Over Thinking is Ruining My Life

[pussinboots61]

Overthinking is taking over my life. I have had CBT, take medication, I try the CBT techniques that I have learnt but still can’t control the worry. Does anyone else have this and have any tips? I feel I can hardly function some days for the worries going round in my head.

I am 63, live on my own after two failed marriages, I have a full time job, earn a good wage. I live in a nice Council flat, have a supportive family and a wide circle of friends. I don’t crave another relationship and don’t want to marry again so I am happy being single now.

Examples of what I catastrophise about - although I am fit and healthy I worry about getting older, fear being stuck in my flat and unable to get up and down the stairs and having to move to somewhere awful. I worry about pending retirement in four years time, worry that I will haveno money, even though I am due to get a decent pension, I worry that I will have nothing to do and be bored all day every day.

I get paranoid if I don’t hear from friends straight away and think they are against me and falling out with me. Some friends have dwindled over the years which happens but I fear losing my current circle of friends and being on my own. I have a couple of friends who can be condescending sometimes with their remarks and I deal with it and don’t accept it like I used to do but I can’t just say my piece and move on from it, it niggles me and I keep going over and over it to anyone who will listen.

I have health anxiety and every time I hear about someone getting cancer I fear its going to happen to me. Tests can come back clear and I am relieved for a while but then I think ‘what if it comes on after the tests’. It’s also not just serious illness I worry about. If I get a slight twinge in my leg I convince myself I’m going to be immobile and unable to walk
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I know I am making myself ill as I go to sleep worrying and wake up worrying. Only work keeps me sane as I am so busy there that I don’t get time to think about things but I fear when work goes I will totally crack up.

It doesn't sound like your medication makes any difference. I would see your GP and either increase the dose or change and see if that helps.

I would see a good therapist. You can find one via BACP.

If you don't already, I suggest doing some exercise every day. Taking a good multivitamin, vitamin D and a probiotic. You might find magnesium helps.

Journalling might also help.

Was it actual CBT you had or was it CBT based? How many sessions did you have? What techniques are you using?

CBT is very effective for rumination and worry, as long it is proper CBT with a qualified therapist. I’d recommend trying again and going private if you can.

The Centre for Clinical Interventions (CCI) is an Australian website which has good self help resources for generalised anxiety and health anxiety. You need to practice ‘containing’ the worry so that you gain more control and it takes up less of your day/ head space. It is absolutely possible to successfully reduce your worry and anxiety, but you need help. Wishing you the best OP.

Have you tried meditating, works for me, also a friend of mine does tapping, maybe look into that.

Your mind is a muscle which you can use techniques to practice retraining it but the key is to be gentle about it. These strategies I learned through some training and have really helped me but I'm still working on it...

*Perception - are your thoughts based on logic and evidence or something sort of insecurity or perception/prejudice?
*Acceptance - accept what you can't control about the situation
*Letting it go - the hardest part but...can be helped by
*Presence of mind - really try to focus on the actual task at hand, the noise of the hot water going into the tea cup, the feel of the cold spoon getting warmed in the cup, the taste of the tea and so on.

Try to be conscious about when your mind goes off down the rabbit holes and gently bring it back to really simple stuff what you see, hear etc...its really important not to give yourself a hard time, be very gentle with yourself about putting down the ruminations and refocusing your attention. It's not about silencing your worries, rather observing them and seeing them a bit more clearly without so much of an emotional/stress response.

I found Acceptance and Commitment Therapy much more effective than CBT. It encourages acceptance of the negative thoughts and worries, while CBT tries to change the thoughts which was just never effective for me. It only worked for me with continued therapy visits however and as soon as I stopped therapy, I tried to maintain the behaviours I learned, but it was hard. So I would recommend regular therapy, whichever type ultimately works for you, and to switch it up if it’s not working. Alongside that visiting the GP to explore other avenues of support.

Yes there's something about resisting the worrying and giving yourself a hard time about it that makes it worse...now you're worrying about worrying about worrying and it becomes an echo-chamber of worry. There's a lot of tension in the world at the moment and in the media as well which doesn't help...I think if you can try to control what you consume media-wise, this can help.

can you keep busy? sounds like your mind is very active, so try to fill your time as much as possible - hobbies / walks / volunteering etc.

it sounds like work is important but it might be useful to build up a variety of activities that you can take part in to keep busy.

CBT is recommended in NICE guidelines because there is a strong evidence base for CBT for worry and rumination, including generalised and health anxiety. CBT would not involve changing the thoughts at all, the focus would be on changing the process of worrying and trying to contain it, if that makes sense. That’s why I was asking if the OP had received intensive CBT or a lighter version. Focusing on individual thoughts and worries would be unhelpful.

I agree though that different therapies work for different people. I would probably recommend high intensity CBT first in this instance.

Thank you for your replies. I have had CBT via Talking Therapies, it used be called IAPT. I've had a few sessions wth them over the past five years, covering general and health anxiety.

I am trying to keep up the techniques like using worry time and giving evidence for and against thoughts but it can be hard keeping it up sometimes, especially the worry time as its easy to forget the time you've set for yourself to worry.

Journalling was my go to for years and I still do it but now I find reading back over what I've written can make me more anxious so I tend to just write the main issue and not go into too much detail.

My mind feels crazy at the moment.

Has anyone ever suggested you might have ADHD? The ruminating and rejection sensitivy seems very adhd like. Sometimes CBT does not work as well with the ADHD brain.

I have a similar sounding brain. Walking in nature daily (preferably with my dog) is essential for quietening my mind and reducing my anxiety.

Watching with interest once a worry is in my mind it's like a runaway train.ive been going over the same thing for four days and talking about it.

It sounds to me as if you’d benefit from therapy, rather than CBT,
looking at the causes, not trying to control the behaviours.

Excellent book -

Susan Nolen-Hoeksema
Women Who Think Too Much: How to break free of overthinking and reclaim your life

It's no surprise that our fast-paced, overly self-analytical culture is pushing many people - especially women - to spend countless hours thinking about negative ideas, feelings, and experiences. Renowned psychologist Dr Susan Nolen-Hoeksema calls this overthinking, and her groundbreaking research shows that an increasing number of women - more than half of those in her extensive study - are doing it too much and too often, leading to sadness, anxiety, and depression.
In Women Who Think Too Much, Nolen-Hoeksema shows us what causes so many women to be overthinkers and provides concrete strategies that can be used to escape these negative thoughts, move to higher ground, and live more productively. Women Who Think Too Much will change lives, and is destined to become a self-help classic.
Available from Amazon

I’m familiar with IAPT, could you re-refer? It sounds like you really need more support currently.

Try to keep using the techniques if you can, I know it can be very difficult but set an alarm for worry time and see how you feel after doing it for a week or so. It’s cliche but these things really do take practice and get easier with time. You are trying to teach your brain to stop the worry process and there is no quick fix sadly.

I think there have been some good additional suggestions in the thread too; exercise, mindfulness techniques and distraction can all help quiet the mind as can spending time in nature. You need to find things that are soothing for you. Breathing techniques can be good too, there are some good apps available like headspace and breathing space. Wishing you all the best OP.