The only way to overcome anxiety is through exposure

[Passaggressfedup]

I recently overcome a massive anxiety of mine. I feel so liberated and proud. It has made me think of the other significant anxiety triggers I experienced in life and concluded that all have been overcome through regular, controlled exposure over time.

I read so many thread about children or young people experiencing anxiety, where the parent has opted to take the child away from the situation thinking it is what's best for them.

I appreciate that there was some specific instances where removal is the for the best, but aren't we, as a society, making things worse by not helping our children to face their fear so that they can not only gradually get over that particular fear, but also learn to build that sense of resilience, pride and positivity that comes with it?

@Octavia64’s posts about anxiety about harm, which I think could be described as trauma, is very very different and is one I’ve never been able to fully overcome.

I get what you’re saying. I think a lot of people are being obtuse.

A lot of us have experienced traumatic events and anxiety is expected. Some of us will be able to overcome. I think if a person can recognise the triggers, routine exposure to these triggers creates resilience.

In cases of sexual assault, exposure to being in the company of men (obviously not the person responsible) if being in a man’s presence causes anxiety, or exposure to being out alone etc.

School refusers - exposure to school environment, be it out of school hours, or in the company of friends/ teachers in small doses has helped children I know get back to school when they thought it would never be possible. Yes - maybe your child hasn’t made it back to school but that isn’t the case for all school refusers.

But don't presume to think that you know how to fix it in everyone, or their kids
I'm not presuming anything. I am giving my opinion on the matter. I don't expect anyone to take anything personally. You agree or you disagree. You debate, put your perspective. I don't get offended by people who disagree.

I don't offer services to cure anxiety. I don't have a tiktok account to tell people what to do. I don't promote a book or website.

It's a common and a growing phenomenon that some people become disproportionately defensive when reading something they don't agree with. Then attack that person and go on a mission to discredit them.

There's no need for it. Just disagree. I won't engage in defending myself or my views. I stand by them and no strangers on a forum making a personal attack will affect me.

wow

Just because handling it the way you describe does not work for many it does not mean they will be subjected to a life of overwhelm and helplessness
Of course not everybody, but statistics are showing that more and more people are diagnosed with anxiety that last for longer and longer periods. It's not me making this up.

What triggers the anxiety for you
Yes, as in considering what these are not as in asking to share these on this thread!

Sure. You just have to pull yourself together when you have a mental health condition. 🙄

I haven’t described my triggers here. On purpose. But in case you’re interested @Passaggressfedup I can feel a panic attack rising by the effort not to think about what happened. My breathing is rapid, and at the same time I feel like I can’t breathe and I’m sweating.

you asked me what my triggers are without thinking what that could do to me. Not so long ago I would have been self harming being asked that question and it’s still a battle not to

please don’t dismiss people as easily as you are doing here. Please stop with the just push through narrative. Exposure. You could do untold harm.

Yep agreed - what gets people over their anxiety is being exposed in a manageable way and nothing bad happening, and then graded exposure up until you can manage the big thing. Unmanaged exposure (“throwing them in at the deep end”) is likely to cause a panic attack and set them back even further.

DS gets terrible stage fright. Should he be allowed to sit out of school plays, definitely not. Should he be thrown in at the deep end and given a main solo to sing? Also definitely not - a small one-line speaking role which he manages well is plenty, and gives him more confidence for next time.

My anxiety is triggered by trauma around a particularly violent rape, and sexual assault which was the culmination of months of stalking, obsessive behaviour.
In your opinion what exposure do I need?
what tips can you give me?

Totally agree OP. If someone thinks the best way is to avoid the thing/situation making them anxious they’ll never develop skills to address the situation themselves. They’ll just avoid everything that makes them anxious and end up doing nothing.

A friend of mind is psychotherapist who specialises in phobias. One of the first things he asks is ‘what is the worst that could happen” (when faced with tge phobia’ and manages the fears initially. He then exposes the person to the phobia in a managed environment. It helps because it puts them back in control of the situation rather than it controlling them.

I find it helpful now when I’m anxious about something to actually think what is making me anxious and then finding strategies to address them including making back-up plans.

I can see that might work for a phobia but those of us with cptsd aligned anxiety asking that question itself is a bad idea. Because my answer to that is being raped and this time he kills me.

Absolutely, I believe it was Churchill who said the only way out is through. I often use it when there’s something I don’t want to do/ am anxious about. Along with put your big girl pants on and have a can of man the fuck up!!

That isn’t my experience of anxiety at all.

i can’t get over it by doing those things

For some people, sure.

I have had debilitating social anxiety since I was a child. I always forced through it, backing out was never an option. I have been incredibly resilient, faced my fears, threw myself out of my comfort zone. However, it never ever got any easier. Now I am in the middle of a mental breakdown because I just couldn't fake it anymore. I'm autistic, I don't know if that has something to do with it.

Your anxiety has a very defined trauma reason. I think the OP was more about generalised anxiety with very minor reasons. And please don’t take my comments above as in anyway something that I would say to you with your past.
I hope you’re getting counselling/ professional support?

And absolutely each to their own this is just my way of getting through any anxiety I have. I once ended up in A&E with a panic attack, I didn’t realise it was that at the time and thought I was having an asthma attack. I promised myself I would never allow myself to be in that position again! So have a variety of coping methods to stop myself getting that anxious ever again!

People are blurring the line between being clinically diagnosed with anxiety and just feeling everyday worries about certain situations/places.

The latter is perfectly normal and can definitely be dealt with by “just face it”. The first is not going to be as there is no specific trigger to expose yourself to.

Frustratingly @Passaggressfedup seems to know this as they’ve avoided answering the question about what they’d expose someone to, but continues on with the idea that people either want to help themselves or they don’t.

A trigger may seem minor to you but that doesn’t mean it is to the person suffering!

A bit simplistic, I think, given that for many people anxiety is a symptom not a condition in isolation. It may be possible to treat anxiety arising in a specific situation with supported exposure (assuming such support can be accessed) but unless treatment identifies and addresses the underlying cause of the anxiety, then it's likely to pop up in a different place. So the classroom feels safe now, but going to the shop doesn't.
Unfortunately unless the cause is obvious, it can take a long time to identify and may need all sorts of interventions from hormone tests to therapy. Unfortunately these interventions are rarely readily available and if a person is relient and what the NHS can offer, the advice to 'get help to cure your anxiety' is far easier to type out that it is to implement.
In some areas unless you are at the point of being a danger to yourself or others or can afford to self fund, there is no help. So people end up self managing anxiety as best they can, which is often simply avoiding triggers.

Then you don’t have anxiety as a medical condition, you have normal every day worries.

No one is suggesting that. It's terrible what has happened to you.

As a previous poster said it's normal daily activities that result in excessive anxiety that would require exposure. Such as the example given of walking to post a letter. Not repeating the traumatic event.

the thread title is a wild and unhelpful generalisation and as is obvious from other posters' contributions it is not remotely that simple in many cases.

I’m a trauma informed therapist and use different approaches depending on the presenting issue.
For OCD, ERP (exposure response prevention) is often mentioned as the gold standard, graded exposure from the least feared to most feared. It works well for OCD rituals and phobia. It works less well for EBSA and generalised anxiety, where a more psychotherapeutic approach is a better fit. Not often provided via NHS sadly, who offer CBT due to financial constraints.
It’s not a one size fits all solution. Would make my work a lot easier if it was! I know of many ND teenagers who were gradually encouraged back into school time and time again and some eventually reintegrated back with support from school. For some, school just wasn’t the right fit at all. The school system and environment works in a counter intuitive way to the ND brain. At work, I see how employers will make tangible accommodations for their ND workforce with hybrid working, use of headphones, separate spaces, respect of sensory needs etc. Ironically, they’re much better at this than schools, where arguably it’s far more important to get it right first time.
If only “man the fuck up and get on with it” worked.
So yes, graded exposure for OCD, or for a phobia of spiders/buttons= great. It doesn’t always work that easily for other anxieties.

Yanbu. Its through repeat exposure that we learn to recognise that the perceived threat is not as severe as we thought, that we can survive it, because we did.

We have become very bad at dealing with discomfort. Life is full of discomfort and we have to learn to accept it.