Is anxiety controlling your life? How to take control, feel calmer and happier.

by Paula Bendon – Counselling, CBT and Hypnosis Therapist

The vast majority of people with anxiety problems never seek help and can really feel alone

Who suffers from anxiety? – It can affect anyone, anytime, any age race or gender. Approximately 10% of the UK population suffer from anxiety. Many people with anxiety don’t know what to do and often don’t seek even though it casn be very treatable. It can be hard to share this with their loved ones and many live with this on their own. One in four people in the UK will experience a mental health problem each year. Women are twice as likely to get anxiety than men. Worryingly child and adolescent anxiety is on the increase year on year.

Symptoms – Physical and emotional
• Worry and fear
• Feeling overwhelmed all the time
• Panic attacks
• Nervousness
• Lack of sleep
• Avoidance of social situations and people
• Faster heartbeat and shortness of breath
• Sweating
• Shaking
• Dry mouth

What to do if you have anxiety?

There are many ways you can overcome anxiety

• Counselling – Talking to a trained counsellor who specialises in anxiety in a safe and confidential environment can help you talk openly about your difficult feelings, explore why you are having them and to work out strategies with the therapist to get to a much better place.

• Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) – With the help of a CBT therapist explore your thoughts and feelings and behaviour. Together with unhelpful negative and difficult thinking patterns which help maintain anxiety and it’s suffering. Then learn CBT tools and techniques to help yourself overcome them.

• Hypnotherapy – Is an effective, safe and efficient therapy to overcome anxiety when you are feeling overwhelmed. The relaxation techniques used in hypnosis creates an ideal mindset to help overcome and release the stronghold anxiety can have on our mind and behaviour.

Photo by Christopher Ott on Unsplash