Never ending anxiety

[partypickle]

I've been suffering from anxiety for four months now since my dad passed away suddenly.

It's the physical symptoms that are flooring me and I was just wondering what anyone's else's experience is of them and how long they last.

Every day it's nausea, upset tummy, headache, chest pains, palpitations, globus sensation, tiredness, eczema flare up, struggling to eat or sleep etc etc

I have daily anxiety attacks which now seem to be without a trigger

I've seen the GP who prescribed tablets for stomach acid which did nothing except give me even worse headaches.
I can't have anti anxiety meds due to other health issues - won't go into that one.

I'm having CBT but not really finding it useful and I've been doing meditation and mindfulness for weeks now.

I just would like some advice as to how to further manage this without meds.

Trying to exist with three teenagers and crushing anxiety is not easy

Thanks in advance

You can't have any anti anxiety meds at all? Unfortunate that's the only thing I've ever found to work for me

What, specifically, are you anxious about? What are the thoughts that are triggering your body to go into the fight or flight response?

@Eyesopenwideawake
I think the constantly feeling unwell makes me feel anxious which then makes me feel more unwell. It's hard to explain. It's just there all the time.
Anything to do with my Dad used to be a trigger but now I can literally be brushing my teeth and I feel the anxiety attack coming on

@Midnightlove
Sadly not. I've had a few health issues over the years that fall into the 'can't have' category. I've explored this in depth with my GP

Tapping might be worth a try, it seems to be helping me. I just use the app The Tapping Solution, the free version - I think you can pay for more 'tapping sessions' but I haven't needed to so far. I do the ones for stress and anxiety

Are you sure? I mean there’s loads and loads of different types including atypical ones.

If you can’t tolerate them then lithium or other mood stabilisers are used. I think you are being fobbed off. And it’s up to your gp to find something that will work.

Understood, it's the anxiety cycle. You have a worrying thought that fires up the F/F response so you body reacts and that makes you feel anxious which adds to the physical reaction...and so on.

Grief can show up in so many different ways, especially if the death was unexpected or in difficult circumstances. Have you considered bereavement therapy? If the relationship wasn't easy then maybe therapy with a wider scope might be better.

Just as an aside, when you feel an anxiety attack coming on, try to relax and let it pass by. Fighting/resisting/fearing it will do nothing other than make it feel worse and make you more scared of it happening again - another vicious cycle.

The (lovely) Howard Cooper describes thoughts as nothing more than an image plus a voice (or a sound) plus a sensation. That's it. You can choose to change any one of those elements to flip the thought into something completely different.