How do you deal with anxiety?

[artyboy]

Is driving a major source of your anxiety? For me it is mostly social anxiety and worrying about things (that I cannot control). In 2014 I was into some things like smoking cigarettes, pot and was also working a stressful job. I also like coffee.... Well to shorten the story I had a panic attack start up on the way back on a long drive, which got much worse when I got home. So bad that I at the time thought I was having a heart attack and ended up in the ER where they found absolutely nothing wrong with me. So that leads me to this...well first I'd like to hear more about your anxiety if you would like to share that but here's what I went through and how I (try) to deal with mine.

One for those who don't have anxiety problem I will point out that it isn't just a matter of feeling worried all the time. There's a long long list of things that anxiety can effect...basically the entire body.

So after my panic attack deal and thousands in medical bills (I didn't have insurance at the time) the doctors had me try several medications which led to nasty side effects that I didn't like. One of the medications made me vomit and diarrhea...pretty sure that was serotonin syndrome or whatever the case was...wasn't about to continue taking it, even after the nurse at the doctor's office claimed I had another panic attack (horse shit). So I tried Zoloft for a while, didn't have serious side effects but I basically became next to emotionless... I wasn't sad, but I wasn't happy...I didn't have anxiety, hooray right? Well it basically turned me into a zombie, I didn't like what it was doing to me as a person.

So I stopped medications, had enough of it and figured the only way that would work if anything at all was to see a therapist and at the time I only had a $5 copay because I didn't have insurance at the time. Results will vary just as they do with medications, but I found it to be helpful. I also found Dale Carnegie's books to be helpful as well.

Here's ultimate what seemed to work for me. It was actively thinking about how I thought about things and how they made me feel. In other words I would have to pay close attention to what I thought and how I thought about things that would make me worry about something or stress over things.

Now driving is kind of a catch 22 because you don't exactly want to have aroma therapy candles going and get too relaxed....




Forgive me for my stupid sense of humor...

Anyway, dealing with anxiety is different for everyone as the root causes are always different. I'm not dumping on medications entirely, they do have their purpose and some people inevitably need them but I feel for most of us we should look at them like stepping stones and should be on them but for limited amount of time.

Driving at night time is what I meant. I find it calmes me. Apart from pasting speed cameras lol. God I worry for days after passing one of those things.

I won't take meds if I can help it. In the UK the NHS doesn't like giving meds out. So they usually do cognitive therapy.

My purpose for this thread was to see what different methods do people use to help combat anxiety.