Overwhelmed with unexplained anxiety

The other day, I became overwhelmed with unexplained anxiety. “Where could it be coming from?” I thought. “I’m not worried about anything specific. There’s no imminent threat or other reason for the “fight or flight” reflex. What could be causing this?” I thought. Soon I remembered one of my earliest lessons: the “fight or flight” response does not occur without reason. There must be some form of trigger to this anxiety. What’s the only trigger I had ever experienced that had ever been able to completely hide its face? Cognitive distortions. As soon as I began paying attention I noticed, “should” statements, magnifications, and “black-and-white” thinking flying left and right. Somehow I had come to think that I had moved passed cognitive distortions. I stopped noticing them, and so just figured I had become so adept at correcting for them that it was almost automatic. How wrong I was. Distortions have always proved a hidden saboteur on the mission to managing anxiety.

At my first appointment with Dr. Jenny Yip, she handed me a list of the ten cognitive distortions. She asked me to look over the list and tell her which of them might apply to me. As I read them I felt like I was reading through a bad melodrama (“You’re so stupid, stupid, stupid!”) Clearly, none of these could apply to me; an intelligent and rational individual, or so I thought. As time went on, I slowly began to admit to one and then the next until I found myself committing them all. I was simply not noticing them and sometimes intentionally avoiding them because I felt ashamed of such blatant errors in judgment. The reality is that cognitive distortions are a part of our everyday thought process. This is something we must accept, and once we do, we are more capable of remaining mindful of them. Keeping an “automatic thought record” helps a great deal. In fact, after my recent experience, I just began keeping one again after not doing it for months. Managing an anxiety disorder is a lifelong process. If I find myself more edgy or overwhelmed than I am used to, perhaps it is time to reevaluate my present position and review and reuse the tools that I have learned along my journey.

Managing an anxiety disorder is a lifelong process.
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