Anxiety can make even ordinary situations feel difficult.
You may find yourself constantly worrying about what might happen, replaying conversations, imagining worst-case scenarios or struggling to switch your mind off. At other times anxiety can feel intensely physical, bringing racing thoughts, tension, a pounding heart, nausea, dizziness or panic.
Sometimes there is an obvious reason for feeling anxious. Sometimes there is not.
Either way, therapy can help you understand what is keeping the anxiety going and begin developing different ways of responding.
Anxiety affects people in many different ways.
You might experience:
You do not have to wait until anxiety becomes overwhelming before seeking help.
Anxiety is part of the body's natural threat system.
When something feels dangerous, the brain and body prepare us to respond. This is useful when there is a genuine threat, but sometimes the same response becomes attached to situations, memories, thoughts or sensations that are not actually dangerous.
Avoidance can then reinforce the problem.
If we repeatedly avoid something because it makes us anxious, we never get the opportunity to learn that we can cope with it. The anxiety remains powerful, and over time our world can become increasingly restricted.
Therapy can help identify these patterns and work with both the thoughts and automatic responses that maintain them.
I do not use one approach for everybody.
Depending on your needs, therapy may draw on psychotherapy, counselling, clinical hypnotherapy, BWRT® and practical psychological strategies.
We might work on:
For some people, understanding the reasons for their anxiety is very important.
Others already understand exactly why they feel anxious but find that knowing this has not changed the response.
In those situations, we may work more directly with the emotional and automatic processes involved.
Panic attacks can feel frightening, particularly when they appear unexpectedly.
Symptoms can include a racing heartbeat, shaking, breathlessness, dizziness, chest tightness or a sense that something terrible is about to happen.
People can then become anxious about having another panic attack, creating a cycle in which fear of the symptoms becomes part of the problem.
Therapy can help you understand this cycle and develop a different relationship with the sensations and thoughts associated with panic.
Sometimes anxiety develops after experiences that have left us feeling unsafe, rejected, humiliated or powerless.
Even when we consciously know that the original situation is over, the mind can continue reacting to reminders as though the threat remains.
Where appropriate, psychotherapy or BWRT® may be used to work with these responses without requiring you to repeatedly relive everything that happened.
I have over 12 years' experience as a psychotherapist and clinical hypnotherapist and have undertaken additional specialist training in anxiety-related difficulties.
My approach is warm, practical and non-judgemental.
We will work together to understand what you are experiencing and agree what you would like to change.
There is no one-size-fits-all treatment plan. Therapy is adapted to you.
I offer face-to-face therapy from Craven Clinic in Skipton, North Yorkshire, as well as online sessions.
Individual therapy session: £89
Session length: 75 minutes
If you are considering therapy, I offer a free introductory telephone or online consultation.
This gives you an opportunity to tell me a little about what is happening, ask questions about how I work and decide whether working together feels right for you.
There is no obligation to book further sessions.
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