Anxiety disorders occur when someone worries constantly, is fearful of everyday events, has physical symptoms such as a racing heart and nausea, is irritable and has difficulty concentrating. There are different anxiety disorders, such post-traumatic stress disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder, that have different symptoms and forms of treatment. These anxiety disorders are usually treated with a combination of therapy and medication.
Thoughts and Behaviors
Cognitive-behavior therapists help clients focus on their thoughts and help those clients see how their thoughts often lead to their emotions and behaviors. For instance, a person who has panic attacks before public speaking may think that the audience will laugh at her or that she'll make a fool out of herself. These thoughts will lead to anxious feelings and then to the actual panic attack. Therapists help clients learn how to challenge their negative thoughts and replace those negative, irrational thoughts with realistic ones, which will ultimately help them reduce their feelings of anxiety and symptoms of their disorders.
Exposure Therapy
For specific phobias and obsessive-compulsive behavior, exposure therapy uses techniques to expose the client to the objects or situations that they fear the most in a safe environment. Therapists will teach clients how to use relaxation techniques when they're presented with an anxiety-provoking situation and then expose clients to those situations. For example, a client who's working with a therapist to deal with her fear of germs and dirt might learn how to relax when she's unable to wash her hands after touching a public doorknob or after being outside. Slowly the therapist would expose the client to dirt and help her continue to relax during the process. Exposure therapy is utilized to help clients live more normal lives. Some people with specific phobias are greatly impacted. For instance, someone who's afraid of heights might turn down a job interview, because it's on the fifth floor of a building. Being able to handle these situations makes completing daily tasks easier.
Grounding Techniques
Therapists usually teach grounding techniques to clients with anxiety disorders, especially if they have post-traumatic stress disorder. People with post-traumatic stress disorder have flashbacks in which they feel as if they're back at the time of the trauma, and grounding techniques help a person get past those flashbacks. An example of a grounding technique is to count something, such as the tiles on the ceiling or the number of people in a room. Another grounding technique is focusing on a muscle, such as a calf muscle, and squeezing and releasing that muscle over and over. These techniques bring the person back to the present moment.
