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One of the ways I like to describe anxiety is the inability to move forward due to future fears in a situation that feels like everyone around you has no problem with. However, you cannot cope and deal with it, paralyzing you to move forward in your personal journey.

When attending anxiety therapy, one of the ways a therapist supports anxiety is by working on 2 different powerful levels of anxiety therapy intervention.

1. The first level of intervention is when someone is anxious and dealing with anxiety at a crisis level to deal with the present and current level of anxiety distress. The therapist will often provide coping and intervention strategies to support a person in self-regulation to deal with the debilitating anxiety. From there, the individual and therapist work towards discovering the best healthy and positive interventions and outcomes. Some examples may include learning to be more in touch and having a deeper awareness within your body. This allows you a chance to learn to slow down and take a healthy mental break. Other examples include bare-bone basics such as learning to breathe very healthy and intentionally, reducing the effects of negative outcomes such as panic attacks. This also might consist of learning aftercare strategies such as “What do I do if I had a panic attack and now, I feel tired, embarrassed and wasted.”

2. The 2^nd level of anxiety intervention is figuring out what might be lying deeper within the individual. In other words, “Where did my anxiety possibly come from?”

This is a different level of therapy and can sometimes consist of having to look back and see if there could be something that created the anxiety. Some examples can include triggering situations from negative past experiences, past/present trauma, neurodivergent challenges such as ADHD or the Autism Spectrum, or just plain new situations that have never been encountered before and have to figure out how to cope with the new situation never experienced before healthily.

Sometimes, strategies such as cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), Person-centered therapy, and Trauma therapies such as Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) can be used to intervene in dealing with anxiety.

3. Another area to consider for anxiety therapy intervention is the sometimes-winning combination of seeing a therapist support the first two categories and also seeing your doctor or a psychiatrist to find out if there could be any physical or physiological issues, such as a chemical imbalance getting in the way. You see if there are chemical/medical reasons for the anxiety, things such as blood work or other medical interventions can provide reasons for the anxiety. In other words, get medical support from a doctor/psychiatrist and emotional/mental health support from your therapist… (on a side note, an excellent general doctor or psychiatrist can provide emotional and mental health support; however, often, due to their busy schedules they will usually refer a patient to someone such as a counselling therapist due to the current medical system having such a high volume of patients they attend to.)

Learning healthy anxiety interventions, finding which interventions work best for you, and then practicing the interventions can be a great way to begin finding hope in the complex world of dealing with anxiety.

If you are reading this article and realize you or a loved one requires more intervention in dealing with their high anxiety levels, it might be time to consider anxiety therapy with a qualified counselling therapist. Call/Text Lindsay or Jeremiah at 403-690-8617 and have a complimentary 15-minute consult to discuss anxiety therapy and begin to walk in New Life.