Stay in control

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is the most widely-used therapy for anxiety disorders. Substantial research has shown that it is highly effective for the treatment of many types of anxiety, such as:

  • General Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
  • Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD)
  • Panic Disorder (PD)
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Phobias
  • And many other conditions

CBT treats anxiety by helping you change the way you think and behave during the times that you’re anxious. The goal is to learn to interrupt and change the worried thoughts that create anxiety. You’ll also learn how to reduce avoidant behaviors that prevent you from overcoming anxiety.

As the name suggests, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy involves two main components:

  1. Cognitive therapy addresses the cognitions, or negative thoughts, that contribute to anxiety.
  2. Behavioral therapy addresses the way that you behave and react in situations that trigger anxiety.

A fundamental concept of CBT is that it’s our thoughts, not external events, that affect how we feel. This means that by training our thoughts, we can overcome challenges like excessive anxiety.

To illustrate this, imagine that you’ve just received an invitation to a party. How can your thoughts about this situation affect how you feel?

Thoughts: “This could be fun. It’ll give me a chance to get to know some people better.”

Feelings: Optimistic, happy

Thoughts: “I never know what to say or do at parties. I’ll probably say something inappropriate.”

Feelings: Anxious, negative

Notice that the same event can elicit completely different feelings because of our thoughts about it.

So how can CBT help you to change your thinking and help you to not be anxious?

One way is by thought challenging – also called cognitive restructuring. This involves three steps:

  1. Identify the negative thoughts. People that struggle with anxiety have a strong tendency to see situations as being more severe than they actually are. For example, for someone with a germ phobia, a handshake might seem life-threatening. Although this might seem obviously irrational to you, identifying your own negative thoughts can be really challenging. One way that we can identify them is by working out what you were thinking when you began to feel anxious.
  2. Challenge the negative thoughts. In this step, we’ll question the evidence for your anxiety-provoking thoughts and test out the reality of negative predictions. Strategies include conducting experiments, weighing the pros and cons of avoidance, and determining the realistic odds of events unfolding as you expect.
  3. Replace negative thoughts with realistic thoughts. Once your negative thoughts are identified, we can replace them with more accurate and positive thoughts. We might also develop some realistic, calming statements that can help you in stressful situations.

Another CBT tool for anxiety is exposure therapy. By strategically exposing yourself to situations that cause anxiety, you can get an increasing sense of control and your anxiety will decrease.

Exposures are usually done in one of two ways: We might explore situations through roleplay or conversation (in vitro), or we might plan to confront them in real life (in vivo).

Instead of facing your biggest fear immediately, which can be traumatizing, we might take an approach called systematic desensitization. This allows you to gradually challenge your fears, build confidence, and develop the skills you need to control panic.

This generally involves two steps:

  1. Create a list. We’ll make a list of a few steps with clear, measurable objectives to work your way up to your goal. For example, if you have anxiety about spiders, we might start by looking at pictures of spiders, working our way up to being in the same room as a spider, and eventually having a spider contact your bare skin.
  2. Work through the steps. With my help, you’ll work your way through the list. You’ll learn to stay in each situation until the anxiety decreases and you’ll become desensitized to your fears.

Depending on the situation, we may also learn some relaxation techniques to help you stay in control.

These techniques have been proven to be highly effective in helping people cope with anxiety. Everyone’s treatment plan is unique to the individual, and I will help you to work through the anxiety that is holding you back, whatever its current form may be.