managing anxiety

[starfish123]

So I have my last session of a course of 6 cbt sessions next Monday for general, health and social anxiety.

The next day I felt positive that I've learnt to try to break it down and not suppress or fight it which is good and ready to take it on myself after the last session. I even went into a clothes shop on my own without feeling all the usual dizziness and sick feeling before work.

Then after a few hours at work I got a migraine (without the proper headache), then got really unsteady, tight chest, shakey, pins and needles in my feet and really tired. All I wanted to do was hide or escape, but I also didn't feel like I could move and felt I had to stay till the end, I didn't want to tell anyone- I was confused and didn't want to be seen to be not managing & I didn't know what was going on. I was stuck between wanting to hide in a room on my own, but also worried about being on my own, dealing with walking on my own, being able to drive myself home or get a bus instead. This worsened over a few hours and I wondered if this was even anxiety or something else, but not wanting anyone to know I was struggling incase I broke down. (I've been like in cafes in the past- my mum just tells me to go outside- at the time I'm not able to consider that that would help on my own and I'm not sure it really deals with it properly.)

The thing is when it came to home time and nothing had changed or happened across that whole time before, during and after I started to feel better and nobody had really noticed.

That evening at home I felt exhausted and really down and that went into the next day feeling like I had a dark foggy cloud over me, but I knew things weren't that bad.

What I'm not sure of is how to continue using what I have learnt on my own and and wandering why I have gone from noticing my unhelpful thoughts to having a bad days like that- where it all got difficult and confusing again.

I've also noticed how frequent and I'm only now starting to see how irrational my thoughts get on a lot of things including socially. But I tell her I can go out and do the simple actions she sets me to do and in that room its easy to say no problem and thats easy- but actually doing it is so much harder. She says its good that I'm able to recognise it and that should make it easier to over come- but I worry I might go backwards again and its hard work.

My therapist did tell me that people generally take time to try all the techniques
on their own for a while, then come back if they feel they need more support.

I'd like to know how others manage short term therapy, anxiety and bad days.

I thought I'd share this on here as I don't really want to tell family/ friends as I don't feel they really understand.

[Oosh]

Well done. You sound like you're getting a good handle on things there. And you sound like you have a very supportive mum.

It happened, let it happen and just keep functioning. It's much better to continue to function despite the dodgy spells than to withdraw and have dodgy spells isolated from life back at home.

You had some anxiety at work and you just carried on, well done. That's fantastic. Just keep doing that, like you said, nobody notices. That's what I found too.

Watch what you eat. I found foods could change my mood and it puts the thought in your head that anxiety is maybe coming so you bring it on by worrying. Foods can create brain fog too which I suffered a lot with. I started taking high strength fish oil and I can't remember last time I had brain fog.
Stay away from sugary foods at work too, for me they brought on anxiety, whether it be then or at a later time.

Next time you feel anxious at work pop to the toilet maybe. Relax and focus on something that relaxes you and gives you confidence. Your mum, happy plans you have, confident things you've done in the past, things like that. Take deep breathes and breathe all the way out and change your state back to one with a little more calm, confidence and ideally humour. Think of stuff that makes you laugh. It's very hard to feel anxious when you are amused. Listen to your favourite song on your phone.

Other days will be better so just keep going.