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Habits
Bad Habits
During the course of my anxiety, I developed a number of habits which helped to feed my anxiety. I still suffer with them occaisionally, but to a lesser degree.
I am detailing them, as I was amazed (and comforted) to find that many other people with anxiety develop similar habits
- pulse checking - I was constantly checking my pulse to see if my heart rate was up, if I was skipping heart beats, or if my heart had stopped. Written down, it sounds crazy, but its true !
- scanning for symptoms - One of the things which still drives me crazy at times is scanning my body for symptoms - being on the lookout for the tell-tale signs of an anxiety attack. I am most prone to do this when waking up first thing in the morning, if I awake in the night and just before I go to sleep. The simple act of looking for signs of an attack can sometimes trigger an attack. I have much better control over this now through the meditation techniques which I have learned, but it still takes a grip from time to time.
Good Habits
Good habits are hard to keep up, but they are worth the effort. I don't keep them up all of the time, I fall by the way-side from time to time, but I try to keep myself on track as much as possible :
- Physical fitness - for me, trying to keep fit really helps to keep my anxiety at bay. I'm not sure why : some people say it's chemicals released in your brains, some say its adrenalin in your bloodstream being purged...I don't know, I just know it really helps me
- Meditation - simple meditation really helps to keep my brain from becoming the noisy confused mess which I get when I am anxious. It helps to quiet down the racing thoughts, gives me some peace and makes everything seem calmer and easier to handle. If I practice it regularly, it does seem to keep anxiety attacks down. But, the technique of deflecting intruding thoughts in meditation really helps to keep anxiety provoking thoughts at bay during the normal course of my day as well.
Last Updated : 14 April 2004 17:23:13