Generalized Anxiety
Treatment
Therapy for Generalized Anxiety
Is Generalized Anxiety getting in your way?
Does any of this sound like you?
- You worry about all of the things… all of the time
- You can’t seem to turn your mind off long enough to get to sleep, or can’t stay asleep
- You always feel tired (even if you get enough sleep), constantly on edge, or both
- You feel like you can’t concentrate, no matter how hard you try
- Your muscles ache, even when they have no reason to
- You just want to be able to relax!
Anxiety is a human emotion that we all experience at times in our lives (this is actually a good thing!), but occasionally circumstances can lead to an increase in anxiety that feels miserable or downright intolerable.
Generalized anxiety may focus around:
- Your school or work performance
- Your health
- Your family’s health
- Your finances
- Your relationships
- Your day-to-day responsibilities
- Your future
Between work, school, family responsibilities, financial obligations, and on and on, it’s enough to make anyone feel stressed! But sometimes that stress can start to feel overwhelming.
Check out the screening tool below if you are wondering if you might have Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD).
If you suffer from Generalized Anxiety Disorder, you are not alone. According to the Anxiety & Depression Association of America, 3.1% of the US population (or 6.8 million adults) have GAD.
What Causes Generalized Anxiety Disorder?
Most anxiety is caused by a combination of two main factors: genetics and environment. What does this mean?
First, you may have inherited a greater likelihood of developing generalized anxiety from your biological parents. Just like green eyes or brown hair, anxiety is something that can be passed down from one generation to the next. Like other traits, however, just because your parent has a hooked nose or anxiety, that doesn’t mean that you are destined to.
Second, the way that you learned to handle anxiety growing up may have made your anxiety worse over time. For example, if you had a parent or caregiver that worried about everything all the time, then you may have picked up this habit from them. Or if you learned as a child that avoiding certain things helped you to feel better, then this may have solidified your anxiety around those things. Unfortunately, what tends to help us to feel better in the short-term often makes anxiety worse in the long-run!
The good news is that whether you were born with anxiety or you picked it up along the way, therapy can help you learn how to cope with your anxiety more effectively and stop letting it interfere with your life.
What Does Treatment for Generalized Anxiety Look LIke?
If you are done letting anxiety run your life, the good news is that anxiety is treatable! Below are the 3 main types of treatment that I use in generalized anxiety counseling.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) focuses on breaking unhelpful patterns in your thinking and acting and finding more effective ways of being.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) incorporates mindfulness and acceptance strategies to help you be more present and bring your life more in line with your values.
Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP)
Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps you break your cycle of anxiety and face your fears in gradual steps.
No matter what your goals are, we would work together to make a plan to help you overcome your generalized anxiety in manageable steps. My goal is to give you the tools you need to start enjoying your life again as quickly as possible.
So what next?
If you are starting to feel that your life is being taken over by worry or stress, I encourage you to reach out for help! If you are struggling to find calm in the storm or are just feeling overwhelmed with life, I would love to help you to learn the tools that you need to take your life back. It is possible to find balance in the chaos and live a meaningful and fulfilling life.
Let's talk!
If you’d like to talk about how I could help you with your generalized anxiety, please feel free to reach out!