Free Yourself from Anxiety (23 page)

As you can see maintenance factors are all about the kind of person you are apart from your Anxiety, and the kind of life you were living before Anxiety struck. Making changes in these areas is difficult for anybody, and may well require the kind of energy you simply don’t have while your Anxiety is at its worst.

But once you have made some progress towards recovery you will free up some of the energy that was going into your Anxiety and you can start to think about making changes at this next level.

If you feel daunted by this, then consider moving beyond self-help. You can explore withheld feelings, lack of confidence, low self esteem and damaged inner child with a counsellor or therapist. If you choose a person-centred counsellor then you can be sure that you will stay in control of how far you go with this work.

Assertiveness, problem solving and decision making can all be learnt on courses – check out what evening classes and other courses are available to you locally.

If you need to explore your spiritual side don’t be afraid to turn to the religious leaders in your local community.

Use this checklist to make sure you’ve considered all of the possible maintenance factors for your Anxiety.

So you’ve reached the end of the book – or maybe you’re having a quick peek at the end to see where the journey leads, or have skimmed through, dipping in and out. We’ve designed this book to be used as a complete programme, taking things in the order that we believe will help you get the best from it, but we know that very few people read self-help books like that, to start with at any rate.

If you’ve been skimming, dipping, or jumped straight to the end, then we suggest you take a deep breath and set about working through the chapters from the beginning, giving each task your full attention, and taking as much time as you need.

Once you’ve done that, you can assess the progress you’ve made. You will, for sure, have learnt much about yourself, and about Anxiety. You may have been able to use that knowledge, and the techniques we describe, to start on the road to a life free from Anxiety (no one will ever be entirely free from normal anxiety). You may even feel that you have travelled so far along that road that you consider yourself to have recovered from Anxiety.

But the story isn’t finished yet.

While you are in the grip of an Anxiety disorder it’s easy to think that life would be wonderful and simple if only you weren’t so anxious. In fact as you move through recovery you’re likely to feel complicated
emotions, some of which may take you by surprise. Spend some time thinking about this, and make a list of the emotions you’re feeling. Here are some likely candidates:

If you are elated, excited or proud then just enjoy the moment. Don’t, whatever you do, belittle your achievements. If you’ve managed something that was difficult for you then you deserve to feel happy about it.

What about if you’re disappointed? Take a moment to look through your notebook – it will remind you of how far you’ve come and how much more you now understand about Anxiety. Remember that everyone has different needs and will move at a different pace. You can go through any part of the programme again, or all of it. Before you do, ask yourself if you need to set new goals, and if they need to be more realistic.

If you’re apprehensive about the future, give yourself time to adapt to a life without Anxiety. All Anxiety disorders absorb a lot of your time and energy, and tend to make you isolated. As you come out of Anxiety’s confining world you may find that things have changed in ways that confuse you at first. Don’t worry about it, and use your new skills to tackle things one at a time. After all, someone who has been in hospital for a while, or who has been living abroad, would have to cope with the same changes.

You might feel surprised that sadness was on the list, and yet this is a normal part of change. If there is a new beginning, then there must have been an ending. If there is a gain, there will always have been a loss.

If you suffered from Anxiety for a long time, then you will have made little adjustments that made life more bearable. The weekly visit from the person who kindly did your shopping may have been a highlight in a life with no social contact, but now you do your own shopping and you don’t need them any more.

Also you may feel sad at the number of tedious things you are now able to do. Shopping for clothes may be fun, but shopping for soap and frozen peas is just a chore for most of us. Anxiety has let you off that particular hook.

These feelings are a normal part of letting go of old patterns. Don’t try to block these feelings out, tell yourself that they will pass, and that every life has some light and shade in it. And you do have to let go of the old, so that there is room for the new opportunities that await you.

If you are worried about your Anxiety returning, that’s understandable, but you now have new insight and new skills. Instead of dreading the bolt from the blue, you can now look back and see how your Anxiety developed in the first place.

You can identify the little warning signs that you ignored the first time around. If you get those signs again, you’ll recognise them and, even better, you’ll know what to do. Out of all the different things we’ve suggested you’ll know by now which are the most helpful for you personally. If you feel yourself slipping back into Anxiety, then take action to stop the slide. Put things in place that you know are helpful – dig out your relaxation CD, check your eating habits, remember to be assertive and challenge your thoughts. In other words, take care of yourself.

And remember that recovery does not always progress in a straight line. It can also be viewed as a cycle. You may need to go round more than once, but you can keep coming back, and each time it will get easier.