Four Ways I Deal With SUDDEN Anxiety
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Four Ways I Deal With SUDDEN Anxiety
Hello lovely ladies! I can’t believe it’s Monday. The Jewish holidays have been back to back, so we are a bit off schedule-wise. Normally, we have Sabbath from Friday night through Saturday night. This year, the Jewish holidays overlap with Sabbath and then continue through Sunday. Having that day off between Sabbath and the start of the week to go out, explore, take care of chores, etc. is the typical state of affairs, but going right into the new week is a different kind of challenge! This coming weekend is the last Jewish holiday until Chanukah, so it will be nice to get back into a routine as things even out.
We are currently celebrating the holiday of Sukkot, or the “Festival of Booths,” and we had a beautiful first couple of days. Now we are in what we call “Chol Hamoed” which basically means the intermediate days when we can still work but we are simultaneously celebrating the festival. We built a beautiful Sukkah and decorated it, but yesterday just as we were about to have some friends over for a little snack, the wind completely took our Sukkah out! One of the legs BENT and the whole thing started to collapse. Unfortunately, we don’t know what we are going to do next, but for the moment we can stop by our friends’ homes and use their sukkahs as needed.
In other news, last night as I was climbing into bed, I found myself immediately hit with a swell of anxiety. I almost thought I was going to have a panic attack! I rarely feel this way anymore and when I do, it’s usually situational, but this came out of nowhere. I have dealt with this in the past, so I was able to stop my physical reaction in its tracks by taking deep breaths, looking around the room and naming the objects around me, and having my husband put his arms around me to have someone to physically touch. But it was so random and odd that I thought I would share a few techniques I’ve come up with over the years that really help me to STOP an anxiety attack before it overtakes me.
Anxiety is an interesting emotion. I think we have come as a society to view it as something to take ownership of - “MY anxiety” - rather than like any other emotion we experience as human beings. We wouldn’t really think of saying “MY sadness” or “MY happiness.” We would just say, “I’m feeling sad,” or, “I’m feeling happy.” I remember the first time I started looking at things this way and stopped calling my anxious feelings “MY anxiety,” I felt instantly lighter. It wasn’t something that lived on my back, always waiting in the shadows to surprise me. It was like any other emotion - situational, fleeting, and natural to the human state.
So last night when I felt anxious all of a sudden and felt the physical attributes of anxiety (heart racing, quickening breath, etc.), I didn’t lean into it like I used to, ready to go along for the ride. I tried my best to stop it. Now, I’m not a doctor and everyone is different. I know that the experience of anxiety and anxiousness is hard to control and I’m not saying that my suggestions will work for each person. But if I can help even one of you in a moment of sudden anxiety, that’s great! So let me share my tools.
Don’t explore where the anxiety came from at that moment. There’s a book I love and that I’ve recommended multiple times called, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff.” It’s a small book for your bedside table that I read periodically when I’m starting to get in my own head too much. One of the chapters in the book talks about anxiety and recommends not trying to analyze where your anxiety is coming from in the moment that you’re feeling it. Instead, let it pass like a breeze over you. Don’t get into the nitty-gritty of the emotional root of your feelings. Let the anxiety pass first. I found this mind-blowing when I first read it. As someone who is always trying to find the root of my feelings, I used to try and delve deep while I was in the throes of anxiety and it always made my anxiety worse. I wasn’t able to think clearly and I was searching so hard for an answer in the hopes that it would solve the physical and emotional discomfort I was feeling. Once I stopped trying to search for the root while I was feeling anxious, I was able to let the emotions pass and revisit the root of it later. I wasn’t extending the period of time I was mired in this uncomfortable state. Instead, I could recognize the feeling, accept it as being there for the moment, and try to figure out what caused it later. This has saved me so much grief and I highly recommend keeping it in mind for the future!
Get into your physical body and the physical space you are in. As I mentioned above, there are some real physical actions you can take to ground yourself when you’re feeling yourself spiral into anxiety. Anxiety is all in the mind, so it’s really important to get out of your head and put yourself back into the present place. I always start by taking some deep breaths to feel my lungs and my chest raising up and down. The next thing I do is to name the objects that surround me, reminding me of where I actually am, not where my head is at. So last night, for example, I was lying in bed. I opened my eyes and named my dresser, the ceiling fan, my lamp, my windows, and my drapes. Naming things is sort of like counting sheep - it’s boring and simple and forces your mind to slow down a bit. Lastly, asking my husband to hold me steadied me as well. I knew I wasn’t alone and I had the grounding presence of Jacob to keep me in my body and out of my head. I could feel another person breathing, existing, right next to me so I knew I wasn’t going to slip into my anxious thoughts.
Think of mundane and happy things. My next trick is perhaps something that just works for me, but I always find that it helps. When you’re in the throes of anxiety, it’s easy to start imagining everything being out of control, scary, and larger than life. The easiest way to ground my thoughts is to think of the most mundane and happy things that surround us. Perhaps that’s watching a show like The Office where people are living normal, boring, happy lives and nothing is too out of control. Perhaps that’s thinking about your next family trip and planning a simple little itinerary. I find that thinking about the beautiful, boring parts of life reminds me that the big scary stuff is really very rare and the simple small stuff is what life is made of.
Pray to God about what your grateful for. Lastly, once you’ve calmed down a bit, I recommend thanking God for all the things you’re grateful for. Praying to God for help can be helpful as well, but sometimes when anxiety is sudden we can cry out desperately which makes us feel even more out of control. Handing over the reins to God and expecting Him to erase all of our negative feelings can be overwhelming when the feelings don’t immediately dissipate. Instead, I try to thank God for all He has given me in the moments where I’m definitely not focused on being grateful. It would not be my first impulse to thank God in the middle of a panic attack, but doing so gets me out of my head, where things are gray and awful, and reminds me of reality - all the beautiful things I do have and all the wonderful things God gives me. Getting out of my head - where the real danger is - is the key to moving out of sudden anxiety and allowing the feeling to move on by rather than settle in place.
Have you ever struggled with anxious feelings? What are your thoughts? Leave them in the comments down below!
Mark Your Calendar: Book Club Is TOMORROW!
![Take Back Your Family: From the Tyrants of Burnout, Busyness, Individualism, and the Nuclear Ideal by [Jefferson Bethke]](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd70af52f-64aa-4187-ba69-f5724f9ca06d_328x500.jpeg "Take Back Your Family: From the Tyrants of Burnout, Busyness, Individualism, and the Nuclear Ideal by [Jefferson Bethke]")
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I really needed this article about anxiety in my life right now. Thank you
In my personal experience, when I say "my anxiety" I'm referring to my chronic, diagnosed anxiety disorder not just the emotion. Not that the two are mutually exclusive of course. I mean, I feel anxious when I shouldn't because of my anxiety. It has been co opted into referring to just feeling anxious. I think is a symptom of a larger issue, a lot of people treat mental health struggles as something quirky or even something to be romanticized rather than something that should be taken kinda seriously. Anyways, those are just my thought, which are of course very subjective.
I love the grounding and calming techniques you shared! A lot of those have really helped me too! (Of course I am very single so it's a heavy blanket or my cat, not a husband in my case lol) Both chronic anxiety and feeling anxious are no fun so it's good to have things you know make you feel better!