Please help!

[Nicole_T]

Hi,
I am hoping someone can help with some advice or some encouragement. I started having panic attacks and anxiety about 5 months ago after quitting my pill. The anxiety was awful and I won’t detail all the symptoms and feelings I had, but it’s going away slowly to the point where I believe I don’t really have that much anxiety anymore.
My issue is that during all this time all I can focus on was the anxiety and how I was feeling, and I scare myself thinking that I will never be able to think of something else. No matter what I do, who I talk to, I always have the thought of anxiety in my head, be it quotes I read from people, me re-assuring myself etc.
The last few episodes of anxiety I had came from either thinking ‘I am trapped in my head and no one can save me’ or even reading a book and hearing my own voice in my head whilst reading. I’ve also had it while having normal memories pop in my head but for some reason just freaking me out, freaked out by my own normal thoughts.
I find myself scanning my thoughts constantly for the thought of anxiety, and even if I have normal thoughts I then analyse them, like where did it come from, how did it get here. Even if I have a song in my head, I have the background thought ‘you’ve got a thought in your head because you’re avoiding to think about anxiety’. I am obsessed with the subject and it makes me depressed thinking that I will never be able to just relax and will always be checking what’s in my head, what my thoughts are. I think this could be because OCD and intrusive thoughts come with anxiety so I’m questioning every single thought. I also get this feeling of dread because I feel my mind will never be normal again.
It could be that I associate thinking about anxiety with getting anxiety and I’m scared of thinking about it but at the same time all I can do is think about it. When another thought pops in my head and then another, I suddenly think ‘do I still have a racing mind’?
I feel like I can’t live like this anymore, starting Zoloft soon which I’m hoping can help.
If anyone has experience this or has any advice, I’d love to hear it.

[Oosh]

Don't freek yourself out because anxiety is still in your thoughts, it's bound to be because it's habit now. Just like if you were always thinking about work you'd probably be in the habit of going home and thinking about work there too.

The fear that you'll always be thinking about anxiety now is just an idea, a suggestion. Throw in some doubt and suddenly it's a disturbing idea.

Recognise that doubts at work and that the truth is it's easy to get into the habit of thinking about a dominant subject. It doesn't MEAN anything other than you can become locked into a dominant subject. And that's especially true of anxiety, you become trapped because your thoughts always seem to return to the topic of anxiety/anxieties.

It's really really common and I was like that too but it's nothing to be afraid of. Instead of monitoring for signs you're thinking about anxiety monitor for the times that you noticed you had forgotten. I'd notice I'd forgotten for an hour, then it was eventually a day or two and in the end you'd notice whole weeks go by where you had literally forgotten and your thoughts had returned to external things, interests, goals, plans, jobs, things you enjoy etc

Then those periods of feeling you're locked into anxious thinking become the exception and you call them setbacks. But all you do is remember how your thoughts were on all of those other subjects, don't fear anxious thinkings return, don't give it significance and just go back to that external thinking, then you notice you forget again.

DONT be tricked into believing this is all something to fear. Just have a good perspective on it, put doubt in its place. Don't let doubt get you worried "yeh but what if" etc

Thoughts about anxiety are nothing to fear. They're just traces of a bad habit you used to have. Forget them as quickly as they appear. Don't keep hold of them by giving them any significance.