Self-Help Tips for Dealing with Anxiety

Everybody experiences anxiety from time to time in their life. You can’t always breathe through an anxiety attack either. Anxiety attacks people in different ways. Some have trouble breathing, their heart races, with flushed skin and chest pain. If you have frequent anxiety attacks, try these self-help tips for dealing with them.

1. Exaggerate your biggest fear

  Talk to a friend about your biggest fear, whether it be giving a presentation to your class or riding a roller coaster. Make it as dramatic as possible with lots of descriptive words and plenty of your raw emotions. Then when it comes time for you to do that thing that scares you, it won’t be as horrifying because you’ve already ruled out all the possible horrible things that can happen to you. After talking to your friend about this a couple of times, your stories and exaggerations will start to become very silly and something you can laugh about together.  

2. Distract yourself

  In your scary situation, don’t think about where you are or what you’re doing. It seems easier said than done, but with practice, it’ll almost be like you aren’t even in the situation that causes your anxiety.

3. Exercise

  Stress and anxiety both release the same hormone: adrenaline. When you exercise, you are releasing this hormone, making your anxiety levels go down.  

4. Do not consume too much caffeine or alcohol

  Both are stimulants and will only make your anxiety worse. Instead, turn to drinks like milk and water. Some general foods that are good to bring down your anxiety levels include nuts, berries, yogurts, legumes, and dark orange vegetables.  

5. Meditate

  Calm yourself down and focus on your breathing; nothing else. Tune out everything going on around you and count each breath you take.  

6. Break down the days into minutes

  Instead of stressing yourself out about what you’re going to do in the next three hours, focus on the seconds and minutes you are living in right now. This will help to eliminate some worries and anxiety you may have for a certain part of your day.  

7. Use visual anchors

  If you feel yourself getting anxious, find something that brings a sense of calm to you and focus on it. For example, if you find yourself stuck in traffic, you can look up at the clouds to help you feel calm.  

8. Repeat a mantra

Simply repeat over and over in your head, a phrase that brings calmness and peace within yourself. A sample phrase would be, “I am enough” or “I can do this.” Building yourself up is often a technique people use to relieve some of their anxiety.

9. Write a love letter to yourself

This is just like what you’d do if you were repeating a mantra. Write down on a piece of paper all of the things you love about yourself. Then when you’re having an anxiety attack, read the letter. This, once again, will help relieve some anxiety.

You aren’t alone in this world. Millions of people suffer from anxiety. These tips given may not all work for you, and that’s okay. There are other tips out there for you to try, as well as doctors and other professionals to talk to.

Could Your Weight Gain Be the Result of Emotional Overeating?

  Weight gain is frustrating enough, but when you can’t seem to identify the cause(s) of it, the frustration is compounded. Emotional overeating is a somewhat sneaky problem – because it can involve mindless eating, it’s the sort of thing that can occur without you realizing it. If you are having trouble figuring out what’s causing your weight gain, here are some tips on identifying emotional overeating (as opposed to just overeating).  

Seemingly Unexplainable Weight Gain

If you are gaining weight and you can’t seem to figure out why this is (ironically) a sign that the problem may lie with emotional overeating. As noted above, you often don’t know you’re doing it when it comes to emotional overeating. You may even be working out regularly and preparing healthy meals and still gaining weight because you are mindlessly eating other foods when you feel negative emotions.  

A Sudden Urge

Sources say that emotional “hunger” comes on quite suddenly, perhaps in the form of an irresistible craving for a certain food or just the urge to eat right now. True hunger is usually more gradual than that – unless you have low blood sugar or have gone a very long time without eating, true hunger does not usually take the form of an urgent need to eat a whole lot right away.  

Depression

More and more the connection between emotional overeating and depression is being discovered. Do you feel depressed periodically? When you even think of feeling depressed, what goes through your mind? How do you cope? If you are picturing a big serving of your favorite comfort food, then this may be a sign that your overeating is emotion-based.  

Stress

Are you going through a stressful time in your life simultaneous to your weight gain? Have you seen that pattern before? Stress, with its accompanying anxiety and other negative feelings, can trigger someone to overeat in response to those feelings.  

Guilt

How do you feel after you eat? Are you consumed with guilt? Do you feel ashamed? These feelings are signs that you have a problem with emotional overeating. Normal eating to satisfy normal hunger does not make a person feel guilty.  

Specific Cravings

As many parents know, genuine hunger usually means that you’re more open to various food options. In emotional overeating, though, cravings may be so specific that no other food will do to satisfy your “hunger.” You feel like you have to have that particular food to feel satisfied.

The Dangers of Depression

There are definite dangers associated with depression. It can affect nearly all ages, with some groups and demographics being more susceptible than others (women are more likely to develop depression than men, for example, and teens are said to be more prone to depression than adults). Depression can even be fatal, warn medical professionals, and it’s not just the disorder that poses risks. Medications can also present their own list of risky side effects.

Here are some of the dangers commonly associated with depression.

Suicide

This may be the “ultimate” danger associated with depression – it’s considered by many to be the most extreme manifestation of the disorder. Depressed people may convince themselves that they just aren’t worth enough to live, or that their friends and family will be better off without them. Warning signs of suicide include:

* Preoccupation with death – person constantly talks about death or conducts extensive research into the afterlife, methods of suicide, and other related subjects

* Gathering belongings and giving them away

* Cleaning out and “getting things in order” for no apparent reason

* Continual speaking about death, the afterlife, or other similar things

Loss of Job and Income

Depression can be debilitating. The depressed person feels worthless and unmotivated and may call in sick frequently or not show up for work. They may be late or be unable to face difficulties during the workday. Depression can cause a person to be indecisive and unable to concentrate, which could be extremely dangerous in certain types of work (such as construction or factory work that requires a worker to be alert to avoid injury to him/herself or others).

Losing a job may then exacerbate the person’s depression, and the loss of income could affect the amount of medical attention and medication he or she is able to afford.

Medications

While medication can save lives, it can also pose serious and/or dangerous side effects. Antidepressants tend to have fewer side effects than SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors), but antidepressants may, ironically, induce suicidal thoughts.

Several years ago, a popular antidepressant was called on the carpet for indirectly causing the actual suicides of many people who took it. SSRIs may cause bad headaches, temporary or chronic diarrhea, insomnia, nausea, and/or nervousness and agitation.

Self-Neglect

Depressed people have a tendency to neglect their own health and care. They may not have the energy or focus to keep their homes clean, eat well, or care for their bodies. Because of this self-neglect, depressed individuals may be more susceptible to illness.

More serious illnesses may go untreated because the depressed person just can’t cope with the idea of having a serious illness and therefore he or she doesn’t seek help or treatment.