Anxiety Specialist

What is anxiety?

Everyone feels anxious or nervous every now and then — it’s a natural part of life. However, when those fears are pervasive and constant and disrupt your life, you may have an anxiety disorder. Anxiety disorders are prevalent and cause intense, unpleasant feelings such as helplessness, an impending sense of doom, and fear.

Anxiety also causes a variety of disruptive physical symptoms including:

• Palpitations
• Sweating
• Dizziness
• Shortness of breath
• Nausea
• Gastrointestinal problems

Anxiety often develops in relation to everyday concerns such as your health, loss, injury, shame, aggression, or guilt.

What are the different types of anxiety?

Anxiety disorders emerge in several variations, causing differing symptoms, thoughts, and behaviors.

Generalized anxiety disorder

You have intense and persistent concerns about the future, making you feel out of control and unable to engage in positive and meaningful activities. You feel restless, irritable, and can’t concentrate. You often feel fatigued and irritable and engage in catastrophic thinking.

Panic disorders

Panic disorder is characterized by panic attacks — out-of-the-blue attacks of acute anxiety which are typically accompanied by the fear that one is dying or going crazy. Panic attacks can last from minutes to hours. You may also have physical symptoms such as palpitations, sweating, dizziness, and shortness of breath. As a result of repeated attacks, you may start to avoid situations that trigger your anxiety.

Social anxiety

You feel extremely uncomfortable in social situations or when you have to meet new people. You may fear social humiliation or negative evaluations. You may avoid social activities and end up getting less out of life.

Phobias

Phobias are an overwhelming, unreasonable fear of an object or situation that poses little real danger but causes intense anxiety and avoidance behaviors. For example, you might have a phobia of spiders, heights, or flying.

How is anxiety treated?

Your team at the Soho Center for Mental Health Counseling & Clinical Supervision provides customized psychotherapy sessions to help you manage your symptoms.

You may benefit from individual and group therapy as well as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT). CBT helps you recognize how your perceptions of a situation may differ from reality and give you the tools you need to acknowledge your anxieties and learn to respond to them in healthier ways.

DBT helps you develop skills to manage painful emotions such as fear.

If fears and anxiety are preventing you from living your best life, schedule an appointment at the Soho Center For Mental Health Counseling & Clinical Supervision by calling the office or booking online today.