Uncontrollable anxiety

[zippidydooday]

Hi.
I'm looking for some tips for my anxiety.
I'd say 90% of the time it's controlled by sertraline.
But the other 10% is horrendous. It's mainly focussed on having to leave my home town or do something new (even as simple as a meal in a new restaurant)
My symptoms are brain fog, diarrhoea, feeling sick, and I always seem to get a uti in the days following. Not sure if this is due to stress or unrelated?
It's affecting my life, as I can't take the kids anywhere far from home without being sick, diarrhoea, panicking all night the night before and then being on antibiotics for the uti the whole week after.
I'm meant to be taking them out for the day tomorrow, somewhere I've never been before.
I'm shaking, panicky, can't get off the toilet and I'm going to vomit shortly.
Holidays are 100% out of the question. I'm not too bad if it's somewhere I've been before, or a day out less than 30 minutes from home, but otherwise it's horrendous.
Anyone else suffer?

Hi @zippidydooday,

Yes I can relate to this and it's so hard as a parent 😩 I'm a mum too.

How long have you been experiencing this? Is there anything that helps?

Hello

I'm sort of in the reverse of this. I previously had post natal anxiety and it has flared massively recently. I've been started on sertraline but it takes a few weeks to work the doctor said. So I also have propranolol at the moment. The idea being if I am really struggling I can increase that. I'm on three times a day at moment and it last about four hours. It takes that sick edge off certainly.

Have you done any CBT, or anything else to manage the ‘overspill’ ?

Please google the sympathetic nervous system - it will help you understand why anxiety causes all the physical sensations you are suffering from (even possibly the UTI's as your system is not dealing with infection control when you are stressed).

Try this video on progressive muscle relaxation when you have 20 minutes to yourself;

Sorry I've only just seen these replies.
I dragged myself on the day out, but was up shaking and panicking most of the night.
Once we were there we all had a really good time.
I just really need to sort the anxiety in the run up, as it is really ruining things.
No UTI either so far, which I'm very happy about.
I'll have a look at the video one of you kindly posted too.

Oh well done @zippidydooday!

It's not an easy thing to force yourself to do something when you feel that anxious so well done for getting through it and fingers crossed on the UTI front 🤞🏻

It sounds like reviewing your meds would be a good start, because it doesn’t sound like the sertraline is working effectively at the moment if that 10% you feel you’re not coping is ruining weeks at a time. The Panic Pod is a good podcast to listen to, to do some more finding out about anxiety in general. What sort of strategies do you try to use? Maybe a refresher of some talking therapies, or other relaxation stuff would help?