Anxiety Treatments

If you are interested in understanding how we can help you to address your anxiety naturally without drugs you can find out more about our 6 step integrative approach.

Firstly, if you have arrived here looking for information on anxiety treatment and to find out what you can do to help your own, (or another person’s anxiety), you might want to find out first more about what constitutes a diagnosis of an anxiety disorder.

Treatment Options

If you are ready to find out what your options are for treatment, then you are in the right place. We believe passionately that you need to have information to have an informed choice, so this post will review all the options available to you. It will also outline what out treatment approach is at The Natural Anxiety Specialist and why we believe we see success with our approach.

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)

Cognitive behaviour Therapy assumes that the mood of an individual is linked directly or in part to their thought patterns. The assumption is based around the idea that negative thinking affects the mood, behaviour, sense of self and physical state of an individual.

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is the most widely-used therapy for anxiety disorders. Research has shown it to be effective in the treatment of panic disorder, phobias, social anxiety disorder, and generalized anxiety disorder, among many other conditions.

Sessions are either in person in a clinic or online. CBT can teach people to manage their fears and anxiety symptoms by identifying thought and behaviour patterns that make you anxious. Then CBT helps you replace these less helpful thought patterns with coping strategies. At the Natural Anxiety Specialist we use CBT techniques with our anxiety clients.

Exercise:

Exercise has been shown repeatedly in trials to reduce anxiety in subjects. In trials it is as effective as relaxation techniques but needs to be a form of aerobic exercise and of a duration longer than 20 minutes as well as being conducted regularly. In fact, it seems clear that short 20 minute aerobic activity through the week was better than a long single 3 hour aerobic activity on the weekend.

Pharmaceutical Drugs:

Exercise has been shown to be as effective for depression as pharmaceutical drugs so at the Natural Anxiety Specialist we do not prescribe anti-anxiety medication. Many people who come for treatment have been suffering for years so may already be taking medication. In these cases we treat them in the same way using our 6 step integrative approach. See our FAQ’s about our treatments and medications.

Relaxation

Relaxation techniques work by switching off your flight and fight response, so your body no longer thinks there is a danger it has to prepare for. This has the effect of immediately reducing your stress hormone levels and this in turn will reduce your physical anxiety symptoms. The beautiful positive feedback loop is that when you feel physically less anxious your mind starts to respond with less anxious thoughts and any mind techniques that you have learnt such as CBT, become easier to engage with. There are many forms of relaxation that can be taught and used as tools by individuals suffering from Anxiety. At the Natural Anxiety Specialist, we like to teach a range of techniques and apply the ones that are most beneficial to each individual. The more things you have in your anti-anxiety toolkit, the more equipped you will be to reduce and counter any anxiety that arises.

¹https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Steven_Petruzzello/publication/21326590_A_Meta-Analysis_on_the_Anxiety-Reducing_Effects_of_Acute_and_Chronic_Exercise/links/54734b230cf24bc8ea19ed2b.pdf (accessed 17/10/17) Accessed 4/10/17