear is embarrassing myself or throwing up or passing out and this is only fueling my anxiety. I think i need to just accept its a part of me and let it happen. If i embarrass myself so what.

My partner got me the cbt training book and i had to eventually put it down as it started my anxiety. I think one to one with a therapist would be better with cbt. But anyway so far im loving Clare Weekes.

Thank you x

[Jeff1943 in reply to gettingbetter09]

Gettingbetter09, that's an excellent start. You will never throw up or pass out, you may feel you will but you never will. It's only the tricks that over sensitive nerves play on fearful minds. The ability of anxiety is limited. And as you say, if you ever proved me wrong and did throw up or pass out, so what? Who cares what others may think, usually people are very helpful and caring, even strangers. So accept all these feelings without fear for the time being: think of a rock on the sea shore, the waves come crashing around it, back and forth, despite their noise and fury the rock endures, you are that rock.

So just accept all the bad feelings no matter how uncomfortablethey are and you stop fueling your nerves with more and more fear and one day you'll think: "Hey, what happened to my anxiety?"

[Meeasy]

I watch this video when I need a boost Good luck 👍

youtu.be/xKJxxq74c-8(Not working as expected?)

[johncraig]

gettingbetter09 one coping measure i swear by is letting everyone and i mean everyone you know that you have this problem and how it affects you.

Trying to hide it or hoping no one notices just intensifies the anxiety.

it took me years to admit to people i had mental heath issues i was embarrassed and in denial but once people knew they were great and although it didn't cure my anxiety it certainly eased my anxiety going into certain situations...john

[gettingbetter09 in reply to johncraig]

Great advice thank you. My anxiety gets fired up when i tell myself to hide it and keep it in.

[johncraig in reply to gettingbetter09]

it really does help...may not cure you but will ease it and once everyone gets there head around your problems they can actually help you more...good luck