I have worked with people struggling with anxiety for many many years, both as a licensed psychologist and before that as a licensed counselor.

Somewhere along the way, helping with anxiety became a specialty of mine.

I didn’t set out to become a referral source for anxiety. In fact, I never would have imagined that happening.

I struggled with anxiety myself and so questioned how I could possibly help others.

a shift in my thinking 

I started thinking about anxiety differently after leading a group for students struggling with social anxiety at a university counseling center. 

Preparing for that group and working with those students turned what I thought I knew about anxiety on its head.

Fast forward 30+ years and here I am, feeling so passionate about how we treat anxiety that I want to write about it.

Anxiety is overwhelming our resources

Everywhere I turn I hear or read reports of increasing anxiety, especially since the pandemic. Certainly, there are things to worry about with our country’s division, catastrophic storms, and mass shootings—just to mention a few of our stressors. 

Medical practitioners share feeling overwhelmed by the multitude of patients struggling with anxiety.

I worry about those who are struggling—I certainly understand the pain. And I’m concerned for overwhelmed providers. 

I don’t think the answer is more providers—although we certainly could use more than we have.

I believe we have to stop using that word—that 7-letter word that starts with an “a.” You know the one I mean—anx**ty.

And, I feel so strongly about this that I want to scream from the rooftops—“Please stop talking about anxiety!” 

Your pain is real

Please know that in saying that we need to stop talking about anxiety, I am not discounting or minimizing your symptoms or your struggles with anxiety. 

I know how uncomfortable those symptoms can be—I’ve been there. And I have witnessed the pain of so many clients who have shared their experiences over the years. So, I get it.

I would love to see you suffer less. I would love for you to free yourself from the unending battle to

• control your anxiety and 
• control your life, in an effort to control your anxiety.

Pathologizing a normal body response

Decreasing suffering can’t happen until we stop pathologizing a normal, necessary body response. 

Turning a normal function of the body into something to be feared and trying to eliminate it is problematic—for you who struggle with anxiety, as well as for society as a whole. 

A normal response in the body is going to keep happening—right?

If it is normal and is going to continue happening, how are you going to avoid it? It might be a bit like trying to hold back the waves from coming to shore.

And, if we are describing normal functions in the body when we talk about anxiety, many if not most, people are going to see themselves in the description and start worrying there is something wrong with them.

More and more people are going to start worrying that they have anxiety. 

And, the more we worry about having anxiety, the worse our symptoms will get.

More people will suffer, and our resources to help will continue to be overburdened. 

Working with our bodies

We have to start working with our bodies rather than trying to stop normal functioning.

We need a different set of skills when it comes to dealing with worries than the skills we use to solve most problems in our lives.

Those of us who are hard-working and want to do things well often get trapped in worry because the skills we have used to be successful in other areas of our lives make things worse rather than better.

I’m going to come back to both of those ideas, as well as others, in my next series of posts: Rethinking Anxiety. 

I’d love to read your reactions as well as any questions about this topic that you would like me to talk about. You can do that by leaving a comment below or emailing me at [email protected]. And if you know someone who would find this post helpful please share.

I will return to writing about other topics at the end of this series. If in the meantime you have a topic you would like me to cover be sure to reach out, and I will do my best to address it.

With warmth and kindness,
Deb

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If you find it hard to be yourself in the world, need to keep others happy to feel okay about yourself, or get derailed by disapproval, check out my book Never Enough—Separating Self-Worth from Approval

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