Anxiety Therapy

Therapy for Anxiety

The ACED team is fully specialized in treating anxiety, and can help you to learn the skills and coping tools needed to soothe and regulate the self-doubt, overthinking, restlessness, and discomfort that comes with it. We are here to help you better understand yourself, how your mind works, and how to create an internal sense of safety that isn’t as reliant on external circumstances or behaviors.

The ACED clinicians are trained and experienced in working with all of the different presentations of anxiety, including Generalized Anxiety Disorder, panic attacks and Panic Disorder, phobias, social anxiety, and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).

While there is no “cure” for anxiety, we know how to help you relieve it, manage it, and understand it so you can get back to living your life and doing the things that you love.

Anxiety Has Taken Over

Anxiety can severely impair your ability to function at work, school, and in social situations, and can greatly interfere with relationships.

Anxiety can rule your mind and body, and life. It is physically painful to experience prolonged anxiety, and it makes sense that you might struggle to show up in your life the way you want to when your body is going haywire.

There is hope - keep reading.

Anxiety can show up in many different ways:

Excessive fear or overthinking: out of proportion to the actual situation, and feels difficult to control
Social anxiety
Trouble falling or staying asleep, restless or unsatisfying sleep
Perfectionism
Difficulty concentrating: It’s challenging to focus
Specific phobias (like going to the doctor, or driving)
Vague, general anxiety that feels impossible to pinpoint
Panic attacks: It feels like you are dying. Sudden bursts of intense fear that trigger severe physical reactions when there is no real danger or apparent cause
Restlessness or feeling on edge: You feel a persistent need to move or to distract yourself
Irritability: You feel easily annoyed or on edge
Health anxiety
Extreme people pleasing
Fear of judgment, rejection, abandonment
Hypervigilance: Increased alertness, searching for signs of “danger”
Avoidance behavior: you find yourself procrastinating too much, and avoid emotions, situations tasks, people, etc that are anxiety-provoking

Anxiety in the Body

Sweaty palms, underarms, or other areas
Tightness in the chest
Muscle tension: clenching of the jaw, balling of the fists, or flexing muscles throughout the body, consciously or unconsciously
Racing heart, heart palpitations
Trembling, shakiness, jitteriness
Shortness of breath
Tunnel vision
Panic attack
Stomach discomfort (nausea, heaviness, buzzing, etc)
Gastrointestinal distress (diarrhea, vomiting, constipation, gas/bloating, Irritable Bowel Syndrome)
Dizziness
Changes in appetite
General physical discomfort
Can’t be still
Fatigue: Anxiety is exhausting and can lead to a ongoing sense of heaviness of feeling tired
And many more (everyone experiences anxiety in both similar and unique ways)

Why Do I Have Anxiety?

Suffering with anxiety can be overwhelming, and effects everything in your life— your relationships, your work or school, your physical body, your emotions, your mental health, your capacity to pay attention, and even your identity. At the same time, having anxiety is not your fault.

Anxiety, in all of its presentations, has a strong genetic component and tends to run in families. There is no cure for anxiety, unfortunately. The treatment for anxiety is learning how to manage it, soothe it, prevent it (as much as possible), and relieve it when it strikes. Since each person’s anxiety is unique, it is important to work with a specialized therapist to learn how to manage it for your specific needs, history, genetics, and style.

Many People Struggle With Anxiety

Anxiety disorders are common in both children and adults. About 18% of U.S. adults and 25% of adolescents age 13 to 18 will experience anxiety, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. About 4% of adults, and nearly 6% of teens, report anxiety disorders classified as severe.

There are several types of anxiety disorders, and research suggests that most are driven by similar underlying processes. Folks struggling with anxiety tend to be easily overwhelmed by their emotions and/or body sensations, and can have understandably big reactions to these uncomfortable or painful feelings and situations.

You might try to cope with this discomfort by avoiding situations or experiences that make you feel anxious. But it doesn’t work, since avoidance usually makes anxiety worse, especially over time.

Anxiety Counseling Works

Psychotherapy for anxiety is a collaborative process, where you get to be a big part of your treatment, and will get support to cope with and reduce your anxiety symptoms. The therapy sessions will look a bit different for everyone, and this is because the ACED team is specialized in individualized anxiety treatment. Some folks will be a great fit for exposure therapy, while others will benefit from learning and practicing DBT skills and tools to help with anxiety in the moment. You and your therapist will decide what you want and need together.

Anxiety issues are very treatable! Most folks who struggle with anxiety are able to reduce or mostly eliminate symptoms after several (or fewer) months of psychotherapy, and many people notice improvement after just a few sessions.

Let Us Help

With the help of a skilled, specialized therapist and/or dietitian (if your anxiety affects your eating), you can develop the coping skills, insight, and compassionate self-care needed to help with your anxiety. We can provide the support you need:

You will receive a personalized treatment plan that is highly specific and aligned with your unique needs and goals
Tools and skills to manage and diminish anxiety symptoms
Support in developing insight and understanding about yourself, your mind, and your body
Education about the science behind anxiety
Help learning to regulate and soothe your intense emotions
Coping skills to advocate for yourself, especially when it comes to your anxiety triggers
Nutrition support, education, and guidance if anxiety affects your relationship with food
Inspiration, motivation, and accountability
So much love and compassion

We utilize a number of therapeutic modalities to aid in your unique recovery process:

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Emotion Focused Family Therapy (EFFT)
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
Psychodynamic Theory
Feminist Theory
Health at Every Size® and Intuitive Eating
Internal Family Systems (IFS) and Parts Work
Relational Cultural Theory
Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT)
Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP)

We Cherish Your Autonomy

You and you alone (given that you are an adult) are in charge of your life and your body. You make decisions based upon what you believe is best for you. We will have plenty of recommendations (see above) to aid your healing process, and if your symptoms are more severe, we may be more directive in nature. However, you are always free to agree or disagree, to come and go as you please, and do what you believe is the best thing for you.

We believe that you must make your own decisions to get the most out of therapy, and we support you in doing so. We cannot make you do anything, and you simply will not change unless you want to. We unconditionally accept you for who you are, right now.