Allay Anxiety|How to Deal with Anxiety, Cope without Drugs… Thrive!

Oh, if I had a dollar for each time I thought to myself, “Anxiety is ruining my life.” For I can not recount how many times those words ran through my brain or escaped from my lips. In fact, it even got to the point that I believed I would just have to accept my misery, my glum lot in life, and play out my hand.

Is that you? I bet it is. And you probably want me to tell you that you CAN overcome your anxiety and that overcoming anxiety is easy and, even better, that I can sell you a program or book that will show you exactly how to do it. Boy, you are bound to be disappointed. You know why? Because I can’t cure your anxiety! But there are things that YOU can do to cure your anxiety but they are not easy. Working on yourself is hard. It is hard like coal mining is hard and everyday you have to hit the mines. There is no break, there is no reprieve. I know that my health is entirely contingent on the fact that I do the things it takes to maintain my mental compentency.

So, who am I? Good question. I am a fellow sufferer of anxiety. Only I had it worse than you do. After my first hospitalization my doctor remarked that I might have the most severe case of anxiety he had ever seen. I had been a wreck for sometime, though it was my social anxiety that was especially debilitating. I had taken all the normal steps, and luckily why parents had been pretty financially successful so I had access to many options and therapies that many people do not.

I saw a psychiatrist. He prescribed some benzodiazepines for my symptoms. The first few days were nothing but pleasant. My anxiety symptoms lessened. I even enjoyed the easy, relaxed feeling that the drug provided. However, it did not last. Soon my anxiety came back, first in social situations and then later full blown, and I found I had developed a new problem. Along with my anxiety, I had developed a powerful dependence on the clonazepam.

I thought that just having an anxiety disorder was unpleasant enough. It became a whole new ball game when I found myself completely addicted to benzodiazepines. This was a whole new hell, believe me. Words simply can not explain the misery brought on by benzo withdrawal symptoms. And this wasn’t a passing phenomenon. I suffered from benzodiazepine withdrawal syndrome for more than two years. It was beyond awful. It was worse, in fact, than my anxiety disorder in the first place.

Quick aside: If you doctor is putting you a regular dosing of benzos — klonopin, xanax, valium, whatever — do the research before you do damage to your body that you will have difficulty coming back from.

So anyway, I started to see a psychiatrist and my condition improved somewhat with medication. So I started to see a therapist to work on “core issues” and really get to the bottom of it. But that was a joke. Sure, my therapist was a nice guy. He had an interesting world view and he took an active interest in me. But what he did not do was help. Finally, I stopped seeing him.

Today I do not see therapists. I do not pay people to have them share their world view with me. Instead I decided to take matters into my own hands. And if I didn’t make that decision I would still be suffering from my anxiety disorder in full force. For, I discovered that therapists and doctors they can only help so much. Most of the work you have to do yourself. If you want to overcome your anxiety, you are going to have to take action.

The question I get is how do I do that. Well, let me ask, have you even looked for an answer to your solution or are you waiting for someone to solve it for you? Because there are plenty of people who will trade you false hopes for cash. Your cash. But if you take action and find the answers yourself, you will be so-much-the-better.

You see, there are sites like this and countless others where people share the exact steps that they took to overcome their anxiety disorders. Oh sure they had some help from professionals, but they learned the majority of the techniques from other anxiety sufferers. We are a great community, these people who used to suffer from anxiety disorders, and we work together to help others out of their own situation. But, the thing is, you have to be willing to do the work. You can’t be closed off. You have to devour every website on anxiety and every blog and start learning. The internet is the best source of information since the dawn of man and you can take advantage of it.

So, read this site and read other sites like it. Learn from those among us who have re-taken their lives. And, with work you can join us.

One of the most troubling things about anxiety disorders is that the person suffering from them so often feels quite helpless when the symptoms strike. Sweaty palms. difficulty speaking and concentrating, and increased heartbeat have become facts of life for the millions of people dealing with anxiety.

Does it have to be this way? The answer to this question is somewhat complex. On the one hand when an anxiety attack strikes, a person has little minute-to-minute control over the symptoms that arise. At this point it is simply too late to do too much about it.

However, prior to an anxiety attack there are steps a person can take to diminish the effects and ultimately reduce the frequency of their occurence. Some of these things may be challenging or require some lifestyle alterations. Are they worth it? I believe they are.

The question becomes have you had enough of dealing with anxiety that you actually want to do something about it. Perhaps you have, perhaps you have not. However at a certain point an individual needs to make a decision. At some point you have to decide.

The little (and sometimes not-so-little) manifestations of the condition can be paralyzing. But often when the episode is over, the person thanks their lucky stars the bout has ended and either goes about their day or retreats into isolation in fear that the symptoms may return.

Very infrequently does a person stand up and decide enough is enough. Stopping anxiety is, quite simply, a choice. Which is fortunate for, like anything else in life, anxiety can be faced and overcome… once a decision has been made to confront it.

What often holds people back isn’t the failure to decide to make a change but rather the failure to realize that they have a choice in the matter. The feel imprisoned by the condition and mostly seek to manage rather than eliminate the symptoms. This is out of ignorance of any other options.

You have options, I am glad to report. There are several ways to attack anxiety and ultimately stop anxiety. But the prescription for relief is not altogether easy. There are things, difficult things, that you will have to do. And often times they don’t mean running to an advice-doctor for help. It becomes kind of isolating because the things that you need to do are things that only you can do. There isn’t anyone you can pay to do them for you.

But, you see, that’s part of the excitement that comes with a new way of looking at life. In the past I know that I would wonder why this was happening to me. What did I do to deserve this? I spent most of my time feeling sorry for myself and not taking any ACTION to actually improve my situation. And that’s what I observe so often in people with anxiety. They think that if they could just spend their entire life in their therapist’s office that there problem would be solved.

And they don’t get any better.

It comes down to the question of how much of your life are you willing to waste? If you died tomorrow do you feel like your life would have been a success? Because anxiety in and of itself is rarely the problem. It is the failure to rise to the occasion and overcome obstacles that is the ruin of people with mental illness. I don’t say this to be hurtful, I say it because it was true for me and when I realized it and started doing the work, my life started to get better.

You can too! That’s the whole point of this site. I want you to take action over your own life. Don’t be a spectator to your own life. Don’t spend your whole life filling the coffers of advice-doctors. Do something. You might have to even re-learn how to think for yourself, but the freedom that a life affords is vastly superior to a life dependent on others to tell you you are OK.

I challenge you to do the work to get there.

One of the circumstances which provoked my anxiety to an extreme was being in the workplace. I struggled with intrusive thoughts about what others may be thinking of me and whether I was doing my job to the satisfaction of my boss. For me one of the most embarrassing elements of the disorder was having to muddle through workplace anxiety.

At the time I wondered just what there was to be anxious about. In my rational mind I knew that I was a competent employee and that I was generally liked and respected by my co-workers. There was simply no need for workplace anxiety.

Still, during nearly every shift some situation would arise and the symptoms would begin to present themselves; My palms would sweat, I’d get a lump in my throat, I’d become paranoid that I was somehow embarrassing myself and I would have difficulty thinking clearly.

I worked in a customer service capacity and, paradoxically, it was dealing with the customers that would often bring the most relief. I knew that the customers would only be present in the shop for a short while. I knew that my interaction with them would last only a few minutes and then I’d never see them again. I somehow convinced myself that what they thought didn’t really matter. And without the fear of judgment, I was able to successfully interact with them.

However, with my co-workers the anxiety was unrelenting. I always felt as if I didn’t belong in the workplace at all, that my co-workers were all superior to me in some way. And with these thoughts in the back of my mind, I could never find myself at ease with them.

But by far by biggest struggle with workplace anxiety was with my boss. I could never find my comfort spot with the man. I felt inferior and lacking and could barely look him in the eye. The fact that I could be fired by this guy at any time wreaked havoc with my sense of comfort. I thought at any moment he would simply fire me. I was anxious around him all the time.

I decided that something needed to be done about this situation.

I had reached the turning point. I decided that I could no longer operate under these conditions and I undertook to address the problem. Throughout this period I had been on a regular schedule of benzodiazepines. The klonopin I was taking would sometimes alleviate the worst of the symptoms. But other times it was totally useless.

As I have discussed previously, I decided that there had to be another way. I commenced to get off the benzodiazepines, which turned out to be out of best decisions of my life. I next turned to the internet in search of alternate treatment strategies for anxiety disorders.

What I found online was, quite frankly, depressing. There was rather a lot of pablum about anxiety symptoms and cognitive behavioral therapy but there was nothing that was actionable. I found stuff like this page at the top of the listings on the search engines for the term “anxiety.” Is that useful to anyone but the completely clueless? This kind of so-called conventional wisdom which implores people to go to a psychiatrist, get on a benzo and start cognitive behavioral therapy is putting a band aid on the problem at best. Such a course of action is exactly what I did and, let me tell, it didn’t help a whiff. If that sounds like a plan to you, so be it. But good luck with the benzo withdrawal syndrome and that’s if you can ever get off of them in the first place. So, having not found much useful information, I dug a little deeper. Next I encountered all the websites that were basically fronts for affiliate products like so-and-so’s ebook that claimed to be able to alleviate anxiety entirely for just one easy payment of $49.99. I never was much for pissing away money so I never got the chance to learn so-and-so’s secret. Such is life.

Anyway, back to my workplace anxiety. I realized that for me I was going to have to practice some acceptance. First, I realized that I would never be comfortable with the idea of a “boss.” I’ve always been an independent person. I see myself as a peer to others. I am not comfortable with being in the superior position when dealing with other adults nor am I comfortable being the inferior position. I just had to accept that about myself. I am not comfortable with bosses. They make me anxious. I’ve accepted it. Not coincidentally when I accepted my anxiety about dealing with boss, it started to diminish. It started to get better. Was it ever a perfect, anxiety-free relationship like the kind I have with a best friend? No. But that’s because my boss was not my best friend. He’s my boss. I accepted it.

The fact of the matter is that accepting anxiety is without a do the most effective way to neutralize it. If anything is the thesis of Allay Anxiety, it is that.

My next step was to take a look at other workplace situations that were causing me anxiety and to see what I could be proactive about. One of the main things about my job that caused anxiety was its fast pace. I worked in a busy restaurant where there were always a million things going on. It demanded rapid multi-tasking. Quite frankly this was never an ideal situation for me. I don’t perform at my best in hectic environments. As a sufferer of mental illness I have realized that I have to stack in my favor rather than against me. I need to work in an atmosphere that plays to my strengths rather than aggravating my weaknesses.

Dealing with anxiety does not mean that you have to a passive observer in your own life. You can take action to affect change. For me that meant finding a new job. I wasn’t in the right environment and I knew it. I was being stubborn and trying to “make it work” when it was never a round peg in the first place.

Which brings us to my next point: Stop trying to prove your “normal!” You are not normal. You have an anxiety disorder that affects your life. It may even impact it severely. Isn’t it time you acknowledged that fact? By trying to run against it, trying to do what the next guy does, just to prove that you are functional human being you are actually setting yourself up for failure. For me that meant that the restaurant business wasn’t a good fit for me. Did I take that to mean I was failure? Absolutely not. I just accepted the fact that I wasn’t doing myself any favors trying to force myself to conform to a situation that I wasn’t suited for.

It’s funny. Only a person with an anxiety disorder will continue to do the action that causes them anxiety. They will try over and over again to “face their fears” in the hope that they will overcome them. In Alcoholics Anonymous they define insanity as doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result. Yet that’s what anxiety sufferers do constantly. But it’s bad advice. You’re really not facing your fears so much as provoking them and, unless you’re a masochist, I don’t see the percentage in that.

The path that I chose was to accept the facts as the facts. I get anxious in a hot, crowded kitchen filled with screaming bosses. The more times I tried to face the situation the more despondent I became since my anxiety symptoms were not decreasing. Finally, I wised up and said if this workplace is causing me this much anxiety it might not be the right workplace for me. And, to be honest with you, I haven’t lost a second of sleep because of this decision. Once I decided to accept it, it began to lose its power.

If you are suffering from workplace anxiety I would invite you to start thinking more concretely about how to address your problem. I don’t think you need to continue to face your fears over and again to prove some point to yourself. You need to put yourself in a situation to succeed.

Take an honest appraisal of the elements at your workplace that are causing your anxiety.

Is there a way to make a change (or eliminate) those elements? Like me, you may not be a work environment that fits your disposition. If so you will probably be best looking for another job where you will be more likely to succeed. Only you can decide on a course of action, and, since I am not counselor, I’m not here to advise you on it. You need to step to the plate and start to take ownership over your own life. I would suggest that your first step be one of acceptance.

A recent publication by the Anxiety Disorders Association of America documents several interesting statistics concerning anxiety disorders. I think the most interesting fact contained therein was that there are a tremendous number of people suffering from this disease. More than 40 million people in America have been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder according to the report.

These numbers are staggering especially in light of the fact that the entire population of the country numbers at around 300 million. These statistics suggest that almost 20% of Americans struggle with anxiety.

The moral of all of this, I suppose, is that if you’ve been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder you are clearly in good company. These statistics illustrate that even though anxiety disorders are not entirely the “norm” they occur with such frequency that I would hope you don’t feel alone if you suffer from one.

Approximately six years ago,  I began attending a weekly therapy group to help cope with struggles related to my anxiety disorder. Signing on to this group was something I was extremely reluctant to do but agreed to try it out for the opportunity to attack my anxiety. After some badgering by my individual therapist I agreed to try out the group.

And I’m very glad I made that decision for it has proven a most rewarding experience for me. Actually, I still show up every week, on Mondays to be exact, and I don’t have any plans to stop attending.

Let me testify here for a moment.  If you suffer from anxiety like me, then the I idea of sharing your trials and tribulations openly in front of a group of total strangers every week can seem intimidating. For me that first week was terrifying. But something not unusual happened. The “strangers” didn’t remain that way for long.

As time went by, I learned of their struggles and their their difficulties and, most of all, I felt accepted. Because of this I was able to communicate openly about my issues with anxiety and depression and come to grasp an entirely new vocabulary for interpersonal relationships.

After years of group attendance, I am a much healthier person. Attacking anxiety isn’t easy. In fact, I still struggle with my anxiety, but I’ve made tremendous gains in that area. If you struggle, like I do, with an anxiety disorder, I can’t recommend group therapy highly enough.

Shortly after diagnosing me with an anxiety disorder, it was my psychiatrist’s preliminary order of business to write an order for a hearty dose of a benzodiazepine named klonopin. Perhaps you’ve heard of it. In an effort to attack the anxiety I was experiencing, I agreed to start on the new medication without much resistance.

Klonopin is one of the most popular benzos and for nearly eights years I took, as prescribed, over five milligrams a day.

I began to experience a disturbing trend. When I would miss a dose, as I would on occasion, very unfortunate things would happen, The withdrawals, just over short intervals, were very unpleasant: headaches, shakes, disorientation and nervousness.

After several years of this routine, I felt like I needed a change. I decided to cease the rollercoaster I’d been on for so long. However, I’d had a little taste of klonopin withdrawal and I was terrified of a prolonged withdrawal syndrone. I met with my psychiatrist again who prescribed me some medications to, as he said, ease the pain of the process. I was instructed to cut one milligram every week. By following this plan I would be benzodazepine free within six weeks.

I began the reduction schedule and things got hairy fast. I was a university student at the time. But after a few weeks, when I was down to 3 milligrams daily, the withdrawal syndrome became untolerable. I suffered from horrendous diarrhea, had difficulty breathing, my vision became impaired, and I went 48 hour stretches without sleep.

I withdrew from my school, though I would return the following fall and eventually earn my degree, and began consuming alcohol with regularity. Things were difficult. Words can not describe how straining that  period was.

In a short while I had adjusted to three milligrams. My anxiety disorder still reared its nasty head from time to time, but it wasn’t a greater problem than it had been when I was on six milligrams. It made me wonder why I was even on the klonopin in the first place. Why did I have to go through that withdrawal episode? And, in due time, I decided that it was time to completely discontinue the klonopin treatments.

Attacking anxiety was taking it’s toll on me, unfortunately, by this time I was a total benzodiazepine addict. I did not abuse the drugs to get a high. But I needed to have my pills. Every day. Without exceptions. Still fearful from the terrible withdrawal experience, I sought professional assistance to medically and safely detox from the benzos.

I checked into a detox center and over fourteen days I was given barbituates to help control the klonopin withdrawal symptoms. This was in November of 2007. For the past year, I have been free of benzodiazepines and the withdrawal has been more manageable, though still very unpleasant.

To this day, I am just beginning to I feel “normal.” The doctors told me that my system, due to the length of time I had been regularly taking the benzos, would require 12-18 months to normalize.

I wish I never started the klonopin in the first place because getting off them has been such a difficulty. I still have 6 months to a year of slow withdrawal to look forward to because these drugs put my system so out of order.

I know, this drug is commonly prescribed today, but I wonder if the costs of the klonopin withdrawal syndrome outweigh the benefits.