Overcome Lightheadedness

[anxietyrecovery]

HI

My main problem is that I become lightheaded all of the time with anxiety, which in turn creates a fear of losing contol/fainting. Please can someone tell me how to remove this horrible symptom from experience?

Thanks

[Vixxy]

As with all anxiety as soon as you stop worrying about it, it disapears. If youve done CBT you can use this to give yourself an alternative belief/statement to counteract the thought processes that lead to you feel like youre going to faint.

An example of how you can make the alternate statement:
Your post with a little bit of embellishment.
I feel lightheaded when I get anxious. Im scared ill loose control and attract attention. Im scared ill faint. If I faint ill get even more anxious as I have lost control of my body.
now for the alternate thought
Ive had this lightheaded feeling every time I go out, BUT I have never fainted or lost control of my body. It is safe to assume that the probabilty that ill faint or lose control is very minimal. If I ever do feel so lightheaded that I think I might faint I trust myself to be able to deal with the situation by finding somewhere quiet to sit until I feel well enough to go home.

The other physically based way is to practise deep abdominal breathing and make sure that when youre out and feeling anxious you focus on taking slow deep breathes into your tummy. You should also try to keep all your muscles as relaxed as possible.

[mandie]

Hi

I really sympathsise with you. This is my worst symptom with my anxiety and its there constantly.

For the past 4 weeks iv had it everyday.

Its got me so upset but iv carried on with my life as best i could and tried not to think about it.

This past week iv been telling myself im not going to faint, iv had it loads before and it will go away when i stop letting it control my life all the time.

Today was the first day iv had where the liteheadedness hasnt been there. I think iv had to accept its there but not be frightened by it. Its hard but it seemed to have worked!!!

love mandie x