Recently, Mental Health Awareness Week came and went and I didn’t realise until the last day. (Oops.) Anxiety is something I’ve been meaning to post about for a while, but it’s such a big subject, it’s taken me a while to get to it.
If you’ve read my post OCD in a Pandemic, then you’ll be aware that this is something that I’ve suffered from myself for some time and has grown worse in recent weeks. To be perfectly honest, apart from trying to adapt my behaviour to reduce the level of anxiety I experience, I haven’t been very good at putting the following advice into practise! But I’ve made notes in talks and interviews about this subject, and have done some personal research, to enable me to compile this post.
What is Anxiety?
Anxiety and fear are not the same. Fear is an emotional reaction triggering a physical response to a perception of impending danger. Anxiety lacks object or cause; it’s what we feel when we’re worried. It exists to move you to take appropriate action, but can go beyond normal levels, which is when it becomes a mental health issue.1
“Anxiety is a feeling of unease, worry or fear which, when persistent and impacting on daily life may be a sign of an anxiety disorder.”2
Dealing With Anxiety3
- Be kind to yourself. Live one day at a time; try not to worry about tomorrow unless you can actually do something about it now.
- Focus on things that help.
- Limit your exposure to the news, and take a break from things that make you anxious.
- (Personal tip: if your Apple device shows headlines when you swipe to the left, go into Settings>News and turn on “Restrict Stories in Today”, and make sure you’re not following any news sources, so you don’t see triggering headlines when you’re trying to stay away.)
- Stay connected to loved ones.
Resources
- Mental Health Foundation’s entry on anxiety and guide to looking after your mental health during the Covid19 outbreak
Apps
I’ve started looking into mental health apps after a couple were mentioned in a journaling class. However according to the reviews, they both required subscriptions to access the majority of the features. So I searched in the app store for “free mental health” and “free breathing exercises”.
I haven’t explored the apps accompanied by “in-app purchases” yet, but I have found two completely free apps, both of which I’m trying out: Breathwrk, which guides the user through breathing exercises for various situations including anxiety relief; and Cove, which is an interesting app for musical expression of emotion and mood. (No music knowledge required!)
Writing
I recently started a bullet journal—to organise myself mainly, but I also know it can be helpful for mental health. I have also begun a journaling class, which is different from a bullet journal, and not a day-to-day account either. I will shortly be publishing a full post on therapeutic writing.
I plan to keep looking for resources and add them to this blog, either in a post or in my Links page, which will become a group of pages for different categories.
Sources
- Paraphrased from talk on fear and anxiety at Alight Women’s Conference 2020
- Mental Health Foundation
- From a talk featured in St Peter’s Brighton Sunday Check-In—I’m afraid I can’t find the video now