Dr. Laura Blog

Anxiety isn’t something that goes away easily or permanently. However, even though you can’t completely cure it, you can develop strategies to reduce your anxiety and learn how to live with it. Here are my tips to help you deal with your anxiety:

1. Exercise. The value of exercise is amazing - it increases blood flow, produces neurotransmitters, and calms anxiety symptoms. Exercise is by no means a cure, but it’s a temporarily relief and my treatment of choice. If you have an anxiety disorder, you really need to exercise more.

2. Take the right medication. A lot of people think medicine is a permanent fix. I think it just puts the dragon in the dungeon (and the dungeon is still there holding the dragon). Plus, there are side effects. For these reasons, I suggest people not use anti-anxiety medication every day, but rather just when it’s over the top. Anti-anxiety medications work within 10-15 minutes whereas antidepressants, which deal with anti-anxiety, sometimes take weeks to have an impact and always have side effects. That being said, there are many people who swear by their antidepressants and feel saved, so it’s definitely specific to the individual.

3. Learn relaxation techniques. Meditate, pray, or listen to oldies rock and roll.

4. Sleep. If you’re not sleeping, go to bed earlier. It’s very important for people with anxiety to not skimp on sleep.

5. Add more fun to your life. If your work causes you a lot of anxiety, try to make the work fun. Invent little games for yourself that you can do without impacting the work.

6. Find healthy distractions. Distractions are a very important tool for controlling anxiety. Creating art is a really good one. Making something gives you a sense of accomplishment, which is a powerful anxiety reducer.

Basically, you have to find ways to bring pleasure, joy, and peace into your life. Otherwise, you obsess about the anxiety, and anxiety loves to be obsessed over. Worry feeds worry and only becomes bigger.