Your Thyroid & Anxiety
My thyroid has been causing me grief since I was a child, when my neck first starting looking puffy—like I had been stung by bees on both sides. My swollen glands protruded so much that doctors used to stop my
How to Help Someone with Anxiety: A Letter to Family & Friends
Last week, we asked the Anxiety Sisterhood what you want your friends and family to know about your life with anxiety, and you told us quite a lot. We tried to put it all together in letter form so you
Anxiety Management Technique: Acceptance
This week, a few members of our community really struggled with believing their anxiety diagnoses. Mags and I understood exactly how they were feeling—we've both been there, done that, and literally wrote the book on it. In fact, most of
Eating My Anxiety
Eating plays a big role in how I cope with anxiety. I don't mean that I reach for quinoa, blueberries, and almonds whenever I feel anxious (how I wish). I mean that when I am anxious, I reach for food
The Anxiety Loop
What brings on your panic attacks? For many of us, ironically, a common cause of our anxiety attacks is
Phobias vs. Fears: An Important Distinction
The only thing worse than my flying phobia was listening to everyone explain how flying is statistically safer than driving. During my most phobic years, I always wanted to turn to these good Samaritans and say, “Listen, you idiot, I
Anxiety Relief Technique: Grounding
Anxiety can do a lot of damage when it shows up, but, for me, the worst is how disorienting the experience can be: it literally turns my world upside down so that I have no idea how to “right myself.”
Floating: A Common Anxiety Symptom
Many of us in the sisterhood have described the sensation, during moments of intense anxiety, of watching ourselves as if we were not in our own bodies. Not that I don’t often dream of being in someone else’s body (preferably
Shrinking World Syndrome
On my way to my friend Wendy’s wedding, I had the mother of all anxiety attacks: dizziness accompanied by severe nausea. The decision to pull over and curl into a ball until the episode passed was hardly a choice; needless
Whatever Doesn’t Kill Me…
I am definitely very suspicious of people who see life lessons in every terrible thing that happens to them. So, when people would suggest that my anxiety attacks could be a learning experience, I couldn’t see it. The only thing